dontae aycock visits auburn

JTS said:
I don't know the exact details, but this screams double standard.

If this is a question of character, then why do we want Shaw, Wright, or Hill? They broke their commitments to come here. The only difference is that some other school got screwed over.

Remember this kid made a SILENT commitment to us and the next day it is splashed all over the internet that he committed to us. How did that information get out? Would that be considered a violation of trust?

How do you ask one kid to back out of a commitment and say it's okay then turn around and tell another that they can't even go on a visit?
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All I can figure is that this is different because he made a "deal" with CPJ when asked point blank if he would take anymore visits. They told Dontae that they were dropping other kids since he was committed and wanted assurances no other visits would be taken. He told the coaches that he was done with his visits.
Then again...they talked to him before the Auburn visit and reminded them of their agreement. They told him...again...before he left they would pull his scholarship offer if he went on the visit. He went anyway.

I am not sure there are too many deals out there made with recruits. Unless it is late in the recruiting period...such as this case.

I never would have made a deal like this with someone I thought was the most important recruit in the class...but I am not a college football coach either...so what do I know.
 
I believe the news got out about his silent or secret commitment to us via his high school's coaches comment in a Tampa newspaer article a couple of days ago. Many of us had heard the rumor, but that was the first time I had actually seen it in print. What confounds me is that it seems strange that Dontae would in an interview just after his visit with us would have mentioned that he was still pondering the possiblity of another visit after having made such a promise to our coaches. Something about all of this leads me to believe maybe there is something more to the story, but I have no idea what.
 
Well, Kodi Burns is from Ft Smith and I think you'll see this year that Arkansas somehow survived without him so it probably isn't all that big a deal in the long run.
 
GTRock said:
I believe the news got out about his silent or secret commitment to us via his high school's coaches comment in a Tampa newspaer article a couple of days ago. Many of us had heard the rumor, but that was the first time I had actually seen it in print. What confounds me is that it seems strange that Dontae would in an interview just after his visit with us would have mentioned that he was still pondering the possiblity of another visit after having made such a promise to our coaches. Something about all of this leads me to believe maybe there is something more to the story, but I have no idea what.
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I am thinking his public comments following the visit was all of the drama he was being told by his brother to try and create for a signing day announcement.

Apparently his brother, Dwight Smith, is the one giving him all of the bad advice...even his own high school said in the paper that Dontae did not make the best decision for him.

Also...his brother apparently is the one that initiated getting Auburn involved.

Remember that Dontae does not live with his parents....he lives with a guardian. Dwight Smith is the only immediate family he has from what I gather.
 
I'm proud of our coaches for standing by their word. I can see how some of you would scream double standard, and it may very well be, but if a kid is told what will happen if he does something, he should be prepared for it to happen and should expect it. He chose to go, so he effectively chose to back out of his scholly. IMO, with the coaching change at Auburn, maybe a longer leash would have been nice, but I don't know what was said between Aycock and staff and with the quick pull of the scholly I have to think theres more than just what meets the eye.
 
gmlane said:
I can see it as a timing issue. If Perkins felt like taking a visit to Ole Miss in a few weeks, I highly doubt anyone would notice, let alone care. His visiting a school would not screw us in the least bit.

The fact that a "committed" prospect is taking a visit 3-4 days before signing day is a completely different thing. Imagine if CPJ doesn't give the ultimatum. Aycock takes his visit, likes it, but waits for Wednesday to announce his final decision. That is a 100% screwjob because we had a scholarship with his name on it.

Now, at least, there are a couple of days to figure out other options for that scholarship.
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+1
 
Then I guess it's not as big a double standard as I thought. And I guess Hill deciding not to visit UGA was a lot more important than I realized.
 
From what I can gather I think the timing of it is the most important thing. In the articles mentioned above this "silent commitment" was made weeks ago. Yet less than a week before signing day this recruit decides to visit another school. Even if the recruit wasn't at all interested in Auburn, he better of told the coaches so. If he was then I can't entirely blame the coaches. This recruit had told us he was signing, made us hold a scholarship for him, then turned out to not really be that interested in us. I mean it's not like this guy is an amazing country-spanning recruitment player who fan pull hats out of bags with as much drama as Favors did.

On a side note, it does seem like his brother was trying to influence him in a way I think is a bad idea. I'm not trying to agree with his coach, but I think the player should be the one deciding where he plays, not the bother trying to get him to go where the brother thinks Aycock has the best chance to get into the NFL.
 
beej67 said:
Then I guess it's not as big a double standard as I thought. And I guess Hill deciding not to visit UGA was a lot more important than I realized.
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Hindsight may be 20/20. Aycock may turn out to be the greatest football player of all time and if so we will regret of course. If not, consider that this action has made it MUCH, MUCH more difficult for future recruits to play games with us.

As far as future recruits delaying committments because of this, the coaches will continue to set deadlines and they will continue to work.

Obviously it would be hypocritical for PJ to call out Chizik or Auburn for stealing recruits when he has done the same. I have not seen that. It would be poor form to invite unoffered players to visit if that would cost them a scholarship somewhere else. Neither GT nor Auburn has been accused of that.

I understand that we set some conditions as part of the verbal committment. I would expect nothing less than pulling the scholarship as a direct result of the commit violating the terms. That cannot be hypocritical, it is the definition of consistency.

The only question is 'is it hypocritical for one of the conditions to be for a commit to not visit other schools when we allow others' verbal commitments to visit us?' I think that comes down to it is up to OTHER schools to set the conditions for a verbal. I would be shocked if PJ would continue to recruit a player that he knew was sneaking around on a commitment, because it would show a lack of character. I would be very surprised if any of the mentioned players who changed to GT were not aboveboard with both sets of coaches from the beginning. But who really knows...
 
GTCrew said:
The only question is 'is it hypocritical for one of the conditions to be for a commit to not visit other schools when we allow others' verbal commitments to visit us?'
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Clearly not. Its up to the recruit to end the recruiting process.

I fully expect and have no problem with coaches from any school contacting any recruit until the LOI is executed. That's why they call it recruiting. The only problem I have is when a coach continues to pursue a recruit when the recruit has requested that he no longer be contacted.

We have a rich history of both last-minute steals and last-minute losses. Until signing day, its recruiting.
 
I would be shocked if PJ would continue to recruit a player that he knew was sneaking around on a commitment, because it would show a lack of character.
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Marcus Wright?
 
If the recruit is open to being swayed then there is nothing whatsoever wrong with it.

I guarantee you that CPJ had no problem with UGA's late overture to Stephen Hill. It didn't bother me at all. I would have felt sick if we had lost him and was very proud when we didn't. But its not fair to hold these kids to a commitment when they want to reconsider. The school can pull the offer and that is all the recourse they are entitled to.
 
The deal was that he broke a promise he made with CPJ.

In short, HE LIED TO CPJ's FACE.
 
We told him that we would keep his commitment silent. Did we lie to him?
 
Here's another thing I don't understand. We are willing to wait on Tate, but not Aycock. I'm pretty sure that we would take Aycock as a QB or a RB. So why did we feel it was necessary to hard ball the kid?
 
JTS said:
Here's another thing I don't understand. We are willing to wait on Tate, but not Aycock. I'm pretty sure that we would take Aycock as a QB or a RB. So why did we feel it was necessary to hard ball the kid?
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tate did not commit to us and tell us he wouldnt visit anywhere else.

Aycock did.
 
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