The Sock 'Em, Bust 'Em Board Because that's our custom

This won’t be fun at all, am I wrong?

June 13, 2012 by Mike Casazza

I once stared at another picture of this very scene for a few minutes and could only imagine the conversation. They could really be saying anything and I have no doubt that was the reality, too.

Well, Crystal Ball Run invites you to a “Caption this!” contest and I think it’s one you can get behind and push toward the finish. In fact, I’m going to be disappointed if we you don’t win this competition.

All you’ve got to do is go down to the comments section, and give us the best caption for this picture. It can be serious, funny, absurd, whatever, just as long as it’s not vulgar, we’ll accept it. And after a few days we’ll pick a winner of the best caption on this picture, with the winner will receive a free copy of the new West Virginia football book “Waiting For Next Year” by Mike Casazza, on us. It’s that easy, that simple, and the book can be yours.

It’s not looking good for Elijah Macon

by Mike Casazza

Even before Matt Humphrey joined the WVU men’s basketball roster yesterday, there was at least realistic concern as to whether Elijah Macon could get himself right in the classroom in time to play for the Mountaineers.

I mean, way before yesterday.

But with Humphrey joining — and more on him in a moment — WVU now has 13 players enrolled who are on scholarship. That’s the NCAA maximum and that’s not a problem until you realize Macon, the top-rated recruit in WVU’s 2012 class, is not in that baker’s dozen.

Reason being? He’s back home in Columbus, Ohio, re-taking three of his core courses so he can replace three lower core grades. That would, ideally, raise his GPA which would then lower the target he has to hit on the ACT he took June 9. It’s not impossible, but certainly it’s not what one would call promising, either.

“I think everyone can be cautiously optimistic, but every college coach has a responsibility to do what’s in the best interest of his team,” Fulford said. “If there’s a kid out there who’s ready to go and he’s a good player – and obviously they do need a shooter, so it’s a good pick-up – I think you can understand making a decision that helps the team.

“But if Elijah makes it, they’ll figure it out. If he qualifies, he’ll have a scholarship.”

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Look for a moment, then move on

June 12, 2012 by Mike Casazza

Joe Alexander remains near the top of the list of people who I cover(ed) and I most enjoy talking to. The list is fluid. It fluctuates. There were times he was No. 1. He might be there again after the very brief conversation we had over the weekend at the WVU fantasy camp.

Asked how he was doing, his pulse soared to about 23 beats perminute and he eased out, “Living. Chillin’. Trying to stay alive.” Naturally. What else is that guy doing? 

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Dana Holgorsen answers important question

by Mike Casazza

A little more than 14 months ago, I sat down with Dana Holgorsen for the first time and we had a conversation that’s going to be hard for me to ever shake.

Not that I’d ever want to.

It was nothing especially remarkable as far as football or strategy or direction was concerned, but it was nevertheless memorable. We touched on all sorts of things, things that would really never carry over to the field. It was more like talking for the first time to someone you were going to share office space with or someone who was moving into the apartment across the hall.

I mean, this was basically his handshake that morning.

“Which is better?” he asked inside his office earlier this month. “The meatball sub at Varsity Club or the stuffed meatball at Stefano’s?”

This is symbolic of nothing relevant to football, which he finally gets his hands on Wednesday in the first of WVU’s 15 spring practices. This is comparing the merits of Morgantown’s eateries and is not to be confused with mastering NCAA compliance or familiarizing himself with a new roster.

This is just the way Holgorsen has gotten to know a place that is still getting to know him … and it’s been a pretty important part of his new life.

“That meatball sub is pretty good,” he said. “The stuffed meatball comes in a bowl by itself with some sauce. They call it an appetizer, but it’s pretty much a meal.”

I remember saying I’d had the sub and my wife once had the meatball, so I’d have to go with the sub. I don’t recall him ever giving me an answer.

Until now.

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Hamsterdam!

by Mike Casazza

The NCAA Division I manual is 426 pages thick, which is ridiculous, especially when you consider that it refreshes and expands every year and that every head coach or assistant coach has to pass a test of random questions so that they may go out and recruit.

I’ve been told many times the topic is tricky, but the test is not. I wonder, though, if that’s changing, what with the way the rules are changing now. I mean, suppose you know all there is to know about permissible and impermissible contact during all stages of the recruiting calender. Yet you also think you’re allowed to travel 50 miles off campus to entertain a recruit on an official visit, when in reality the limit is 30 miles.

