8:00 PM CSN Baltimore has video of Marcus Smith, a U.S. soldier who dressed as a minor league umpire to surprise his children at a Bowie Baysox game with a home visit from Afghanistan.
7:45 PM A Japanese Harley-Davidson motorcycle that was swept out to sea during last year's tsunami washed up on a shore in British Columbia last month. The bike's owner asked that the motorcycle be displayed at the Harley-Davidson Museum in Milwaukee as a memorial to the tsunami victims.
7:30 PM Buffalo Bills receiver David Clowneytweeted the results of his HIV test which came back negative. And to the critics of his decision to share his results, Clowney added: "Some people are Ridiculously stupid ... And can't see the bigger picture about things that are important in this world."
One of the more unexpected picks during the NFL Draft last week was the Minnesota Vikings taking oft-injured Florida State quarterback Christian Ponder with the 12th overall selection.
When later asked why the Vikings selected Ponder, Minnesota Head Coach Leslie Frazier said:
As we know from past, colossal NFL Draft busts, any choice substantially based on a prospect’s “character” is a risk. Especially in the upper-half of the first round.
So how then did the Vikings come to the conclusion that Ponder’s character made him worthy of a 12th overall draft choice?
Without being around former Seminole QB Ponder consistently for any significant length of time, Frazier confirmed to Mike Florio Tuesday on PFT LIVE that the Vikings relied on a Florida State coaching staffed headed by coach Jimbo Fisher.
“When we went down to visit with him, Mike, and just sit down and talk with him and watch him work out, I was really impressed with his poise and leadership qualities that some of the (Florida State) coaches talked to us about and seeing how he handles himself.
“I think there’s some intangibles at that position that you have to have if you’re going to be a NFL successful quarterback.
“The mental toughness has to be there and I think you need to be a relatively bright guy who can understand concepts and be able to lead and he displayed those qualities.
“I said (at the time) if we get a chance this guy could really be who we’re looking for. Fortunately for us the opportunity came and we jumped on it.”
So with the Vikings subsequently drafting Ponder it should come as no surprise that Fisher, who has the same agent as Ponder in Jimmy Sexton, echoed Frazier’s sentiment when it came to a quarterback evaluation.
“He’s always in the film room studying. He’s highly intelligent. He checked every protection for us. He had the ability on every pass to check off and throw to all our guys. He’s a lot more athletic than people think.
On March 3, Charles Robinson of Yahoo Sports broke the news that NCAA officials were investigating a $25,000 payment made in 2010 by the University of Oregon to a Houston man, Will Lyles, for providing recruiting services for the school’s football program.
After Robinson’s report, Ken Goe of the PORTLAND OREGONIAN reported, “Lyles has a mentoring relationship with Oregon running back Lache Seastrunk.” (From 2009-2010, Seastrunk was a heavily recruited high school football prospect from Texas.)
11 days after Robinson’s initial report, Thayer Evans of FOXSports.com reported that LSU had paid Lyles $6,000 in 2010 for providing recruiting services for the school’s football program.
After noting that Lyles had told him he made $36,000 in 2010, Whitlock asked Lyles:
“You got a check for $25,000 from Oregon, where was the other $11,000?”
Lyles:
“The other $11,000 was $6,000 from LSU and the other $5,000 was from Cal-Berkeley.”
On Feb. 26, 2009, Greg Biggins of ESPN.com reported that then-Texas high school football prospect Lache Seastrunk took a recruiting visit to Cal the last week of February.
In the same piece about Cal’s “Junior Day” recruiting event, Biggins noted of then-Louisiana High School recruit Trovon Reed:
Trovon Reed (Thibodaux, La.) was expected to be on hand but won’t be able to make it. Reed is one of the elite receivers in the South and is holding offers from schools like Texas, Georgia, Ole Miss and Arkansas.
“I couldn’t get out there but I’m going to try and make it for their next Junior Day,” Reed said. “I like Cal and I liked how they used Desean Jackson. They want to use me in a similar way so I’m definitely interested in checking them out.
On April 1 I reported of Reed’s close association with Lyles and Seastrunk. Excerpt from that report:
On Feb. 16 I broke the news that NCAA officials had recently visited Thibodaux, Louisiana, to investigate the recruitment of a current Auburn football player, Trovon Reed, and a recent football signee to the school, Greg Robinson.
At the heart of that NCAA investigation was Thibodaux resident Sean Nelson. Nelson, who is an associate of Reed and Robinson, has been characterized as a street agent who exerted possible undue influence on the two recruits in their decision to choose Auburn. Nelson is also a known associate of the NCAA’s current public enemy #1, Will Lyles. Lyles’ one-man recruiting service was recently paid $25,000 by the University of Oregon for recruiting videos that the school has yet to produce to the public.
