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scooter1369
HTTR Forever.
Oh yeah. I forgot about Buster "trunk Junk" Davis. What an asshat he his. He belongs in Tallhassle.
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2/1
Football mines Glenville gold
By: Tyson Wirth - The Daily Iowan
Glenville High School in Cleveland churns out Division-I football talent much like Ohio State produces football victories.
In fact, the two are closely related.
The Buckeyes' Troy Smith and Ted Ginn Jr., the dynamic quarterback-receiver duo who virtually won the Jan. 2 Fiesta Bowl by themselves, hail from Glenville. So does Robert Rose, arguably the nation's top defensive-end recruit this year.
But for all the talent that oozes from the school, Iowa has never corralled a commitment from a Tarblooder.
Until now.
Arvell Nelson, a Sharpie-skinny quarterback, and Derrick Smith, a little-hyped linebacker/safety, will sign their letters of intent to become Hawkeye football players today. Smith became, on Dec. 18, the first link in what he hopes evolves into a long Glenville-to-Iowa chain.
"I'm going to try to make a name for Glenville [in Iowa], to open up a new door for other players to come through," the 6-0, 178-pound Smith told The Daily Iowan.
The potential windfall of such a pipeline would be bountiful. Twenty-eight Tarblooders joined a Division-I program over the last five years, including 10 in this year's class. What makes those totals even more impressive is the school is rooted deep in the inner city of East Cleveland.
Glenville coach Ted Ginn Sr. says his players succeed at such a remarkable rate because of hard work, dedication, and discipline, noting that it\'s not uncommon for the squad to begin work at 6 a.m. and leave school at 6 p.m. He laughed when asked if anyone on the team had a part-time job.
"Football here is a total all-day, every-day, 24-7 job," said Ginn Sr., whose team outscored its opponents 566-95 last fall. "It's not recreation here; it's a business. In high school, you're starting a r?sum? for life."
To put that much emphasis on high-school football might irritate some people. But Smith said the intense work schedule is necessary when so many other distractions abound.
"Kids have the choice to either be on the streets or be in school," the high-school senior said. "Other schools don't have to go through that."
And so the Tarblooders focus on football, and the training pays off in the form of scholarship offers.
Usually, they accept instate offers - 61 percent of Division-I players from Glenville over the last five years stayed within Ohio's borders.
But enough other players, such as Nelson and Smith, leave the state to keep other universities calling. And for Iowa, the calls finally paid off.
"Arvell is an excellent QB," Ginn Sr. said. "I think he's one of the best QBs in the country. I think he was over-looked, and underrated, because people don't look at Glenville at QB.
"They come in to the city, they only look for skill guys: corners, receivers, and such. I think he's going to do great at Iowa."
The Hawkeyes sure hope so. But one thing they don't have to hope for, one thing that's almost ensured, is that Glenville will continue to be a Division-I prospect pipeline. And now Iowa knows how to tap it.
E-mail DI reporter Tyson Wirth at:
[email protected]
2/1
Football mines Glenville gold
By: Tyson Wirth - The Daily Iowan
Glenville High School in Cleveland churns out Division-I football talent much like Ohio State produces football victories.
In fact, the two are closely related.
The Buckeyes' Troy Smith and Ted Ginn Jr., the dynamic quarterback-receiver duo who virtually won the Jan. 2 Fiesta Bowl by themselves, hail from Glenville. So does Robert Rose, arguably the nation's top defensive-end recruit this year.
But for all the talent that oozes from the school, Iowa has never corralled a commitment from a Tarblooder.
Until now.
Arvell Nelson, a Sharpie-skinny quarterback, and Derrick Smith, a little-hyped linebacker/safety, will sign their letters of intent to become Hawkeye football players today. Smith became, on Dec. 18, the first link in what he hopes evolves into a long Glenville-to-Iowa chain.
"I'm going to try to make a name for Glenville [in Iowa], to open up a new door for other players to come through," the 6-0, 178-pound Smith told The Daily Iowan.
The potential windfall of such a pipeline would be bountiful. Twenty-eight Tarblooders joined a Division-I program over the last five years, including 10 in this year's class. What makes those totals even more impressive is the school is rooted deep in the inner city of East Cleveland.
Glenville coach Ted Ginn Sr. says his players succeed at such a remarkable rate because of hard work, dedication, and discipline, noting that it\'s not uncommon for the squad to begin work at 6 a.m. and leave school at 6 p.m. He laughed when asked if anyone on the team had a part-time job.
"Football here is a total all-day, every-day, 24-7 job," said Ginn Sr., whose team outscored its opponents 566-95 last fall. "It's not recreation here; it's a business. In high school, you're starting a r?sum? for life."
To put that much emphasis on high-school football might irritate some people. But Smith said the intense work schedule is necessary when so many other distractions abound.
"Kids have the choice to either be on the streets or be in school," the high-school senior said. "Other schools don't have to go through that."
And so the Tarblooders focus on football, and the training pays off in the form of scholarship offers.
