The 16 best types of recruiting fanatics

We’re way past you guys knowing my thoughts on recruiting — all of it is well-documented on this site. I do a terrible job of covering recruiting on PFB even though there’s a way to do it correctly, just because I’m so turned off by the entire process.

I guess I don’t see a beneficial end game to being locked in to recruiting information. You could say the same about sports in general, I guess, but for me the fun part about sports is getting to talk about outcomes (and more so, moments) with your friends. What is the moment with recruiting?

Did you see the way he signed that letter of intent that binds him to a school which owes him nothing?! Reminded me of the way John Adams signed the Declaration of Independence! What gorgeous pen strokes for a guy his size!

But whatever, just because I’m not always into it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s wrong, per se.[1. I have been lost in the 247 vortex a time or two more than I care to admit — I presume this is a safe place to disclose that.] As long as you go about it the right way and aren’t bro-tweeting at 17-year-olds about why your university is the best university in the country, then to each his own.

I have, however, made a list of my favorite types of recruiting fans out there (I am not exempt from all of these either). This was brought on earlier this week when everybody went bonkers over Mason Rudolph committing to OSU over LSU and a few other schools. I laughed, searched Twitter, and started writing.

This list has probably already been made — many times, even — but I didn’t Google it because I wanted some sense of originality in mine.

Here we go…

1. The “you have to see the arm on this kid” guy — Sadly, I probably fall in this camp [googles thousands of words written about Wes Lunt, hangs head in shame]. The best arms in the history of sports are probably something like 1. Vlad Guerrero 2. Warren Moon 3. Roberto Clemente 4. Ichiro 5. Ryan Mallett and 11,921. Dude you’re talking about. I also love the “he throws like the thing was shot out of a cannon” line. If he literally threw that way we’d have a bunch of dead wide receivers on our hands. Which would obviously be bad.

2. The “wait until you see what our strength guy does with his body” guy — One of my favorite lines is “man, in three semesters with [school trainer] he’s going to gain at least 20 pounds of muscle. Gonna be a monster.” Ok…wait, why are we studying his body to begin with? What if recruits talked about our bodies…”man, three more years of blogging at home and eating chips and salsa every day, Kyle, and you’re going to gain at least 20 pounds of fat. Your kid is going to think you’re a monster!”

3. The “he’s gonna go great when paired with [other person who plays his position]” — What is he, a bottle of wine?

4. The “he reminds me of [legend from your school]” guy — He’s 17.

5. The “I know we were recruiting 29 running backs, but this was our guy all along” guy — This is my favorite, and I’m not sure it’s even close. The brother of this guy is the guy who, when a recruit chooses a different school, says “meh, we didn’t want him anyway…he wasn’t (wait for it) ‘our guy'” This actually happened yesterday with Rudolph and LSU. I laugh every time.

6. The “I know he was a big-time recruit but he didn’t really fit our system” guy — A close cousin of “this was our guy all along” guy. This is the guy who justifies not getting Jadeveon Clowney. I know he’s 6’7 280 lbs., runs a 4.05, and may or may not have murdered a QB in high school but I just don’t see how he fits with our defensive scheme. Right.

7. (when the best of 29 RBs decommits after being committed for 10 months) The “we never wanted him anyway, he has some character issues” guy — We’ll call it the Bralon Addison effect. Wait, didn’t you just write, like, 120 Facebook posts in a 250-day stretch about how much ____________ was going to help your team?!

8. The “we’re a 2-star to 5-star factory anyway” guy — A distant cousin of “wait until you see what our strength guy does with his body” guy. I know you think Rob Glass is going to turn that 2-star safety from Del City into the next Sean Taylor (RIP) but yeah, not happening.

9. The “your gunna totally luv [college town], bro Twitter mention” guy — This is the guy bro-tweeting everybody on your school’s Rivals watch list. This is also where we start treading into “wait a second, how deep are you into this recruiting thing?” territory.

And when was the biggest decision of a high school kid’s life ever swayed by some dude on Twitter using a selfie of him and his bros at the Tumbleweed as his Twitter photo and begging the kid to come play football at his school? And if that’s the case…I mean…do you really want that kid?!

SO many questions…

10. The recruiting service roulette guy — You know…I know [recruit you’re discussing] is 5’4 188 lbs. but Rivals has historically rated undersized linebackers too low. I prefer the rankings at National Recruitnik Nation which ranks [recruit you’re discussing] as a top-five guy at his position.

Nolan (@nolancox) decided to weigh in with a few jewels at this point, I’ll let him take us home..

11. The “yeah I don’t really keep up with recruiting, all I know about this year’s class is that we have seven 4-stars, 16 3-stars, three 2-stars and a couple NR’s who have signed an LOI plus four more solid verbals and a soft commit from this 3 star ATH out of Wichita Falls…plus we’re in the running for a couple other guys including this SICK receiver out of Charleston, SC who runs a 4.43 and reps 225 like 18 times..that’s all just based off of Rivals though because like I said, I don’t really have time to keep up with it since I have a lot of other stuff going on” guy

12. The “well I know he’s only a 3-star, but he plays at Sand Springs and my cousin’s friend is the waterboy at Edmond North so he’s seen him play a lot and says he’s going to be better than Joseph Randle” guy

13. The “you haven’t heard of that guy?” guy — Pretty self explanatory, yes?

14. The name dropper — Well I was roommates with the equipment manager in college so Dez Bryant basically lived at my dorm. I just don’t think any of our receivers this year will be as good as him but I guess we’ll see.

15. The non-name dropper — I can’t tell you who told me this, and you can’t tell ANYONE, but I KNOW we’re getting this guy. [sly grin, head nod]

16. The “he’s from my home town so I’m going to hype him up, talk about what a good kid he is because his parents went to the same church as me, and act like I basically raised him” guy.

What did we miss?