Starmaking out of control in the amateur ranks

I’ll start this column with an admission.

I’m pretty skeeved out by high school athletes holding
press conferences to announce where they’re going to
college.

Full disclosure…I’ve attended only two such press
conferences in my life — Bobby Wade’s 2000 announcement
that he was going to play his college football at Arizona,
and D.J. Foster’s gathering last month to announce that
he’ll play for ASU. I didn’t feel totally comfortable at
either.

A lot changed in the world in those twelve years that
separated the two events. At Wade’s event, I was one of a
handful of media members there, and I attended mostly
because of my own curiosity. I worked in radio at the
time, but high school football talk was relegated on the
airwaves to Friday nights. Specialty websites were in
their infancy, and mainstream sports websites hadn’t yet
realized the thirst for recruiting coverage.

In 2012, high school athletes have audiences of thousands
awaiting their choice through webcasts and in some cases,
television broadcasts. Last year’s top recruit, defensive
end Jadeveon Clowney, announced that he’d be attending the
University of South Carolina live on ESPN — a network
beamed into roughly 100 million households in the United
States. It seems strange to me that a 17 or 18-year-old
student can leave a fourth period econ class and then go
address millions of people via the Worldwide Leader in
Sports.

But my disdain for the whole process reached a new low on
Tuesday morning. That’s when Scottsdale Chaparral High
School star Davonte’ Neal, the 8th-rated recruit in the
country according to ESPNU, was supposed to make his long-
awaited college announcement. The event was to take place
at Kyrene de la Esperanza Elementary School in Phoenix,
where Neal attended before starring at the high school
level.

A webcast was carried on FoxSportsArizona.com and started
at 9:00 a.m. The student body of the school, some 600
strong, assembled to be a part of the announcement. The
funny thing is, it never happened.

At about 9:55 a.m., the school’s principal, Dr. Cheryl
Greene, dismissed the students back to their classrooms.
There would be no announcement made.

Reports of a power struggle between Davonte’ and his
father surfaced soon after. It is believed that the
younger Neal wanted to commit to Arizona, where his former
high school coach Charlie Ragle had been hired to join the
support staff of new coach Rich Rodriguez. Dad is
reportedly set on Notre Dame.

Mind you, this is all three weeks after National Letter of
Intent Day. I have absolutely no problem with a student
athlete taking his time and weighing his options on
college choice — it’s a life-changing decision. Davonte’
Neal could make the decision in July if he wants. Being
confident in your selection is the most important element
here.

But don’t pull 600 kids out of class to have them sit on a
cafeteria floor awaiting your almighty arrival, and then
never show up. That’s wrong no matter how you slice it.
It’s akin to inviting 200 guests to your wedding even
though you’re not sure you’re in love.

At least the kids didn’t bring gifts.

At the risk of sounding like a crotchety old man (even
though I’m only 40), there’s too much star-making going on
in the lower ranks of amateur sports these days.

Remember when only the championship game of the Little
League World Series was televised? Now, you can see the
regional tournaments for weeks leading up to the big event
in Williamsport. How does that kind of exposure not
inflate the heads of impressionable 12-year-old boys in
their formative years?

And now we’ve got the Davonte’ Neal debacle. Neal called
a presser, didn’t show up while hundreds of kids waited,
then later went back to the school and reportedly wanted
to go to each classroom to apologize to the kids. Nothing
like interrupting the education of young children twice in
one day.

About four hours after the original announcement was
scheduled to be made, Neal finally made his future plans
known in front of a handful of people and without a live
webcast.

He will attend the University of Notre Dame.

Is this a case of father knows best? That remains to be
seen.

But nobody involved knew well enough to handle the
situation correctly the first time, and that’s
disappointing.

Follow @Vincemarotta