Usually, they accept instate offers - 61 percent of Division-I players from Glenville over the last five years stayed within Ohio's borders.
But enough other players, such as Nelson and Smith, leave the state to keep other universities calling. And for Iowa, the calls finally paid off.
"Arvell is an excellent QB," Ginn Sr. said. "I think he's one of the best QBs in the country. I think he was over-looked, and underrated, because people don't look at Glenville at QB.
"They come in to the city, they only look for skill guys: corners, receivers, and such. I think he's going to do great at Iowa."
The Hawkeyes sure hope so. But one thing they don't have to hope for, one thing that's almost ensured, is that Glenville will continue to be a Division-I prospect pipeline. And now Iowa knows how to tap it.
E-mail DI reporter Tyson Wirth at:
[email protected]
Last edited by a moderator:
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stxbuck
Woody wore Sambas
"They come into the city, they only look for skill guys."
Uh....Bryant Browning and Robert Rose definitely aren't skill position players, a lot less than Arvell Nelson......just messin' w/ Coach Ginn
Actually another rival might be Miami-Northwestern to the Hurricanes. This was the first time in something like eight years that the Canes did not sign at least 1 kid from Northwestern (Trick Daddy's old school...)
Uh....Bryant Browning and Robert Rose definitely aren't skill position players, a lot less than Arvell Nelson......just messin' w/ Coach Ginn
Actually another rival might be Miami-Northwestern to the Hurricanes. This was the first time in something like eight years that the Canes did not sign at least 1 kid from Northwestern (Trick Daddy's old school...)
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BrutusBobcat
Icon and Entertainer
Maybe someone should ask LLLloyd if any big time QB prospects have ever come out of Glenville. 
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scott91575
Resident hater
Still wondering why Ginn Sr. talked about Glenville QB's as an unknown after Troy Smith's success.
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sehs95
Freshman
No one at Glenville is overlooked. Ginn is a promoter, so you have to take some of what he says with a grain of salt. He said Bryant Browning was the best offensive lineman in the country for Pete's sake. He's good, but he wasn't even the best OL in the county, let alone countRy.
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Patrick Bateman
Made Man
sehs95, i agree. I remember when Ginn Sr. made that comment and I was thinking huh? That being said, he is a promoter and is just trying to get his kids names out and hopefully get them to the best possible schools each player can go.
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G8erBait
Senior
Mainland has had tond of D1 studs. Over the last 2 years they have had a few guys go to Florida. Over the last 2 years they have also sent kids to Ga Tech, Indiana, Nebraska, Georgia and a few other schools that I don't remember. They were loaded last year.
Another school that produces great talent is Lakeland, Florida. They are LOADED this year. They have at least 6 BIG NAME players. I don't mean kids who are being recruited by Northwestern or Illinois, but kids that are being recruited by FSU, Florida, Miami, Notre Dame and Southern Cal. The most well-known player is Chris Rainey. However the BEST player is clearly John Brown. Folks, John Brown is one of the best players to EVER play in the state of Florida at any positon. He is going to be a STAR in college.
Another school that produces great talent is Lakeland, Florida. They are LOADED this year. They have at least 6 BIG NAME players. I don't mean kids who are being recruited by Northwestern or Illinois, but kids that are being recruited by FSU, Florida, Miami, Notre Dame and Southern Cal. The most well-known player is Chris Rainey. However the BEST player is clearly John Brown. Folks, John Brown is one of the best players to EVER play in the state of Florida at any positon. He is going to be a STAR in college.
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OhioState49
Hall of Fame
Ohio State has so many weapons from Cleveland Glenville!
Jamario O'Neal # 3
Ted Ginn Jr. # 7
Donte Witner # 9
Troy Smith # 10
Curtis Terry # 44
Next year
Robert Rose # 11
Ray Small # 13
Bryant Browning # 70
Who is the 1st guy from Glenville to Ohio State to play?
Jamario O'Neal # 3
Ted Ginn Jr. # 7
Donte Witner # 9
Troy Smith # 10
Curtis Terry # 44
Next year
Robert Rose # 11
Ray Small # 13
Bryant Browning # 70
Who is the 1st guy from Glenville to Ohio State to play?
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OSUBasketballJunkie
Never Forget 31-0
I believe it was Donte Whitner or maybe Troy. Just a guess.
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TheStoicPaisano
But I didn't, so it doesn't
Troy was the first on the team, but they made their debut in the same game--the 2003 season opener against Washington. Smith came in for one play in the 2Q and ran. He later had two runs from QB against Northwestern, and ran back some kicks during the Big 10 season. Didn't attempt a pass that year.
Donte played in every game as a true freshman.
Donte played in every game as a true freshman.
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Great stuff about Glenville today..
CPD
Glenville and OSU: A powerful pairing
No high school can match the impact of OSU's Glenville Seven
Thursday, August 24, 2006 Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
Rivals.com national recruiting analyst Jeremy Crabtree has an easy definition for the Glenville-Ohio State relationship.
"It's the pipeline of all pipelines," he said. "Every college talks about how they want to get in with a school and get a kid or two every few years. This is maybe the ultimate situation."
