‘Bush league:’ Oxford coach says new Tennessee staff pulled WR Roc Taylor’s offer 1 day before NSD

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A_Slab_of_Bacon

A_Slab_of_Bacon

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www.al.com

Oxford coach: New Tennessee staff pulls Roc Taylor's offer

Oxford High School coach Keith Etheredge said Tennessee informed him Tuesday that they would not honor wide receiver Roc Taylor's longtime commitment to the school.
www.al.com www.al.com


There's some question about eligibility that seem hard to know, but if that was an issue, you'd think they'd call it off earlier and if the new coach's didn't know ... not sure I'd cut him lose.
 

Burned a bridge here along with the news out that Tennessee has pulled a scholarship the day before NSD. Wonder how much longer this story will stay out there or will people simply forget.
 

Tennessee is a trainwreck at the moment. Previous coach fired and previous AD gone due to major NCAA violations with penalties coming.

Danny White and Josh Heupel have a big mess to cleanup down there.

With that said, I'm not sure this is how they begin to repair their image. Never in favor of pulling a kid's offer on the eve of signing day. But considering how they've conducted themselves on the recruiting trail in recent years, I guess I'm not surprised.
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
www.al.com

Oxford coach: New Tennessee staff pulls Roc Taylor's offer

Oxford High School coach Keith Etheredge said Tennessee informed him Tuesday that they would not honor wide receiver Roc Taylor's longtime commitment to the school.
www.al.com www.al.com


There's some question about eligibility that seem hard to know, but if that was an issue, you'd think they'd call it off earlier and if the new coach's didn't know ... not sure I'd cut him lose.
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The High School coach is over reacting some in saying he will never let one of his players got to Tennessee. In the end that shouldn't be his decision for those kids.

As for pulling the offer this close to NSD, that is a tough one. Yes the kid has stayed loyal to Tennessee but if he was dead set on signing there no matter what he could have signed in the early period. Given the timing the new staff probably should have honored the commitment and let him sign.
 

MRJ said:
Tennessee is a trainwreck at the moment. Previous coach fired and previous AD gone due to major NCAA violations with penalties coming.

Danny White and Josh Heupel have a big mess to cleanup down there.

With that said, I'm not sure this is how they begin to repair their image. Never in favor of pulling a kid's offer on the eve of signing day. But considering how they've conducted themselves on the recruiting trail in recent years, I guess I'm not surprised.
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I think part of the problem might have been that they were simply way overextended on the number of offers that they had made. Perhaps a guy they hadn't counted on getting suddenly indicated he wanted to sign with the Vols today, thus knocking this guy out of the list?


Really think the NCAA needs to get serious about putting a cap on the number of offers that schools can have outstanding at any one time.
 


MNVCGUY said:
The High School coach is over reacting some in saying he will never let one of his players got to Tennessee. In the end that shouldn't be his decision for those kids.

As for pulling the offer this close to NSD, that is a tough one. Yes the kid has stayed loyal to Tennessee but if he was dead set on signing there no matter what he could have signed in the early period. Given the timing the new staff probably should have honored the commitment and let him sign.
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The HS coach situation is always a bit ... weird to me.

I get that many probably do provide guidance and access, at the same time sometimes their sort of gatekeeping seems kinda unseemly too....

I probabbly wouldn't cut a kid's offer one day before signing day, but at the same time because Kid A had some sort of grades complications and there was some issue between that kid and the school.... shouldn't mean a HS coach gets to decide all the other kids should have their HS coach running interferece on a given school...
 

Sounds like the previous staff wasn't going to sign him either and this was known for a while due to academics. And the HC was the only one who didn't know.
 

It takes two to tango.

Miscommunications, misunderstanding by the previous coaches? It is hard to judge, but the new coaching staff should have done a thorough review of previous committted players earlier.

If the kid was academically ineligible, was his HS coach in the know, and did they do something to improve his status?

This isn't exactly a good start publicity-wise for the new head coach at Tennessee.
 
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hungan1 said:
It takes two to tango.

Miscommunications, misunderstanding by the previous coaches? It is hard to judge, but the new coaching staff should have done a thorough review of previous committted players earlier.

If the kid was academically ineligible, was HS coach in the know, and did they do something to improve his status?

This isn't exactly a good start publicity wise for the new head coach at Tennessee.
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I think that's why you probably as a new staff just say "well shit, oh well if it turns out he's not he's not" and you just bite the bullet. If he's not, it's all of one scholarship you can use later.

With all the turnover. It's not like Tennessee is on the edge of a natty anyhow.
 



Heupel was just hired a week ago. It's not like he's had a lot of time to evaluate, especially with all of the recruiting issues he inherited.

If you don't feel like a recruit is a fit for your program, why would you waste a scholarship?
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Heupel was just hired a week ago. It's not like he's had a lot of time to evaluate, especially with all of the recruiting issues he inherited.

If you don't feel like a recruit is a fit for your program, why would you waste a scholarship?
[/QUOTE.
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Loyalty to the kids committing to the program along with Goodwill and Honor. I would think Tennessee needs more of that right now than the road the new coach selected. They can use a scholarship later if need be on a transfer student or late recruit.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Heupel was just hired a week ago. It's not like he's had a lot of time to evaluate, especially with all of the recruiting issues he inherited.

If you don't feel like a recruit is a fit for your program, why would you waste a scholarship?
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Well to .... you know not be a jerk?
 

A_Slab_of_Bacon said:
The HS coach situation is always a bit ... weird to me.

I get that many probably do provide guidance and access, at the same time sometimes their sort of gatekeeping seems kinda unseemly too....

I probabbly wouldn't cut a kid's offer one day before signing day, but at the same time because Kid A had some sort of grades complications and there was some issue between that kid and the school.... shouldn't mean a HS coach gets to decide all the other kids should have their HS coach running interferece on a given school...
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In regards to the head coach: The coaches job SHOULD be to assist the college teams in getting info about his players and to provide some guidance for the recruit. Of course we all know, especially on the basketball side, that there are many high school coaches that find ways to profit off of providing access and who take an extremely active role in the recruiting of their athletes.

This coach definitely seems like one of those and it wouldn't shock me to find out that he was/is getting kickbacks of some kind along the way.
 




#2Gopher said:
Loyalty to the kids committing to the program along with Goodwill and Honor. I would think Tennessee needs more of that right now than the road the new coach selected. They can use a scholarship later if need be on a transfer student or late recruit.
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And what if they found out he doesn't have the grades or there were shady things in his past recruitment? Or if he's just not the type of player he wants to coach?

You don't become a head coach of a SEC football team without pissing some people off a long the way. If Heupel had been there a month, or even years and did this, then yes it's a bad look. He's had basically 4-5 days to make the decision.
 

Recruiting is cut-throat stuff. You hate for something like this to get blown up, but offers are pulled all the time. My memory is a little hazy, but if I'm not mistaken Fleck honored the offers for every in-state kid when he took the job but a few out of state kids decommitted -- and the rumors were that they were encouraged to look elsewhere. An OL and that JUCO QB come to mind...and I think there were more.
 

MGGopher said:
Recruiting is cut-throat stuff. You hate for something like this to get blown up, but offers are pulled all the time. My memory is a little hazy, but if I'm not mistaken Fleck honored the offers for every in-state kid when he took the job but a few out of state kids decommitted -- and the rumors were that they were encouraged to look elsewhere. An OL and that JUCO QB come to mind...and I think there were more.
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I think rescinding an offer is a delicate thing but yeah I don't have a problem with it "generally".

But a day before... like I don't care when you took the job, that's way too late.
 



Perhaps the discovered the kid had too many McDonald's deliveries
 


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