THE ETERNAL STRUGGLE FOR CONTROL OF THE NARRATIVE, CONTROL OF PLAYERS, AND CONTROL OF BRAGGING RIGHTS
Certain local football coaches and administration aren't super happy about this development, and we'll get to their reaction in a second. and they aren't alone, of course. Nick Saban is pissed, as are most of the ACC's coaches, for example. There are a lot of complaints about the timing of the early signing period (too close to Christmas), there are concerns that it locks players into a choice that they may not still want to make by February (what if a coach leaves?), and that maybe kids won't want to play in their high school playoff games if they've already committed to a college (see: McCaffrey, Christian). A lot of the complaints are couched in concerns for the student-athlete while not acknowledging that changing the binding nature of intent letters would effectively negate arguments against allowing players to sign them whenever they want.
But because all of these complaints are seen through the prism of how much control coaches can exert on the recruiting process instead of the recruits themselves, none of them strike me as genuine, except maybe Urban Meyer's take on it:
You make too many mistakes in recruiting [and] someone else is probably standing up here [at the podium] ... Bodies change and the game of football [does, too]. I want as much time [as possible]. I want to watch them play their senior year.
Hell yeah you do, and you want to flip them in January once you've had time to look at the tape of a kid who just got fifty offers over the course of a week after being initially rated as a three star prospect.
And that's fine! Ohio State fans revel in the idea that Meyer is a shark who takes no prisoners and lives his life at the pinnacle of the Glengarry Glen Ross summit, and flipping recruits is the functional equivalent of flipping the bird to the rest of the country every winter. But in terms of achievement, that's exactly what it is: a super badass victory lap that rubs Ohio State's success in the face of the rest of the country. To pretend that the reasons coaches and athletic department heads have for opposing the early signing period are anything but self-concerned is disingenuous.
Entire article:
http://www.elevenwarriors.com/colle...rol-of-players-and-control-of-bragging-rights