Wash Post writes about Marcus Coker snafu with Gopher noncommit

[Stan]

DeMatha Running Back Doesn't Really Commit:

So you're DeMatha running back Marcus Coker and you wake up one morning and learn that you've committed to play for Minnesota. Small problem omitted from various reports - included the one I linked, which includes no attribution - Coker didn't really accept a scholarship offer to play for the Golden Gophers

"All he did was commit in his mind to a visit to go to Minnesota, that's what he committed to. He has not committed to go to Minnesota," DeMatha Coach Bill McGregor said. "I'm out of the office. [DeMatha trainer] Wendy [Norris] called me, saying, 'Have you heard about Marcus?' She said it was all over the Internet that he's going to Minnesota. But that's not what he committed to. I talked to his mother and she said he did not commit but that he committed to go to a visit to Minnesota.

"I talked to [Minnesota assistant coach] John Butler yesterday and he knows he did not commit to go there, that he committed to a visit. So I don't know how it got out. I even got a phone call from an alum in Minnesota saying it was great that Marcus Coker was going to go to Minnesota."

Just a guess? Someone in Minnesota's football office leaked word to one of the Internet sites that follw the Golden Gophers. It's obvious McGregor wasn't the source of information, and unlikely Coker provided it either. You think Minnesota - or any other team - might want it known that it had just gotten a commitment from a highly-regarded player from one of the nation's top high school programs?

Thanks to the NCAA's archaic rules prohibiting college coaches from commenting publicly on recruits, Web sites covering recruiting have become a lucrative cottage industry with little oversight or regulation as they become unofficial mouthpieces for college athletic departments. Sometimes these sites have great information, other times not so much.

"It just shows you how invalid sometimes the Internet really is," McGregor said. "One Web site picks it up, then another and it goes all over. You know, I think there is a lot of information out there, but you have to check what is valid and what isn't valid."


Posted by Josh Barr, Washington post

 

[grunkiejr]

Just a guess? Someone in Minnesota's football office leaked word to one of the Internet sites that follw the Golden Gophers. It's obvious McGregor wasn't the source of information, and unlikely Coker provided it either. You think Minnesota - or any other team - might want it known that it had just gotten a commitment from a highly-regarded player from one of the nation's top high school programs?

This doesn't seem like a very accurate guess when you consider the news came from a Rivals national writer instead of Gophers Illustrated.

 

[Stan]

This doesn't seem like a very accurate guess when you consider the news came from a Rivals national writer instead of Gophers Illustrated.

I just hope we still get him as that high school seems to produce a lot of players and he's a big kid.

 

[GopherGod]

This doesn't seem like a very accurate guess when you consider the news came from a Rivals national writer instead of Gophers Illustrated.

Let's hope this is not the case because if there is a leak in the football office then that has NCAA sanctions written all over it and the recruiting coordinator for the gophers will be the first to go down.

 

[GoAUpher]

Let's hope this is not the case because if there is a leak in the football office then that has NCAA sanctions written all over it and the recruiting coordinator for the gophers will be the first to go down.

Assuming it was the U I'm betting this would be a secondary violation (especially since it wasn't true). And in the odd little world of the NCAA secondary violations mean nothing.

 

[GopherGod]

Assuming it was the U I'm betting this would be a secondary violation (especially since it wasn't true). And in the odd little world of the NCAA secondary violations mean nothing.

If it wasn't true then obviously there would be no penalty. You never want to cross the NCAA however secondary or not because then when a major issue comes down the line they can throw the hammer down on you as a institution without control.

 

[GoAUpher]

If it wasn't true then obviously there would be no penalty. You never want to cross the NCAA however secondary or not because then when a major issue comes down the line they can throw the hammer down on you as a institution without control.

Fair enough, just suggesting that this instance wouldn't result in anyone getting canned.

 

[RodentRampage]

The leak could have come from sources other than the University of Minnesota. And if it did come from here, it doesn't mean that it was an intentional leak. It's a distorted rumor, like a game of telephone, where what was said at the beginning doesn't always match the end result. This means it could have passed through multiple people before it was reported in a distorted form.

