Maybe I Spoke Too Soon

When I posted yesterday's post titled "Another Good Day in LSU Athletics" I did not guess that the Montrell Conner story would have the legs or the bitterness it showed as the day progressed. Depending on who you believe, one of the following things happened:

• Conner, his parents, and his coach met with Miles, who personally extended a scholarship offer that was accepted, only later to be told, "Not so fast, I shouldn't have offered it."
• An assistant coach offered Conner the scholarship, which was accepted, but there was a miscommunication with Miles and the offer never should have been extended.
• Conner was offered a scholarship, but only at linebacker and wanted to be a running back, accepted the scholarship and then was told he couldn't be a running back so it wasn't considered accepted.
• Conner misunderstood some nice talk and friendly conversation as a scholarship offer.

Somehow or another, Montrell Conner thought he was a commitment to LSU only to find out that he wasn't going to be considered a commitment. The boards went ape-shit. A major booster reportedly went ape-shit as well.*

Word now is that the "misunderstanding" is resolved, though Conner is not a commitment at this time.

There was lots of blame thrown the coach's way over a problem that lasted all of a couple of hours at most. You would think the foundation of Tiger Stadium was crumbling under our feet. I have a slightly different perspective of blame, however.

I think at least part of the blame for this has to go to the pay recruiting sites, who are always trying to "scoop" one another. I think they often post information before it's really ripe to go out to the public, because they want to be the first to report it. I think they reported Conner's commitment strictly after hearing it from Conner without checking with their sources within the program first. This may be standard procedure, but with an atmosphere like Junior Day with all of its confusion, maybe it shouldn't be.

Anyway, this will all blow over in a little while, and it's really much ado about nothing.

*Incidentally, the exact same thing happened to Tahj Jones, but no one seemed to care that much about that one, because reportedly it has to do with Jones' academic situation.