Two roads have yielded more players for this season, including the one from La Cueva High to the University of New Mexico, with eight players on the current roster part of that connection. But a high school 11 miles from New Mexico's stadium sending eight players - including two walk-ons - to a 6-5 Mountain West team doesn't carry the same weight of the seven Glenville players in Columbus. And Boise State's eight players from Bishop Kelly High in Boise includes five walk-ons.
"Sure there might be schools that have other connections," Crabtree said, "but they're not all major recruits."
There are other loyalties that run deep, like at Arkansas, where coach Houston Nutt has worked a hometown connection. He pulled seven players from his alma mater of Little Rock Central High to the Razorbacks, but one recently transferred, leaving that count at six.
Yet even the most prominent national football powers have trouble matching Glenville's current OSU influence. Glades Central High in Belle Glade, Fla., was a football factory in 2002, with seven grads in the NFL that year, more than any other high school in the country.
When future NFL players Reidel Anthony and Fred Taylor signed with Florida in 1994, it was part of a run of five players in four years for Glades Central and the Gators. '"We had a great relationship with the University of Florida and that coaching staff," said former coach Willie Bueno. "Fred and Reidel went and had such great success there, and then another kid goes and it just steamrolls from there."
Eight players in that 2002 senior class signed to play at Division I schools, but with the departure of coach Steve Spurrier, the Gators' influence waned. One player from that class went to Florida, but a player like receiver Santonio Holmes chose Ohio State without considering the Gators.
"It's a bit different in south Florida," Crabtree said. "A lot of those kids go to Florida State and then it swings to Miami and then to Florida. They lean toward the hot spot. They haven't been as consistent as Glenville."
Crabtree said there should be five Glenville players capable of signing with Big Ten schools this season, led by linebacker Jermale Hines. He also likes receiver Kyle Jefferson, defensive end Eric Thomas, recent transfer linebacker LeBron Daniel and cornerback Otis Merrill. It's a matter of the Buckeyes making their choices.
"It's widely known with the college coaches I've dealt with," Crabtree said, "that Ohio State gets about everybody they want."
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: [email protected], 216-999-4479
CPD
A productive pipeline
Thursday, August 24, 2006
The link between Glenville High and Ohio State has developed into the most important in college football. Here are some other notable pipelines between high schools and colleges.
8 players
New Mexico: Albuquerque (N.M.) La Cueva.
Boise State: Boise (Idaho) Bishop Kelly.
7 players
Ohio State: Glenville.
6 players
Arkansas: Little Rock (Ark.) Central.
Hawaii: 6 from both Kahuku (Hawaii) and Honolulu St. Louis.
Oregon State: Kahuku, Hawaii. 5 players
Alabama-Birmingham: Vestavia Hills (Ala.).
Ball State: Fort Wayne (Ind.) Snider.
Cincinnati: Cincinnati Elder.
Louisiana-Lafayette: 5 from both New Orleans Jesuit and Lafayette (La.).
Louisville: Louisville (Ky.) St. Xavier.
Memphis: Memphis (Tenn.) Christian Brothers.
Oregon: Concord (Calif.) De La Salle.
Penn State: State College (Pa.) Area.
UCLA: Bellflower (Calif.) St. John Bosco.
- Compiled by William Hall
CPD
Building the machine
Muny League players reach for the stars
Thursday, August 24, 2006 Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
One of the 400-plus players who plays for the Glenville Titans might be the next Troy Smith - and the next one may have met the real one.
The seven teams that are part of the Titans football program - five in the Cleveland Municipal Football League and two others playing Pop Warner Football - practice on a field next to the Glenville High football team.
So when former Tarblooders like Ted Ginn Jr. and Troy Smith stop by their old school, they also become real to the elementary and junior high kids who emulate them every day.
"Those guys come down whenever they're home, and they'll throw the ball around with the kids," said Andre Hicks, a coach with an 11-year-old son in the football program. "We can say, 'Not only are they on TV, they're right there with you.'
"We don't have to tell them, they can see it, actually see it. These guys are from the same neighborhood, and if you keep your nose clean and work hard, you can be just like that."
Robert McQueen runs the football program now, five years after the previous organization, the Glenville A's, had its operations suspended by the city when coaches were charged with beating players. One coach was later convicted of two counts of child endangering.
A former wide receiver at Glenville High who graduated in 1984, McQueen recruited several former Glenville players, like Hicks, to step in as coaches. He changed the name from the A's to the Titans and changed the colors to red and black, just like Glenville High.
"The hook is there with football," McQueen said, "but the main purpose is keeping them on the right track. It's about saving these kids' lives."
Money, and a search for sponsors, is always an issue, with car washes and other fundraisers helping to keep the teams running. The program has managed to continue its role in building the futures of its players, in football and otherwise. McQueen said 30 former Titans have moved on to play football for Glenville High.
For the former Glenville players in the neighborhood coaching these players, the influence of the Tarblooders playing at Ohio State and around the country is all part of the program.