Oregon has, to this day, not produced any materials to the public that it received from Lyles for his recruiting services.
Speaking of Cal, on March 13, Thayer Evans reported on the relationship between Lyles and Houston-area high school football prospect Trevon Randle:
Randle said Lyles talked to him a lot about California and Miami. He said Lyles didn’t have to talk to him much about Oregon, because “I told him about Oregon.” But Randle said Lyles knew Ducks coach Chip Kelly well.
Just over a month after meeting Lyles, Randle committed to LSU at a Tigers junior day. Randle said he consulted with his parents before choosing LSU, but said his father is “pretty tight” with Lyles.
Having committed to LSU, Randle said he later spent time with Lyles while attending LSU summer camps. He said Lyles was particularly close with (LSU Assistant Coach Brick) Haley, who recruited him for the Tigers.
It was Haley who cut the $6,000 check to Lyles on behalf of LSU.
Despite that transaction, and LSU commit Randle saying Haley was “particularly close” with Lyles, Haley denied even knowing Lyles in the same FOXSports.com story:
A week later, (Trevon Randle’s Clear Springs (TX) High School Football Coach Clint) Hartman crossed paths with Lyles again. This time he was with LSU defensive line coach Brick Haley, who had come to see Randle. When Lyles tried to walk onto the field, Hartman told him to return to the parking lot.
Hartman later called Haley and told him that Lyles was never to return to Clear Springs High.
“I didn’t know the guy, Coach,” Hartman recalled Haley saying of Lyles. “He showed up and said he was helping the last guy here for LSU.”
Hartman knew that wasn’t true. After all, LSU had never previously recruited at Clear Springs High.
“I want to call them characters in the nicest possible way that we’ve been seeing this offseason on the fringes of recruiting. How do you and your staff address those types of situations?”
“Obviously everyone uses recruiting services but that’s just to gather data and not depend on what they have to say or what their opinions are or anything like that. It’s really solely collection the information that you need on where the prospects are so you can have a pretty good idea on where to go recruit.
“But as far as people being involved, we haven’t really run into that. We’re really just focused on what important to the kid and go through the school and his coaches.
” … You do have to keep your head on a swivel and you have to know what’s going on out there because you don’t want to bury your head in the sand but on the other hand you really need to keep everything close to us and try to communicate as much as you can just with the recruits, the student-athletes and their families to make sure the lines of communication are open and everyone is on the same page.”
The year before Cal and Tedford paid $5,000 to Lyles for his recruiting services - and three weeks before Lyles associate Lache Seastrunk made a recruiting visit to the Cal-Berkeley campus - Tedford said the following at Cal’s 2009 signing day press conference:
“It’s a little unsettling because sometimes they go underground and you can’t get hold of them. You don’t know what’s happening, so you just continue to try. With not being able to text now, now you just have to call and you get an answering machine. So you’re really at their mercy. It’s a helpless feeling when you don’t know the information. You can’t counterpoint something you don’t know about, so that’s some of it. But it’s so competitive. No one’s going to give up. Everybody is going to always continue to battle right down to the end. Obviously, the people we are recruiting against are very good programs and very competitive that way.”
Is it unreasonable to think that at least part of the reason Tedford’s Cal paid Lyles $5,000 was to ensure a unique level of access to Seastrunk and other Texas recruits associated with Lyles?
That isn’t to say that Tedford was directly involved in the recruitment of Seastrunk. That duty fell to Cal football recruiting coordinator Kenwick Thompson, who shares a hometown with Lyles: Houston.
There’s nothing wrong with Lyles tipping off schools to talent in his area. Nor is there his taking money for such services, regardless the amount. (Because the NCAA does not stipulate a limit.)
Though Lyles’ “Compete Scouting Services” does not come close to fulfilling the NCAA’s official definition of what constitutes a legitimate recruiting service, the NCAA rules regarding such activity are so vague that until the NCAA gets serious about governing them, it’s hard to hold even Lyles to any sort of NCAA-borne standard.
During the same interview last week in which he confirmed receiving a $5,000 payment from Cal and a $6,000 payment from LSU, Lyles was asked by FOXSports.com columnist Whitlock:
On Feb. 16 I broke the news that NCAA officials had recently visited Thibodaux, Louisiana, to investigate the recruitment of a current Auburn football player, Trovon Reed, and a recent football signee to the school, Greg Robinson.
At the heart of that NCAA investigation was Thibodaux resident Sean Nelson. Nelson, who is an associate of Reed and Robinson, has been characterized as a street agent who exerted possible undue influence on the two recruits in their decision to choose Auburn. Nelson is also a known associate of the NCAA’s current public enemy #1, Will Lyles. Lyles’ one-man “recruiting service” was recently paid $25,000 by the University of Oregon for recruiting videos that the school has yet to produce to the public.
