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Conflict creates camp conundrum
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Kevin Gorman
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, May 7, 2006
When it came time to choose a football camp to increase exposure, Jeff Stewart's allegiances weren't with a particular shoe company. The Bethel Park quarterback was focused on making an impression on Pitt quarterbacks coach Matt Cavanaugh, so he attended the adidas Elite camp Saturday at the UPMC Sports Performance Complex.
"I'm really looking at Pitt, and I knew Coach Cavanaugh would be here," said Stewart, a 6-foot-3, 190-pound junior who passed for 1,311 yards last season. "I wanted to go through some drills in front of him."
Choosing a football camp wasn't so simple for every college prospect this weekend. Because of a scheduling conflict that pitted the adidas Elite camp against the Nike Training Camp at State College, Western Pennsylvania players had to choose their affiliations: Pitt and adidas. Or Penn State and Nike.
"Obviously, there's only so many weekends, and we scheduled this camp two months before any other camp dates were announced," said Greer Monterastelli of Recruits Unlimited, a Lincoln, Neb.-based company which runs the adidas camps. "Pitt didn't want us to use this facility on (NFL) draft day, and the Steelers are having minicamp here next weekend." Keystone Oaks defensive lineman Myles Caragein got a taste of both camps by traveling to Ohio State on Friday for a Nike camp and attending the adidas camp yesterday, where he was one of its standouts.
"This was a good camp, but at Nike there's a lot more college coaches there," said Caragein, who already has 10 scholarship offers. "I think it gives me a chance to compete against kids who are highly recruited and perform in front of college coaches."
The camps are as different as their logos. The Nike camps attract as many as 500 prospects and dozens of colleges, a scenario that makes it difficult for a borderline Division I prospect to create an impression. By contrast, the adidas camp drew 300 prospects and only a half-dozen colleges.
Gateway coach Terry Smith worked as a counselor at the adidas Elite camp, but sent the Gators' top three prospects - receiver Jon Ditto, cornerback Cameron Saddler and linebacker Shayne Hale - to Penn State. Other Gateway prospects attended the adidas camp.
"They got more exposure," Smith said. "Plus, the kids got a lot of reps in one-and-ones here."
That benefited players like Woodland Hills junior Devan Johnson, one of the top linebackers at the adidas camp. Johnson played tight end exclusively last season, so it was the first chance for college coaches to see him in defensive drills.
"There was great competition here," Johnson said. "I wish there was more coaches here. I saw about four or five schools."
Coaches from Akron, Buffalo, Pitt, Rutgers, Stanford and Tennessee - all adidas-sponsored schools - were in attendance. Pitt coach Dave Wannstedt made the rounds during the camp, as did most of his staff.
One of the chief complaints about the adidas camp was its laser timing at the start and finish of the 40-yard dash. Nike, by comparison, uses a laser start, but a hand-held device to time the finish. As a result, some players were timed several tenths of a second higher than they anticipated.
"It's a touch of reality for the kids," Monterastelli said. "There's been a lot of studies done that show a difference of .24 seconds in human reaction time. We take the complete human error element out of it."
The testing is only beginning, as May is the evaluation period for NCAA coaches. Nike has upcoming camps at Rutgers, Stanford, Florida, Clemson and Oregon, while adidas will have camps at UCLA and North Carolina State. The UPMC complex will play host to Joe Butler's Metro Index camp over the next weeks.
"That's the nature of the beast," Monterastelli said. "Kids have so many opportunities that you can do some camp somewhere until the first of June. There will be a lot of kids who will be camped-out."
Kevin Gorman can be reached at [email protected] or (412) 320-7812.