"We love that Donte Whitner got drafted, that Ted and Troy have made it," Hicks said. "There's no negative just because they made it and we didn't. We love that they made it, and they know that.
"We're trying to pump some more kids in, to keep it going. And that keeps us going. That's what keeps us going."
CPD
The Glenville-OSU Connection
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Troy Smith, 2002 - Starting QB and Heisman contender.
Dareus Hiley, 2003 - Left school for academic reasons.
Donte Whitner, 2003 - Safety left after junior year, taken No. 8 overall by Buffalo in 2006 NFL draft.
Ted Ginn Jr., 2004 - Starting WR and return man also getting Heisman mentions.
Curtis Terry, 2004 - In the two-deep rotation at LB, could see time as pass rusher.
Freddie Lenix, 2005 - Denied by OSU admissions office, LB now at Cincinnati.
Jamario O'Neal, 2005 - Starter at safety; played some as a freshman.
Bryant Browning, 2006 - Unlikely to play on deep OL, but already garnering praise from coaches.
Robert Rose, 2006 - DE opening eyes, should find time this season, looks like future star.
Ray Small, 2006 - WR following Ginn's path after waiting out admissions decision over the summer.
- Doug Lesmerises
CPD
The 'Shoe' fits
No high school can match the impact of OSU's Glenville Seven
Thursday, August 24, 2006Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
The first step inside the Tarblooders Sports Barbershop is a stride toward Columbus, a scarlet Ohio State welcome mat greeting every pair of feet through the door.
Here on a corner of St. Clair Avenue, across the street from Cleveland's Glenville High, they root for the home team. On Saturday afternoons when the TV's on and the shop fills up, that home team is Ohio State and the next step off that mat leads you straight into the Horseshoe.
Glenville High and Ohio Stadium are 147 miles apart, but this season, with seven Tarblooders - two of them Heisman Trophy candidates - playing for the Buckeyes, one high school program controls the fate of a college powerhouse like nowhere else in the country.
Inside the barbershop on a day this summer, the customer in owner Darrell Soloman's barber chair looked up.
"You an Ohio State fan?" he was asked.
"I am now," he said.
If you're a Glenville fan, you almost have no choice. It's impossible to imagine the Buckeyes without the Glenville Seven.
Said OSU freshman defensive end Robert Rose, "We're a family within a family."
Direct line
Having entrusted his own son to the Buckeyes, Glenville coach Ted Ginn Sr. sees the Columbus connection grow each day. It's not unusual for a city power to nourish the state university with its talent, even to this extreme.
But this is something more. This is personal.
Phone calls each week to Buckeyes boss Jim Tressel reinforce Ginn's belief that his whole life approach to coaching football has found a natural progression in the 2-hour drive down I-71.
"We kid about the kids," Ginn said of his talks with Tressel. "I tell him he's soft, and he tells me I'm hard. I tell him he's not getting his money's worth out of the kids, and he tells me, 'I'm saving them from you.'
"And between all that, we create a system that will help kids. Ohio State's become a safe haven, it's become another family. In your life, in your family, in your football program, you have certain systems, and this is the system, this is our success, and that's what we go by now."
One is a 50-year-old urban football preacher making $35,000 a year, with a diamond stud in one ear and a cell-phone ear piece in the other.
The other is the son of a coach, a 53-year-old face-of-a-program politician pulling in $2 million a year in his sweater vest. But they move in unison, the gears of their football machines grinding in synchronization.
"As far as speeches go," freshman receiver Ray Small said, "sometimes I'll be kind of confused, because it's like the same thing Ginn says, Tress says. They are so much alike, it's crazy."
When it comes to their football programs, you can't think of one without the other. Without quarterback Troy Smith, receiver Ted Ginn Jr., safety Jamario O'Neal, linebacker Curtis Terry or the freshmen - Rose, Small and offensive lineman Bryant Browning - Ohio State wouldn't be Ohio State.
With them, Columbus and Cleveland are sister cities.
"It's kind of like a family business," O'Neal said. "You don't want to go start your own business when you know you can go into the family business."
Could've been more
Ginn said he first met Tressel at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes coaching conference years ago, but the player procession didn't begin immediately with Tressel's arrival at Ohio State. Tressel's first recruiting class, signed in February 2001, was Glenville-less.
"Our first guy from Glenville we lost," Tressel said. "We came in the middle of his recruiting. But we've had good fortune."
Led by Mel Tucker, the Cleveland recruiter at the time, and now on through assistant coach Tim Beckman, Ohio State has inked at least two Tarblooders each of the past four years, including Smith in 2002. It's to the point where even linebacker Pierre Woods, that first who got away and now is a rookie with the New England Patriots, has an affinity for Ohio State.
"I don't have any hard feelings about it," Woods said. "People say you're supposed to hate Ohio State, but I don't hate Ohio State. I'm happy for those guys."
