We've been doing this thing for a bit now called "The Argument." Pretty simple: one topic, two sides -- and I mediate. With signing day 2010 in the rearview, let's discuss something that crops up all the time: an early signing period.
Making the case for an early signing period is Arizona State Sun Devils recruiting coordinator Matt Lubick.
LUBICK'S TAKE
Nowadays with recruiting, things start earlier and earlier -- so before kids start their senior years, they've already been on roughly four or five unofficial campus visits. Many kids are prepared to make a decision; having that earlier signing period would alleviate a lot of the pressure on the kid and on the school. You could fill your numbers and feel good about it.
Guys are doing more and more junior days and getting out to camps, so he can make a good decision. To me, the only bad thing about the early signing day is that it could make people make decisions too fast without really going through the evaluation process. Kids are still developing. But I think if you have an early signing period it would be for those "no doubters" -- those kids who you know, without question, that you want in your program.
And now, making the case against an early signing period is Duke Blue Devils head coach David Cutcliffe.
CUTCLIFFE'S TAKE
The only way that I would favor -- and the only way it makes any sense -- is if there's a kid that wants to sign, you can give him five days in the first part of August, but don't change the process to make official visits or to change so there's contact periods in the spring.
That's a zoo for high schools to start doing contacts in the spring -- then you'll have 100 coaches pulling your kids out of class. So if you keep the process, and the kid has been on your campus four or five times, and if he wants to put his money where his mouth is, go ahead and sign. Then we wouldn't get so many early commitments that aren't true. Some of these kids commit like it's a bird in the hand and then go shop themselves, and that's just not a good way to do business.
The biggest problem with it is you're looking at kids who, at the most, have only had six semesters of their academic work done. A lot of things can happen. A lot of kids don't have a valid test score in, so you're opening up a can of worms.
And we're going to be recruiting 10th graders then and contacting kids so much earlier and earlier. Somewhere in there you have to just stop it.
Plus, you have situations where coaches have won nine games and gotten replaced. It's kinda like the playoff thing, where it all sounds really good when you just argue it, but there's a lot of logistics involved in charging our calendar and messing with a lot of things that have worked pretty well for a lot of year that people don't take into consideration.
It's also another chance for a coach to get fired. People will say, "Hey, look, he didn't recruit well early."
