Everett Golson spoke to Bruce Feldman about why he transferred to Florida State from Notre Dame and, quite honestly, didn’t really shed any clarity on the situation. I mean, he gave the interview in San Diego at George Whitfield’s QB camp while wearing Notre Dame gear and studying Florida State’s playbook with his ex-teammate, Amir Carlisle. Yes, that’s all as weird as it sounds.
But out of the strange explanations that Golson delivered to Feldman, quite a few folks seemed to latch on to this nugget:
Another option Golson had considered, Texas, also was out of the picture. The Longhorns, who have had QB issues for a couple of seasons now, actually open the 2015 season against ND in South Bend. According to Golson, ND wasn’t going to release him to Texas. Sources told FOX Sports UT had interest in Golson, and he was intrigued by the ‘Horns, especially since Charlie Strong’s coaching staff had developed Teddy Bridgewater into a first-round draft pick.
“I would’ve definitely entertained it, but just knowing that I couldn’t, it kinda limited me,” Golson said. “It was pretty awkward, but it was kind of expected. It would’ve been interesting to see Texas. They (Notre Dame) basically limited me to the schools that we wouldn’t play. I wasn’t really surprised by it.”
Asked about his reaction when he heard that Notre Dame AD Jack Swarbrick denied talk that the school blocked any of Golson’s transfer options, the 22-year-old said: “I just kinda left it alone. The biggest thing for me was I wanted to be somewhere down south, too. They didn’t necessarily block me from something I was strongly considering, except maybe Texas.”
The “few folks” certainly included Feldman himself, whom wished to back up his initial report claiming the block to Texas in play, but he certainly wasn’t the only one. Fox Sports re-trumepted it, the Austin-American Statemen latched on, and CollegeSpun were among the many outlets that pounced on the quote.
While, I certainly don’t begrudge any outlet that ran such a story in the least, I do find it funny a bit funny that so much is being made about this. The competing quotes from Golson and Swarbrick boils down to semantics. The best part, the Fox Sports re-trumpeting said as much:
This is all semantics on Swarbrick’s part. His quote dances around the issue and puts the onus on Golson by saying ND didn’t deny any school that Golson identified as one he’s interested in. Notre Dame asked Golson for a list of 10 schools he would consider — that also met Notre Dame’s approval, by the way — and Swarbrick spun it as, “See? These are the 10 schools Everett identified he was interested in. We didn’t block any of them.”
The insinuation that Golson’s list required some kind of ND pre-approval is hilarious speculation at best and an inflammatory accusation at worst. That claim, by the way, is in the same article that later says “[u]ltimately, none of this is a huge deal”, even though the headline and hot take suggest otherwise.
Golson is telling the truth. So is Swarbrick. As I said before, I don’t really care that folks are running with this, but it really speaks to a larger issue or, more accurately the current environment of sports media as a whole: nuance has no place at the table.
The opinions must be black or white. Shades of gray simply don’t work. You have to take a side, provoke a reaction. If you try to look for the middle ground, you’ve failed. As someone that runs a blog, I know that the hard truth is that a one-sided opinion generates more clicks and comments than trying to examine something at all angles. Or to put it another way: this is why Skip Bayless is making money hand over fist at ESPN despite failing to hold on to practically every possible respectable sports publication job in DFW.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with going about writing this way either. Some of my favorite posts that I’ve written are ones where I’ve FJM’d some particularly terrible takes or ones where I’ve drawn a line in the sand myself to make a point. The problem comes when folks feel the need to do this for every little thing as the end result leads to incomplete reporting.
The limited information provided by Feldman in regards to Golson’s Texas comments leaves so many unanswered questions. Would he really be willing to face his old teammates and in his old home stadium in front of 80,000-plus that used to cheer him on? Golson switched from “interesting to see Texas” to “strongly considering…maybe” in his quote–I would have loved for him to expand on his level of interest and if he thought Texas could’ve been a serious contender.
There’s a lot of ground to explore there from the psyche of an athlete trying to make one last push to the NFL to the graduate transfer process itself and how schools handle it. Instead, the whole thing just felt like a “told you so” moment. Of all stories to try and play that card, one based purely on semantics is eye-roll inducing.
The Roundup
Tonight will be my final show on the DFW airwaves. The show will go on, but in podcast form; however, let’s have one last hurrah. If you are in the DFW area, tune in on 1160 AM at 6pm CT. Streaming is available via the TuneIn radio app (search for KVCE) and on the web at KVCE’s website. I may even throw up a Periscope stream during breaks or during the broadcast as well. My show will be replaced by KVCE’s show dedicated to veteran outreach and issues which is called Alliance 4 the Brave which currently runs Monday-Thursday in my timeslot. So while I’m a little bummed to be stepping back, allowing that show another hour in the week to run instead is something I’m pretty happy about. I want to thank everyone for your support and I look forward to continue to show via the wonders of the Internet.
Friendly reminder: Irish baseball starts their postseason today. It’s been a long time since we could say that, so be sure to check out ESPN3 via WatchESPN at 1pm ET today. One Foot Down has a solid primer for what you need to know about the game as well.
Adidas part 2? Under Armour reportedly wants to lure Texas away from Nike and wants to do so to the tune of $150 million over 10 years, topping the ND deal. According to that post, the source of said news is Chip Brown. If you do not remember Chip, allow me to remind you how wrong he can be when it comes such matters. Mark me in the camp of believing the CEO of a publicly traded company doesn’t show up to ND’s campus and speak at a presser to say ND will be the marque school only to go back on that statement in a year for a program that does have a large market, albeit a regional one. Ask the Longhorn Network how that gamble has worked out (apologies in advance for linking Clay Travis, but there’s actual reporting there).
Michigan Man goes Shabazz Napier. Jabril Peppers went on a Twitter rant to claim his summer stipend checks were insufficient to allow him to eat right. Remember what I said earlier about nuance not having a place at the table? Here’s another example. Peppers, in his own tweets, makes mention that he should’ve stayed in the dorms. Room and board is covered on full athletic scholarships. Off-campus housing is covered in the stipend, but only to the level of equivalent housing arrangements on campus (e.g. if you live in a two bedroom apartment, you get what a two bedroom dorm/suite on campus will cost). There is potential to pocket money if the apartment is cheaper than on-campus housing; however going the other way means that stipend check needs to be stretched out big time. But hey, let’s use 140 character tweets to serve as the meat of the reporting!
This headline is becoming far too common. “College football player arrested for domestic abuse” is something I can do without in my life. This time the offender is Jevonte Domond of LSU who stands accused of choke-slamming his fiancée while she leaned over the crib of their newborn baby.
And now your moment of Nix… Don’t drink and tweet, kids.
The Booze
In honor of the constant flooding in the DFW area and Garrick Sherman’s drunk tweets, I present the Irish Flood (via):
- 2 oz Bailey’s
- 2 oz Kahlua
- 4 oz Dark Rum
Can be served in a 6 oz glass to create your own flood or a glass that will actually fit the ingredients so you don’t waste booze.
- Epilogue - January 3, 2022
- HLS Podcast Finale - January 2, 2022
- The Final Fiesta: Notre Dame vs Oklahoma State NCAA ’14 Sim - December 31, 2021
trey
Dont drink and text…but if you WANT to drink, here’s a recipe. Funny placement of those two topics. 😉