Ginn Sr. is left to lament that there aren't more Glenville players in Columbus right now, figuring the Glenville Seven could be 11.
n Donte Whitner, a 2003 recruit, left school early and was the No. 8 pick in the NFL draft.
n Dareus Hiley, who signed with Whitner, dropped out of Ohio State because of academics.
n Linebacker Freddie Lenix signed in 2005 but was never admitted and is playing at Cincinnati.
n And Ginn is convinced defensive end Curtis Smith could have been a Buckeye if his grades had measured up, but he, too, wound up with the Bearcats.
Yet even for the first Tressel Tarblooders, it wasn't a smooth start. Troy Smith arrived without a position. Whitner didn't start full time until he was a junior. But living together early on, those two had each other, and coach Ginn had their backs. Now Whitner's a millionaire and Smith is a magazine cover-boy.
That kind of success is a magical recruiting tool.
"When guys you played with before, guys that have come from the same school you came from, are having success, it gives you a lot of confidence," Whitner said. "You feel like you can go there and play right away."
Tight bond
Even if you can't play, you know you can catch a ride. On the first day of preseason camp, Ginn Jr. pulled up at the team hotel in his truck, and Rose, Small and Browning piled out.
"They've been tagging along because they don't have a car," Smith said, "so they're always with someone."
In June, when Rose dominated the North-South Classic in Columbus, his final high school football appearance, O'Neal, Ginn Jr. and Smith were in the stands to see it.
Glenville players arrive on campus without ever leaving home.
"It was the No. 1 factor in my decision to come here," said Terry, a junior linebacker who should see time as a pass-rusher. "If I would have gone anywhere else, I really wouldn't have known anyone. But with so many people down here, Ted and Troy and Donte really made sure they took care of you."
Assisting in the acclimation comes naturally for the Tarblooders. Many of the best players in the Cleveland area find their way to Glenville each season. Glenville players aren't born, they're accepted. So it continues at college.
"Tress makes it so everyone fits in here, no matter where you're from," Ted Ginn Jr. said. "That was the same way at Glenville. We get a lot of transfers at Glenville - Rob Rose, Ray Small, Troy and when they came in, nobody shied away from them.
"As soon as they came in, it was 'Hey, you are my brother now.' After you get down here, you get with the new guys and you say, 'Hey, you're my brother,' and we're all together. No matter what, we stick together."
Connection continues
Glenville's influence doesn't extend only to Columbus. Inside the barbershop on a summer day before football practice started, 18-year-old James Garnett waited for a haircut. He remembered sitting with his Glenville football teammates watching Ohio State games last year before the Tarblooders prepared for their own games.
But Garnett's not a Buckeye. He's at Bowling Green, where he plans to walk on the football team next year.
"You know if you want to get out, if you want to go to college, go to Glenville," Garnett said. "I wanted to get out, and now I'm going."
In February, 21 Glenville players signed to play football in college, 15 at Division I programs, including five others in the Big Ten.
"I want to have seven kids at every school," Ginn Sr. said. "I can see this happening at Iowa, at Indiana, at Wisconsin, because the people there are good people.
"It just so happens it's Ohio State, and then everybody grows up and wants to be part of Ohio State, then we understand Ohio State is family, and Tress does a good job of selling that."
It just so happens the Buckeyes take the cream off the top, while the rest of the schools sweep in for the loads of talent still remaining. According to the Internet scouting service rivals.com, Rose was the No. 2 recruit in Ohio last season, Small was No. 5 and Browning No. 14. They were the three highest-ranked Glenville players and the only Tarblooders offered OSU scholarships.
It just so happens that Tressel and Beckman and Mel Tucker, now a Browns assistant but still family to Ginn Sr., all have Northeast Ohio roots.
It just so happens that Small already is hoping the pipeline continues this season with Tarblooder linebacker Jermale Hines, who has offers from Michigan and Wisconsin but not one from Ohio State, yet.
It just so happens that Ginn Sr. envisions the day when O'Neal and Whitner and Smith and his son buy houses near each other and form another community.
It just so happens that the most important tenet of coach Ginn's philosophy - make the world better for who comes next - can turn into an ideal recruiting pitch without much tweaking.
"I'm working hard for myself and the people that are coming up," Small said. "Just like Ted did it, he worked hard to show me the way, so I'll work hard to show somebody else the way. I really do hope it continues."
"I don't see why it would stop," said Soloman, the owner of the barbershop, talking while he cuts. "These kids, they know these guys."
He asked 11-year-old Richard Mitchell, waiting in a chair against the wall, for his favorite team.
"Ohio State."
"That's what every kid around here is going to say," Soloman said. "But around here, people probably haven't watched Ohio State football games before this."
Now they are. That message reaches the Glenville Buckeyes. The connection continues.
"It means a lot," Smith said. "It gives kids hope, it gives them a future to look forward to, because we grew up in the same neighborhoods they are."
Thanks to the Glenville Seven, that hope is dressed in Scarlet and Gray.
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: [email protected], 216-999-4479
CPD
Glenville and OSU: A powerful pairing
No high school can match the impact of OSU's Glenville Seven
Thursday, August 24, 2006 Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
Rivals.com national recruiting analyst Jeremy Crabtree has an easy definition for the Glenville-Ohio State relationship.
