KISSIMMEE -- Larry Coker could set his watch by the question. Miami's coach will attend a booster event this spring, local media arrive, and the topic pops up.
Willie Williams.
If by some chance the name escapes you, don't worry. The actual person really can't go anywhere, at least as long as his electronic ankle bracelet keeps functioning.
The Miami recruit is currently under house arrest, awaiting a probation-violation hearing June 30. Williams may not have made the FBI's Ten Most Wanted, but he was ranked the No. 2 high school football player in America last season.
He particularly enjoyed his recruiting visit to Florida, at least until the police showed up. Williams allegedly set off some fire extinguishers, got into a fight at a nightclub and came on to a coed against her will. That prompted the parole-violation charge, and we soon discovered Williams had been arrested 10 times as a juvenile.
He quickly became the face of NCAA recruiting reform, along with Colorado Coach Gary Barnett. Besides a delicious training table, that program allegedly utilized sex and booze as prime recruiting tools. As coincidence would have it, an independent commission issued its report this past week.
It blistered just about every supposed leader on campus. Boulder, Colo., has become synonymous with Sodom and Gomorrah. The main difference was that Gomorrah's coaches weren't under any great pressure to win the Big 12 title.
That's not fair, since the vast majority of Colorado players aren't out-of-control boozers, much less rapists. Just as very few Miami players have to wear electronic ankle bracelets. Just as most college football players don't do anything to embarrass their schools.
It doesn't matter. In this high-profile game, the ones who do set the perceptions. That's why Coker knew the inevitable questions about Williams were coming Friday afternoon at the Hurricane Club spring golf tour. And he knew what to say about bringing a guy such as that to Coral Gables.
"I'm not trying to convince anybody," Coker said. "I'm trying to convince myself, and Willie has done that. He has good test scores and grades.
"Has he done some things wrong? Sure, there have been problems. But there were 117 schools that would have given Willie Williams a chance to be a part of their university."
No doubt, every other Division I-A school would have signed Williams and dealt with the consequences as they came. When it came to character issues, they would have echoed Coker.
Miami talked to counselors, coaches and administrators. It saw Williams' test scores and noted he was mentoring students. There were more than enough positives to overcome the whispers.
But shouldn't 10 arrests have said something? Even if they were mostly petty offenses?
There were legal privacy issues involved, but come on. After, say, the sixth or seventh trip to the juvenile detention facility, some coach somewhere had to know. And recruiters could have picked up on it, if they'd really wanted to know.
It doesn't enhance the image of an institute of higher learning, but that's the price a school must pay for big-time success. The best players often aren't the best people, so you make allowances and justify as best you can.
Williams' scholarship is on hold, though don't be shocked if he reports for fall practice. Schools believe the only way they can get a name, cultivate alumni and open the donation spigot is through a high-profile football team (see: UCF).
They're right, of course. There aren't many Web sites or 1-900 numbers or recruiting gurus dedicated to tracking where national merit scholars are going to college.
Coker is an excellent coach, and the kind of man you'd trust to look after your son. And Williams may just need some structure and maturity to straighten himself out. If so, he wouldn't be the first supposedly lost cause who one day got a college diploma.
At least the judge thought enough to allow him to leave his house this weekend to attend his senior prom. His high school coach had to drive him and kept an eye on the fire extinguishers.
Williams may make Miami proud one day, and not just because he had 18 tackles against FSU. But for now, the questions will come like clockwork.
"With the right program and right structure, he'll be fine," Coker said.
Could be. But it shows how warped the system has become when a school official has to go around convincing people that anyone with 10 arrests belongs on any college campus.
And what's really sad is there are 116 other coaches who'd love to be in Coker's place.
I'm gonna have to agree with Soldier on this one.