 

[grunkiejr]

Let's hope this is not the case because if there is a leak in the football office then that has NCAA sanctions written all over it and the recruiting coordinator for the gophers will be the first to go down.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that if the Gophers athletic dept were to provide a tip off to someone that it would likely be to their local Rivals site instead of the national where they are bound to have less of a relationship. Further, when the news hit the coach came out and said that it was misunderstanding of what was being communicated. If I were to make a guess on what happened, the coach (or player) told the national Rivals writer that Coker had committed to going to Minnesota which was intended to mean committed to going to Minnesota for a visit but was understood by the writer to mean he had verbally committed to attend Minnesota. Given the facts that we know: 1) Rivals National released the info 2) the coach called it miscommunication 3) the player said he has committed to visiting Minnesota but he has not committed to attending Minnesota, this seems like a more plausible guess than the Washington Post's writer.

 

[RodentRampage]

The coach or the player might have mentioned it to someone, who told someone else. That would explain why the rumor was distorted. The only way to keep a secret is to tell no one, because once you tell someone, that rumor is likely to spread, even if you get a promise not to tell. Your friend will think it is ok to tell just his or her friend, and so on. Especially with all the ears out there looking for information.

Had this been leaked from here, it likely would be a more accurate leak.

 

[DarrenTheGreek]

Anyone else find it comical that this writer rips on-line recruiting sites for spreading false information when he does the exact same thing by implying that the University football office had something to do with this?

 

[MilesTarver]

Anyone else find it comical that this writer rips on-line recruiting sites for spreading false information when he does the exact same thing by implying that the University football office had something to do with this?

if it wasn't the U, who was it?

there was an interview with him:

Three-star running back Marcus Coker has had to address plenty of rumors lately.

The most prominent false report involving the 6-foot-1, 222-pound junior from Hyattsville (Md.) DeMatha was that he committed to Minnesota recently.

Coker debunked that story promptly.

"It was just a misunderstanding between me and the coach," Coker said. "I told him I promised I would come up there but I'm not committed."

Its just one of the those weird situations where somebody reported based on a misunderstanding and others spread it like gospel.

he says flat out the misunderstanding was between him and brewster, not him and media. if brew has this misunderstanding with the kid...who else could have passed this information on?

 

[dinkything]

if it wasn't the U, who was it?

he says flat out the misunderstanding was between him and brewster, not him and media. if brew has this misunderstanding with the kid...who else could have passed this information on?

brewster's litany of embarrassing gaffes is enough to make joe biden blush...

 

[grunkiejr]

if it wasn't the U, who was it?

there was an interview with him:



he says flat out the misunderstanding was between him and brewster, not him and media. if brew has this misunderstanding with the kid...who else could have passed this information on?

This is very presumptious. His words are not that "it was between him and Brewster." The coach could be his high school coach. Remember that Brewster is not permitted to talk to the media about recruits and it is a part of his high school coach's job to talk to the media. His HS coach may have misunderstood his intentions or even more likely, the media representative misunderstood his HS coach.

 

[gopherguy05]

brewster's litany of embarrassing gaffes is enough to make joe biden blush...

Way to actually find out what happened instead of just blaming Brewster for something he probably didn't even do.


You don't have to like the guy, but please don't blame everything that happens in the world on him. The next thing you know the Gopher women's soccer team will lose a recruit and it will be Brewster's fault...

 

[GoAUpher]

Way to actually find out what happened instead of just blaming Brewster for something he probably didn't even do.


You don't have to like the guy, but please don't blame everything that happens in the world on him. The next thing you know the Gopher women's soccer team will lose a recruit and it will be Brewster's fault...

You're missing two . He can't understand you unless you end every paragraph with emoticons in triplicate.

 

[RodentRampage]

He says it was a misunderstanding between himself and Brewster, but is he correct? That sounds like he is speculating as to the reason this rumor came out.

 

[EG#9]

I'd love to know the upside to someone on/affiliated with the Gopher Football Staff leaking a commitment that did not exist. Local fans were excited (and some posters were even lukewarm on the kid) for less than 24 hours and then found out there was no commitment. If you can't come up with an upside for this, it's kind of difficult to believe the Gophers spread this rumor.

 

[Schlic Daddy]

brewster's litany of embarrassing gaffes is enough to make joe biden blush...