"It's the pipeline of all pipelines," he said. "Every college talks about how they want to get in with a school and get a kid or two every few years. This is maybe the ultimate situation."
Two roads have yielded more players for this season, including the one from La Cueva High to the University of New Mexico, with eight players on the current roster part of that connection. But a high school 11 miles from New Mexico's stadium sending eight players - including two walk-ons - to a 6-5 Mountain West team doesn't carry the same weight of the seven Glenville players in Columbus. And Boise State's eight players from Bishop Kelly High in Boise includes five walk-ons.
"Sure there might be schools that have other connections," Crabtree said, "but they're not all major recruits."
There are other loyalties that run deep, like at Arkansas, where coach Houston Nutt has worked a hometown connection. He pulled seven players from his alma mater of Little Rock Central High to the Razorbacks, but one recently transferred, leaving that count at six.
Yet even the most prominent national football powers have trouble matching Glenville's current OSU influence. Glades Central High in Belle Glade, Fla., was a football factory in 2002, with seven grads in the NFL that year, more than any other high school in the country.
When future NFL players Reidel Anthony and Fred Taylor signed with Florida in 1994, it was part of a run of five players in four years for Glades Central and the Gators. '"We had a great relationship with the University of Florida and that coaching staff," said former coach Willie Bueno. "Fred and Reidel went and had such great success there, and then another kid goes and it just steamrolls from there."
Eight players in that 2002 senior class signed to play at Division I schools, but with the departure of coach Steve Spurrier, the Gators' influence waned. One player from that class went to Florida, but a player like receiver Santonio Holmes chose Ohio State without considering the Gators.
"It's a bit different in south Florida," Crabtree said. "A lot of those kids go to Florida State and then it swings to Miami and then to Florida. They lean toward the hot spot. They haven't been as consistent as Glenville."
Crabtree said there should be five Glenville players capable of signing with Big Ten schools this season, led by linebacker Jermale Hines. He also likes receiver Kyle Jefferson, defensive end Eric Thomas, recent transfer linebacker LeBron Daniel and cornerback Otis Merrill. It's a matter of the Buckeyes making their choices.
"It's widely known with the college coaches I've dealt with," Crabtree said, "that Ohio State gets about everybody they want."
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: [email protected], 216-999-4479
CPD
A productive pipeline
Thursday, August 24, 2006
The link between Glenville High and Ohio State has developed into the most important in college football. Here are some other notable pipelines between high schools and colleges.
8 players
New Mexico: Albuquerque (N.M.) La Cueva.
Boise State: Boise (Idaho) Bishop Kelly.
7 players
Ohio State: Glenville.
6 players
Arkansas: Little Rock (Ark.) Central.
Hawaii: 6 from both Kahuku (Hawaii) and Honolulu St. Louis.
Oregon State: Kahuku, Hawaii. 5 players
Alabama-Birmingham: Vestavia Hills (Ala.).
Ball State: Fort Wayne (Ind.) Snider.
Cincinnati: Cincinnati Elder.
Louisiana-Lafayette: 5 from both New Orleans Jesuit and Lafayette (La.).
Louisville: Louisville (Ky.) St. Xavier.
Memphis: Memphis (Tenn.) Christian Brothers.
Oregon: Concord (Calif.) De La Salle.
Penn State: State College (Pa.) Area.
UCLA: Bellflower (Calif.) St. John Bosco.
- Compiled by William Hall
CPD
Building the machine
Muny League players reach for the stars
Thursday, August 24, 2006 Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
One of the 400-plus players who plays for the Glenville Titans might be the next Troy Smith - and the next one may have met the real one.
The seven teams that are part of the Titans football program - five in the Cleveland Municipal Football League and two others playing Pop Warner Football - practice on a field next to the Glenville High football team.
So when former Tarblooders like Ted Ginn Jr. and Troy Smith stop by their old school, they also become real to the elementary and junior high kids who emulate them every day.
"Those guys come down whenever they're home, and they'll throw the ball around with the kids," said Andre Hicks, a coach with an 11-year-old son in the football program. "We can say, 'Not only are they on TV, they're right there with you.'
"We don't have to tell them, they can see it, actually see it. These guys are from the same neighborhood, and if you keep your nose clean and work hard, you can be just like that."
Robert McQueen runs the football program now, five years after the previous organization, the Glenville A's, had its operations suspended by the city when coaches were charged with beating players. One coach was later convicted of two counts of child endangering.
A former wide receiver at Glenville High who graduated in 1984, McQueen recruited several former Glenville players, like Hicks, to step in as coaches. He changed the name from the A's to the Titans and changed the colors to red and black, just like Glenville High.
"The hook is there with football," McQueen said, "but the main purpose is keeping them on the right track. It's about saving these kids' lives."
Money, and a search for sponsors, is always an issue, with car washes and other fundraisers helping to keep the teams running. The program has managed to continue its role in building the futures of its players, in football and otherwise. McQueen said 30 former Titans have moved on to play football for Glenville High.
