A quick reality check before signing day

As "Countdown to Signing Day" looms ahead for those High School Seniors with aspirations to play college football, and some die-hard college football junkies spend countless hours tracking the final stages of their team's recruiting progress, I am compelled to fulfill my duty as a humanitarian to remind folks -- everything about the business of college recruiting is a very inexact science. In fact, it's a crapshoot.

The unpredictable nature of the typical 17 or 18 year-old, foiling even the shrewdest "Recruiting Guru" is as common as a screw up at the drive-thru window.

Indeed, there's nothing like the daunting task of predicting the future for anyone, much less a teenager. Let's be honest, without the fanfare (and legal problems) of Miss Cleo, predicting the future is exactly what recruiting analysts are in the business of doing.

And let's give them their due... they have the unenviable task of guessing which kids will make adequate grades, stay in school, not get seriously injured or hurt too often, not eschew football altogether and sign with a pro baseball team, find playing time, stay out of the coach's doghouse, not hang around with the wrong crowd, not pull a John Walker Lindh and hook up with the Taliban (OK, only in California), not deal with an agent too soon, not get caught up in a system they don't fit in, etc... I think you get the idea.

Still, no matter how many times a player is listed as a "can't miss" or "five star athlete," mistakes do happen fairly often.

I cannot count the number of times (back when I paid more attention to this annual circus) I heard John Q. Analyst froth at the mouth about his "gargantuan lineman," or that "Mercurial Wide Receiver," or the latest "game-breaking Tailback," and of course the obligatory "rifle-armed Quarterback."

I also cannot count the number of times said lineman, receiver, running back and QB did not pan out.

When you add the element of partisanship, the "misses" are even more common.

The classic example here is good ol' Forrest Davis. It seems all a player had to do was declare he was going to Alabama and his rating would pick up a notch, go back on his commitment to UA and his stock would wither away. But there's no need picking on Forrest.

In this day and age any Division I school has at least one web page or news outlet that devotes barrels of ink to cover nothing but recruiting. Naturally, all of these schools have some delusional "homers" who think every player they sign will be the next Walter Payton, Jerry Rice, Dick Butkis or Joe Montana. Forrest just beat them to the punch by being so inaccurate prior to the Information Age.

So let's cut the gurus some slack. After all, think of yourself as the object of prognostication. Where will you be in four years? Will you be healthy then? Will you have "lost a step?" What will be doing for a living?

As for me, one thing's for sure -- I won't be working as a "Recruiting Expert." I make a fool of myself enough in private life, no need to broadcast that to a wider audience. This web site gives me all the stage I need for just that sort of thing.