Now that college football’s national letter of intent day is out of the way, we’re sifting through the rubble.
Those prone to do so are ranking recruiting classes.
The art of intuitive judgment, based on football knowledge, isn’t nearly as important in those rankings as it should be.
More often, it’s based on number crunching, reading and information gathering, and even accepting the word of high school coaches and other third parties as if they don’t have any axes grinding.
The dot-com backlash has set it, in part because of the financial success and popularity of the sites, plus the realization that, well, maybe we shouldn’t have been quoting these services for years as if they could provide the infallible and definitive judgments on players and recruiting classes.
They’re more hobbyists than experts, but to their credit, they’ve found a way to get us to buy into it — literally and figuratively.
If it worked for Mel Kiper Jr., an outsider who became a respected and influential part of the football game, especially as NFL scouting became more number crunching and information gathering than football knowledge, it could work for them on the college level.
So the ratings are best used as conversation pieces.
That’s all.
But why did it take so many so long to figure that out?
I’m just as amused by the post-signing rhetoric.
Today, I’m here to translate.
He really means: “You want me to beat those guys from the Southeastern Conference? It might help if I got as much help from the registrar’s office and the faculty as they do! Half the guys who signed with SEC programs couldn’t even get into school here and we ain’t exactly Harvard!”
The sports information director often forgot to add: “When none of them ultimately offered him a scholarship, he settled for us.”
Unfortunately, in 2008, he really means: “I mostly liked the uniforms” and he isn’t talking about Penn State, Notre Dame or Michigan.
And the race to get the most jersey, pants, and helmet combinations, and the uglier the better, picks up steam.
He really means: “Now do you understand why we only had two of our assistant coaches at a lot of our practices the last two seasons? And why it sometimes looked on Saturdays like they hadn’t even seen the game plan?”
When a coach says: “Two-star, five-star, who cares?”
He really means: “Ask those dot-com dweebs what a zone blitz is, how good the tackle’s drop step is, how they’re truly qualified to make judgments, or if they’ve actually seen somebody play for something other than a few snippets of tape or maybe an all-star game. And then tell me I should care what their ratings are! But uh well yeah we kinda look at ’em, too. And it can’t hurt.”
He often means: “If he doesn’t get any better, we can just run him off.” Or: “His younger brother already is a stud.” Or: “Geez, somebody’s got to be on the scout team.”
He’s really thinking: “I hope I still have a job in 2009.”
He neglects to point out that he was crossing his fingers and hoping that he would triple his salary and move to another school or the NFL before his “son” is a junior.
Terry Frei: 303-954-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com