For the former Glenville players in the neighborhood coaching these players, the influence of the Tarblooders playing at Ohio State and around the country is all part of the program.
"We love that Donte Whitner got drafted, that Ted and Troy have made it," Hicks said. "There's no negative just because they made it and we didn't. We love that they made it, and they know that.
"We're trying to pump some more kids in, to keep it going. And that keeps us going. That's what keeps us going."
CPD
The Glenville-OSU Connection
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Troy Smith, 2002 - Starting QB and Heisman contender.
Dareus Hiley, 2003 - Left school for academic reasons.
Donte Whitner, 2003 - Safety left after junior year, taken No. 8 overall by Buffalo in 2006 NFL draft.
Ted Ginn Jr., 2004 - Starting WR and return man also getting Heisman mentions.
Curtis Terry, 2004 - In the two-deep rotation at LB, could see time as pass rusher.
Freddie Lenix, 2005 - Denied by OSU admissions office, LB now at Cincinnati.
Jamario O'Neal, 2005 - Starter at safety; played some as a freshman.
Bryant Browning, 2006 - Unlikely to play on deep OL, but already garnering praise from coaches.
Robert Rose, 2006 - DE opening eyes, should find time this season, looks like future star.
Ray Small, 2006 - WR following Ginn's path after waiting out admissions decision over the summer.
- Doug Lesmerises
CPD
The 'Shoe' fits
No high school can match the impact of OSU's Glenville Seven
Thursday, August 24, 2006Doug Lesmerises
Plain Dealer Reporter
The first step inside the Tarblooders Sports Barbershop is a stride toward Columbus, a scarlet Ohio State welcome mat greeting every pair of feet through the door.
Here on a corner of St. Clair Avenue, across the street from Cleveland's Glenville High, they root for the home team. On Saturday afternoons when the TV's on and the shop fills up, that home team is Ohio State and the next step off that mat leads you straight into the Horseshoe.
Glenville High and Ohio Stadium are 147 miles apart, but this season, with seven Tarblooders - two of them Heisman Trophy candidates - playing for the Buckeyes, one high school program controls the fate of a college powerhouse like nowhere else in the country.
Inside the barbershop on a day this summer, the customer in owner Darrell Soloman's barber chair looked up.
"You an Ohio State fan?" he was asked.
"I am now," he said.
If you're a Glenville fan, you almost have no choice. It's impossible to imagine the Buckeyes without the Glenville Seven.
Said OSU freshman defensive end Robert Rose, "We're a family within a family."
Direct line
Having entrusted his own son to the Buckeyes, Glenville coach Ted Ginn Sr. sees the Columbus connection grow each day. It's not unusual for a city power to nourish the state university with its talent, even to this extreme.
But this is something more. This is personal.
Phone calls each week to Buckeyes boss Jim Tressel reinforce Ginn's belief that his whole life approach to coaching football has found a natural progression in the 2-hour drive down I-71.
"We kid about the kids," Ginn said of his talks with Tressel. "I tell him he's soft, and he tells me I'm hard. I tell him he's not getting his money's worth out of the kids, and he tells me, 'I'm saving them from you.'
"And between all that, we create a system that will help kids. Ohio State's become a safe haven, it's become another family. In your life, in your family, in your football program, you have certain systems, and this is the system, this is our success, and that's what we go by now."
One is a 50-year-old urban football preacher making $35,000 a year, with a diamond stud in one ear and a cell-phone ear piece in the other.
The other is the son of a coach, a 53-year-old face-of-a-program politician pulling in $2 million a year in his sweater vest. But they move in unison, the gears of their football machines grinding in synchronization.
"As far as speeches go," freshman receiver Ray Small said, "sometimes I'll be kind of confused, because it's like the same thing Ginn says, Tress says. They are so much alike, it's crazy."
When it comes to their football programs, you can't think of one without the other. Without quarterback Troy Smith, receiver Ted Ginn Jr., safety Jamario O'Neal, linebacker Curtis Terry or the freshmen - Rose, Small and offensive lineman Bryant Browning - Ohio State wouldn't be Ohio State.
With them, Columbus and Cleveland are sister cities.
"It's kind of like a family business," O'Neal said. "You don't want to go start your own business when you know you can go into the family business."
Could've been more
Ginn said he first met Tressel at a Fellowship of Christian Athletes coaching conference years ago, but the player procession didn't begin immediately with Tressel's arrival at Ohio State. Tressel's first recruiting class, signed in February 2001, was Glenville-less.
"Our first guy from Glenville we lost," Tressel said. "We came in the middle of his recruiting. But we've had good fortune."
Led by Mel Tucker, the Cleveland recruiter at the time, and now on through assistant coach Tim Beckman, Ohio State has inked at least two Tarblooders each of the past four years, including Smith in 2002. It's to the point where even linebacker Pierre Woods, that first who got away and now is a rookie with the New England Patriots, has an affinity for Ohio State.
"I don't have any hard feelings about it," Woods said. "People say you're supposed to hate Ohio State, but I don't hate Ohio State. I'm happy for those guys."