Or maybe you think it’s 20 and you blow the whistle on rival schools traveling 28 miles — and don’t think schools aren’t lining up to out other schools and sometimes get the rule wrong.

And that’s only part of the problem. It seems the real trouble is that while the book is growing with pace, it’s being outpaced by clever minds that find ways to go around the rules and still stay within the rules.

And, of course, there are people who bust break the rules, some rather brazenly, and either hope they never get caught or attempt to hide behind the size and abiguity of the rulebook.

Seriously, google “bump rule,” or better yet, the “Saban rule,” and feast your rolling eyes on that confusion.

Still, there are so many ways to get in and out of trouble, either innocently or maliciously, that the problem has become not the intent or the application of the legislation, but the actual volume of legislation.

So what’s the solution for the NCAA, which is simultaneously seeking to protect prospective student-athletes by actively discouraging interactions between fans and recruits, but is about to let basketball coaches make unlimited phone calls and send unlimited text messages to recruits that have completed their sophomore years?

Interesting question and, as far as WVU is concerned, a really interesting answer.

“I hope,” said Ryan Dorchester, WVU’s coordinator of recruiting operations, “there’s some deregulation on a lot of stuff.”

If you think Dorchester is some sort of rebel, you’d be right as long as you consider Mark Emmert, the guy who runs the NCAA, to be the leader of the rebellion. He wants to review the NCAA Division I Manual and help it lose a few pounds.

So, yes, in so many ways, the best way to help with governance is to eliminate rules.

“Some of the rules that govern contact – how you can get a hold of a prospect, the phone call limitations, all that stuff – with Facebook and email, communication is virtually seamless now,” Dorchester said.

“But you’ve still got rules that say when a kid can call you but you can’t call them. I just think you need to do away with a lot of it. It’s just unnecessary rules, in my opinion, and makes it harder than it needs to be.”

WVU football early enrollees

June 11, 2012 by Mike Casazza

Here are the first-year players who arrived over the weekend and went to class today …

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Noel Devine explains actions of Noel Devine

by Mike Casazza

You’ll remember when Noel Devine was scooped up in the speed-and-talent sweep the Philadelphia Eagles conducted last summer. They were collecting all these toys on both sides of the ball and Devine was particularly provocative because — well, he’s Noel Devine.

My goodness, the potential with pro coaches who could sit around and design a play or a package to best utilize his wonderful gifts. So fast. So breathtakingly elusive.

And a little mercurial, too. He simply walked out of training camp after but a few days and, as one might suspect, never had another NFL team tap him on the shoulder. The Omaha Nighthawks, of the four-team UFL, did and Devine made it through, which seems a small detail, but was nevertheless a big matter he had to settle.

Walk out on a team and you have prove certain things to certain people. Theories abound as to why Devine left the Eagles, why he left the NFL. Devine, now with the Montreal Alouettes, who are as happy to have him as was YouTube, explained his action.

Undrafted, Devine signed with the Philadelphia Eagles as a free agent in 2011, but walked out on the team after four days. He was struggling mentally after the sudden death of another friend, Alonzo Stewart, 24, a robbery victim who was shot and killed last July. Stewart, Devine said, was like a brother to him.

“I wasn’t focused. I just needed time away from the game,” said Devine, who eventually signed with Omaha of the UFL. “I’m blessed and fortunate to have a second opportunity to redeem myself and play the game I love. I want to continue to make my mother proud. She’s my [guardian] angel.”

Obviously, no F Double today

June 8, 2012 by Mike Casazza

I’m writing this as quickly as I can, not because I have somewhere to go, but because I have no idea how long this portal will be open for me this morning. Meanwhile, “Rabbit Run” plays on Pandora and serves as my shot clock. So, no, no Friday Feedback today. Not enough posts or comments this week because of the Internet problems at Charleston Newspapers and no trust from me in the Internet there sustaining throughout the time I need to write one.

Sorry for the hassles and for wasting your time this week. I’m told it’s better, but we’ll see. Just a few things to pass on that we didn’t get into here this week:

1) Randy Mazey: Baseball coach with the full faith and support of the WVU athletic department. This includes the one still unexplained blemish on his otherwise fine resume.

Mazey said he felt comfortable with WVU’s plans to improve its baseball program.

“First and foremost, they’ve made a commitment to being good in the Big 12,” he said. “They’ve made a commitment to the finances, which is a huge part of this, and the commitment to facilities is a huge part of it. They’ve made commitments across the board.