I really doubt Brewster is the one relaying the info to Rivals...that would be an obvious violation. Rivals gets its information from players and high school coaches and family members. I would guess, as grunkie said, the coach he was referring to was his high school coach.

 

[MilesTarver]

I really doubt Brewster is the one relaying the info to Rivals...that would be an obvious violation. Rivals gets its information from players and high school coaches and family members. I would guess, as grunkie said, the coach he was referring to was his high school coach.

you keep thinking that, schlic. the rest of us "get" how it works...but it's far better to be naive to the whole situation. less to worry about.

grunkie, you said he could of been referring to his hs coach, but it seems to me from these quotes that the hs coach was very clear, and knew what was going on the entire time from these comments:

"All he did was commit in his mind to a visit to go to Minnesota, that's what he committed to. He has not committed to go to Minnesota," DeMatha Coach Bill McGregor said. "I'm out of the office. [DeMatha trainer] Wendy [Norris] called me, saying, 'Have you heard about Marcus?' She said it was all over the Internet that he's going to Minnesota. But that's not what he committed to. I talked to his mother and she said he did not commit but that he committed to go to a visit to Minnesota.

he seemed to be the one clearing this whole matter up. so try again with another rational, go for it.

 

[ColNathanJessup]

I'm not sure you realize this but there are nine other coaches not including a recruiting coordinator whom most people call "coach." It is highly unlikely Brewster had anything to do with this.

Again, it was a misunderstanding with a nat'l writer. This happens about 130 times a year (at minimum). It's ridiculous trying to make more out of this than it is.

 

[RodentRampage]

We get how it works. Someone said something, but who? We can't assume it was Brewster, nor can we assume that it was anyone at Minnesota. Do we have any reason to assume that the HS coach and the player spoke to absolutely no one about this?

 

[Monty519]

Wouldn't surprise me if it wasn't made clear by Coker or McGregor that he was only committing to a visit and someone ran off with it. Media is a shaky thing anyway. One of the coaches here could have just said, we got this kid coming up here and someone says "COMMIT!" and it's over. That's why most of the media sucks lol.

 

[GopherGod]

I'm not sure you realize this but there are nine other coaches not including a recruiting coordinator whom most people call "coach." It is highly unlikely Brewster had anything to do with this.

Again, it was a misunderstanding with a nat'l writer. This happens about 130 times a year (at minimum). It's ridiculous trying to make more out of this than it is.

It wouldn't really matter if it was the head coach, assistant coach, or recruiting coordinator, either way it is not permitted and the head coach and program are held liable for the actions of assistant coaches. By the way why are we wasting a six figure salary on a "coach" who is not a coach but merely a recruiting coordinator, when most other programs have these recruiting responsibilities covered by an actual position coach. It seems that the money could better be spent on attracting higher level coaches.

 

[GoAUpher]

It wouldn't really matter if it was the head coach, assistant coach, or recruiting coordinator, either way it is not permitted and the head coach and program are held liable for the actions of assistant coaches. By the way why are we wasting a six figure salary on a "coach" who is not a coach but merely a recruiting coordinator, when most other programs have these recruiting responsibilities covered by an actual position coach. It seems that the money could better be spent on attracting higher level coaches.

No one said it was permitted, they we just responding to the silly accusation that of course, it HAD to be Brewster b/c no one else could be called coach.

 

[ColNathanJessup]

No one said it was permitted, they we just responding to the silly accusation that of course, it HAD to be Brewster b/c no one else could be called coach.

Like he said, someone else intimated that just because the dude said "coach" it automatically meant Brewster.

The truth is we have absolutely NO idea how the miscommunication occurred and between whom. But having read about 100,000 recruiting articles in my time, my guess is the person most responsible for this is the Mike Farrell, the Rivals writer who misunderstood someone and was wrong. Again, this happens a hundred times a year.

You're obsession that this would/could lead to "NCAA sanctions" (your words) indicates to me that you have some sort of agenda that is not based in any sort of reality at all. On a list of 1-100 of things we should worry about our program, this ranks 195th.

 

[amateurdwarftosser]

A misunderstnading between him and the coach. Could have been his HS coach, coach Brewster, a position coach, a graduate assistant coach, his pop warner coach...who knows? Either way, he's coming here for a visit..