Ginn Sr. is left to lament that there aren't more Glenville players in Columbus right now, figuring the Glenville Seven could be 11.
n Donte Whitner, a 2003 recruit, left school early and was the No. 8 pick in the NFL draft.
n Dareus Hiley, who signed with Whitner, dropped out of Ohio State because of academics.
n Linebacker Freddie Lenix signed in 2005 but was never admitted and is playing at Cincinnati.
n And Ginn is convinced defensive end Curtis Smith could have been a Buckeye if his grades had measured up, but he, too, wound up with the Bearcats.
Yet even for the first Tressel Tarblooders, it wasn't a smooth start. Troy Smith arrived without a position. Whitner didn't start full time until he was a junior. But living together early on, those two had each other, and coach Ginn had their backs. Now Whitner's a millionaire and Smith is a magazine cover-boy.
That kind of success is a magical recruiting tool.
"When guys you played with before, guys that have come from the same school you came from, are having success, it gives you a lot of confidence," Whitner said. "You feel like you can go there and play right away."
Tight bond
Even if you can't play, you know you can catch a ride. On the first day of preseason camp, Ginn Jr. pulled up at the team hotel in his truck, and Rose, Small and Browning piled out.
"They've been tagging along because they don't have a car," Smith said, "so they're always with someone."
In June, when Rose dominated the North-South Classic in Columbus, his final high school football appearance, O'Neal, Ginn Jr. and Smith were in the stands to see it.
Glenville players arrive on campus without ever leaving home.
"It was the No. 1 factor in my decision to come here," said Terry, a junior linebacker who should see time as a pass-rusher. "If I would have gone anywhere else, I really wouldn't have known anyone. But with so many people down here, Ted and Troy and Donte really made sure they took care of you."
Assisting in the acclimation comes naturally for the Tarblooders. Many of the best players in the Cleveland area find their way to Glenville each season. Glenville players aren't born, they're accepted. So it continues at college.
"Tress makes it so everyone fits in here, no matter where you're from," Ted Ginn Jr. said. "That was the same way at Glenville. We get a lot of transfers at Glenville - Rob Rose, Ray Small, Troy and when they came in, nobody shied away from them.
"As soon as they came in, it was 'Hey, you are my brother now.' After you get down here, you get with the new guys and you say, 'Hey, you're my brother,' and we're all together. No matter what, we stick together."
Connection continues
Glenville's influence doesn't extend only to Columbus. Inside the barbershop on a summer day before football practice started, 18-year-old James Garnett waited for a haircut. He remembered sitting with his Glenville football teammates watching Ohio State games last year before the Tarblooders prepared for their own games.
But Garnett's not a Buckeye. He's at Bowling Green, where he plans to walk on the football team next year.
"You know if you want to get out, if you want to go to college, go to Glenville," Garnett said. "I wanted to get out, and now I'm going."
In February, 21 Glenville players signed to play football in college, 15 at Division I programs, including five others in the Big Ten.
"I want to have seven kids at every school," Ginn Sr. said. "I can see this happening at Iowa, at Indiana, at Wisconsin, because the people there are good people.
"It just so happens it's Ohio State, and then everybody grows up and wants to be part of Ohio State, then we understand Ohio State is family, and Tress does a good job of selling that."
It just so happens the Buckeyes take the cream off the top, while the rest of the schools sweep in for the loads of talent still remaining. According to the Internet scouting service rivals.com, Rose was the No. 2 recruit in Ohio last season, Small was No. 5 and Browning No. 14. They were the three highest-ranked Glenville players and the only Tarblooders offered OSU scholarships.
It just so happens that Tressel and Beckman and Mel Tucker, now a Browns assistant but still family to Ginn Sr., all have Northeast Ohio roots.
It just so happens that Small already is hoping the pipeline continues this season with Tarblooder linebacker Jermale Hines, who has offers from Michigan and Wisconsin but not one from Ohio State, yet.
It just so happens that Ginn Sr. envisions the day when O'Neal and Whitner and Smith and his son buy houses near each other and form another community.
It just so happens that the most important tenet of coach Ginn's philosophy - make the world better for who comes next - can turn into an ideal recruiting pitch without much tweaking.
"I'm working hard for myself and the people that are coming up," Small said. "Just like Ted did it, he worked hard to show me the way, so I'll work hard to show somebody else the way. I really do hope it continues."
"I don't see why it would stop," said Soloman, the owner of the barbershop, talking while he cuts. "These kids, they know these guys."
He asked 11-year-old Richard Mitchell, waiting in a chair against the wall, for his favorite team.
"Ohio State."
"That's what every kid around here is going to say," Soloman said. "But around here, people probably haven't watched Ohio State football games before this."
Now they are. That message reaches the Glenville Buckeyes. The connection continues.
"It means a lot," Smith said. "It gives kids hope, it gives them a future to look forward to, because we grew up in the same neighborhoods they are."
Thanks to the Glenville Seven, that hope is dressed in Scarlet and Gray.
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: [email protected], 216-999-4479
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