“This isn’t going to be a one-man show. It’s going to take a lot of people, and so far the administration at West Virginia has been great at providing what I feel is necessary to compete where we’re trying to compete.”

2) Remember Krystal Forthan? In May, I wrote this about her and about Mike Carey’s success with transfers as WVU’s women’s basketball coach.

“We’ve been fortunate,” Carey said. “We do our homework and try to figure out if it’s a good fit and if there’s a good feel. And we have to have a need.  If we have a need for that position, then we want them to be good people and we want them to fit. We don’t want a transfer in here that doesn’t fit with the rest of the players and upsets the whole program.”

That story also included this from Carey: ” “She is a very talented player who will add instant notoriety to WVU women’s basketball.” Bingo! I’m weird like this, but notoriety is one of the most incorrectly used words we have. It refers to the quality or state of being notorious, so unless Forthan was a rapper from Brooklyn, it didn’t really fit here.

Or did it? Because right on freaking cue, Forthan has given up her scholarship and basketball and school so she may pursue modeling.

3) Ryan Dorchester, a man of many changes in his almost eight years at WVU as a undergraduate student, manager, graduate student, graduate assistant and now man of import, says things really haven’t changed of late. He has a bigger paycheck and a new title as the coordinator of recruiting operations, but recruiting is recruiting.

“I don’t know if there’s a secret, a hidden edge that you can find because I think it’s very well-noted and very well-covered, but what you can do is be thorough,” he said.

And so Holgorsen includes a question with just about every discussion about a prospect: “Why?”

“As in, ‘Why do you like this kid? Why is this kid better than the other kid?'” Dorchester said. “You’ve got to be able to back it up with something other than, ‘Just because.’ You can’t go with, ‘He’s going to be a great ballplayer. He’d be a great fit.’

“Those are cliché terms. You have to point to specific stuff to explain what you think. You’ve got to be able to base your opinion on something.”

Now, the Mountaineers are trying to find areas they can exploit and have made something out of a player’s senior highlights and — I did not ask Dorchester to say this — local newspapers!

4) Book! Keep working the Father’s Day Special for Waiting For The Fall. Had a few so far and they’re sentimental, except the one fella who used the inscription to confess to something from his childhood. I promised to keep it a secret, but the guy unlocked the potential of this idea.

5) Book!! College Football Zealots have a website, obviously, as well as a live radio show. They invited me on for noon today to talk WFTF and WVU football, and I’m sure we’ll steer off the road a time or two, too. You can listen live, or afterward, at this link. If you have half a chance, you grab it. Rabbit run.

Let’s talk and dream a little bit

June 6, 2012 by Mike Casazza

Meant to hit this yesterday, but the Internet broke in Charleston and I wasn’t able to get around to it — though that ends up being a good thing, I think. Anyhow, I wrote a column for Tuesday wrapping up the Big 12 Conference meetings and forwarding what I strongly suspect is the next wave of expansion. This was included:

Teams from the ACC might soon understand finances and football are attached and are much more appealing in the Big 12 – and let’s not kid ourselves and pretend Florida State and Clemson aren’t much farther down the road than they’re presenting themselves to be.

Similarly, the Big 12 may soon accept that the best way for its football teams to make the national semifinals, either in the top-four or the three-plus-one format, and compete regularly for a national title is to have 12 teams, a strong conference strength of schedule and a title game to convince both the computers and the humans it is a top-four conference with a top-four team – or two top four teams.

The easiest way to bolster the Big 12 may very well be to weaken the ACC. This is the playoff before the playoff, though the principle is the same: Survive and advance.

Well, it jumped up a notch. It did, didn’t it?

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Randy Mazey accepts WVU baseball task

by Mike Casazza

First reported by @FollowTheFrogs yesterday and then some time later confirmed to me by once-skeptical sources yesterday, TCU associate head coach Randy Mazey has been named WVU’s new baseball coach.

I admit I don’t devote the focus to baseball as much as perhaps I should, and I kind of hate coaching searches, but this one obviously had my ear. Last week I wrote the search was tricky and that was about the time I’d heard Mazey would interview and that WVU was  happy to get it, but that WVU was probably under the impression Mazey was, well, too good for the job.  The Horned Frogs have a pretty vibrant program.

Days later, he’s the WVU coach — and what a resume he has.

Press conference at 2 p.m. and, I don’t know, I guess we’ll have plenty to discuss with him.