LSU also recently admitted it paid Lyles $6,500 last December with the school having since confirmed it will discontinue its relationship with him.
Like Nelson, Lyles has been characterized as a street agent who may have contributed to Texas high school football recruit Lache Seastrunk choosing Oregon. Wednesday ESPN reported that Lyles has also now been accused by current Tulsa assistant football coach Van Malone of soliciting $80,000 in 2007 for the football services of then-Florida high school recruit Patrick Peterson when Malone was an assistant coach at Texas A&M.
Since the initial allegations about Lyles broke regarding the exorbitant payment from Oregon to a single-person business entity created just months before coach Chip Kelly cut the check, Lyles has effectively gone into hiding from the media.
Nelson though is a different story, as I found out today.
Even after the national notoriety now heaped on Lyles, which has placed the Oregon and LSU football programs in possible NCAA jeopardy, Nelson continues to display the above photo of himself, Lyles and Seastrunk on his Facebook page. (In 2009 Reed and Seastrunk together paid multiple visits to various prospective schools, including Auburn, with Lyles and Nelson in tow.)
Somehow worse though is the party promo flyer posted on Nelson’s same Facebook page - as his profile photo no less - for an April 8 shindig at a Thibodaux establishment. The advertisement touts the soiree as a “pre-prom party for Greg Robinson,Cartel Murray, Josh Johnson, Raheem Richard & Jarranisha Allen.”
Robinson is the recent Auburn signee who was interviewed a little over a month ago by the NCAA about his recruitment to Auburn and his relationship with Nelson. Murray, Johnson and Richard are former teammates of Robinson and Reed at Thiboudaux high school with all considered legitimate college football prospects.
Underneath the party flyer posted on his Facebook page, Nelson wrote this note to current Thibodaux high school football player A.J. Bolden after Bolden lamented that he wouldn’t be part of the festivities:
no doubt u is part of it. when i was tryna get in touch wit u i had ur old number. finally i got ur number from neak but flyer was made. kampus smakk and dee daw performing and not on flyer. is gon be crazy
Sounds a lot like Nelson is throwing the party himself, no? Read more…
Today I was sent a statement written by Thibodaux High School football coach Dennis Lorio - which through an NCAA official I have confirmed was indeed authored by Lorio.
Lorio was one of four individuals who I reported Wednesday were interviewed in Thibodaux, Louisiana, on Monday by NCAA investigators about Auburn’s football recruiting tactics.
Here is the completely unedited statement from Lorio:
There have some questions lately about events of the recent year. I would like to clarify what facts I am aware of. Sometimes media members take information and try to paint a picture which may or may not be accurate. They only provide the information they want the reader to see. The points I believe were most crucial are below.Read more…
According to SPORTS ILLUSTRATED and 247Sports.com, Alabama linebackers coach Sal Sunseri is college football’s “2011 Recruiter of the Year.”
(SI & 24/7: The best recruiting pitch college football has to offer)
In response to his being bestowed such a prestigious honor on behalf of the University of Alabama, here’s Sunseri first comments as reported by 247Sports.com’s JC Shurbutt:
“This recognition should really go to our entire staff and to the University of Alabama. (Saban’s) philosophy is to provide an atmosphere for academic development, athletic development, character development and career development. When we are talking to recruits across the country, we talk about those four areas and show how that works at Alabama.
“We’ve had more Freshman Academic All-SEC honorees than anyone and more Academic All-Americans than anyone in the conference the last two years. Our graduation rate is always up near the top nationally.”
With Sunseri the best college football recruiting has to offer, I thought it might be instructive and fun to see him in action.
Here’s Sunseri giving his pitch to Lousiana high school defensive end prospect Jermauria Rasco: Read more…
“I am pleased to announce that Les Miles will remain the head coach at LSU. Les has led this program to many great successes on the field and his players represent LSU well off the field. We look forward to many great years of LSU football under his leadership.”
Miles is speaking at the AFCA Coaches Convention today in Dallas and will hold a press conference to discuss his decision in Baton Rouge upon his return to the Louisiana city.
Following LSU’s Cotton Bowl victory over Texas A&M in Dallas on Friday, Les Milescouldn’t have made more clear, at least under the circumstances, that he was seriously considering a move to the Univ. of Michigan.
The jet is personally owned by Richard H. Rogel, a wealthy “independent investor” and high-ranking official at the University of Michigan who in 2004 personally donated $22 millon to the school. Rogel is also the former president of the University of Michigan’s Alumni Association and served as Chair of a University of Michigan fundraising initiative that raised over $3 billion.
The plane, with the tail number N929SR, was also spotted in West Virginia last March as former Univ. of Michigan football coach Rich Rodriguez utilized the jet to visit family.
So why is it significant that Rogel’s private jet made a stopoff in Baton Rouge today?
