I once wrote about how our emotions tend to trick us. Or maybe it's the other way around. It's a tough sell and makes us feel uneasy, but we try to feel sentiments that apply to a given scenario.
I think about the Barenaked Ladies and their hit song "One Week": "I'm the kind of guy who laughs at a funeral. Can't understand what I mean? Well, you soon will."
I'm not quite sure what that means. I've never laughed at a funeral, but it's very provocative. I've discussed how weird the feelings are when someone we love passes. You never know quite what to say to anyone, or how to hold your arms, or what face to present. All our emotions tell us is that we should feel melancholy in some way.
This may be far-fetched, but follow me here: it's a lot like recruiting in big-time college football. We shouldn't care, but we do. I guess it's the inverse of the funeral situation, but it's case-in-point in the way our emotions toy with us.
Why should we care about the plans of an 18- or 17-year-old kid for the next four years of his life? Is it really necessary to pay money to a Web site so that we can post "Terrelle Pryor is a Buckeye!"?
No, it's not, but many do. This is why recruiting insiders, like Scouts Inc. and Rivals.com, make millions of dollars off our obsession with who will lead our beloved teams the next few seasons. We shouldn't care, but we do.
The obsession with Terrelle Pryor, "the next Vince Young," has become a three-ringed circus with no finale of trapeze artists and talking elephants in sight.
Eighth graders are ranked now . . . eighth graders!
Since he graduated junior high and left for Jeanette High School in Pennsylvania, Terrelle Pryor has had a microscope on him that would make even Chris Hanson cringe. (Have a seat, recruiting insider . . . right here.)
Have I immersed myself in the stupid hoopla that envelops this kid? Yes. Am I proud of it? No. But I know where to draw the line and I already have.
Terrell Owens (coincidence on the first name? I think not) is trying to patent his phrase "I love me some me!" But, I think it's on hold, as the buffoons surrounding Pryor make his head swell larger than Paris Hilton's.
As I reported on National Signing Day for six straight hours on Wednesday, I began to wonder what my life had become.
Was I that guy who talks about how good he was back when he played (yes, I used to be able to throw a pigskin a quarter-mile)? No, because, well, I wasn't very good. Am I trying to vicariously live through another human being? No. But something just isn't right with all of this.
College football is a monster that gives ESPN billions of dollars in revenue every year. There's a reason the family of networks in the worldwide leader in sports telecasted over 400 live games in 12 weeks. Instead of being pleased with right now, we want to know what's next. We don't want to live for today and enjoy it--we want to keep progressing and get the upper-hand on everyone two days in advance.
That's the nature of media. It's not the story that happened today, it's the one that's going to break tomorrow. This is the brainchild and culprit of our obsession with high-level collegiate football.
We don't want to celebrate a Buckeye team that over-achieved and made the national title game--we want to know when our next glass football is going in the Woody Hayes Athletic Center.
I cash a paycheck that stems from knowing the ins and outs of recruiting. If you're going to do something, you may as well do it right. Do I love it? It's fun but not fulfilling.
I spend many hours a week finding out what Terrelle Pryor's next move is, or when the top linebacker in Jim Tressel's latest recruiting class is enrolling. Remember the name Etienne Sabino--you heard it here first--he's the next great Ohio State linebacker.
I'm not ashamed of what I do, nor should you be ashamed of your love for it. It's the society we live in: Don't tell me what happened, tell me what is about to happen. I thrive off of that notion. There is no embarrassment or looking back in shame at your fixation with the Ohio State recruiting class of 2008.
Since I've got your attention: remember that name Etienne Sabino and remember others like Mike Adams (remember Orlando Pace?), Lamaar Thomas (Percy Harvin, look out) and Orhian Johnson (another Troy Smith), because these are the guys that will be leading the scarlet and gray for the next few years. Enjoy it.
The class of 2009? It looks just as promising, believe me.
Sorry, I don't do eighth grade rankings. That's all you get.
