Recruiting: Conway Springs
July 15, 2008 @ 10:00 a.m. by Joannaby joanna
I went out to Conway Springs this morning to spend a little time with Jaydan Bird — no surprise, I’m writing a story on the Oklahoma signee for the upcoming season. I watched the Cardinals during their conditioning. I was exhausted just watching the sprints.
Coach Lelin George and I started talking about what Bird’s recruiting.
Since he’s already committed, it does cut down on the calls from coaches, but George told me that in the spring, he got a call from an Arkansas booster. This booster was trying to find out if Bird was going to Arkansas. George said that the guy told him he’d heard that and wanted to hear it from George.
I was flabbergasted. I mean, what’s a booster doing calling a high school coach to find out where a kid is going to school. I’m sure this isn’t unusual, but it’s a little ridiculous. George told him he had no idea, then an Arkansas sportswriter called and asked him the same question.
But this is the time we live in — and have lived in for awhile. Where college football is huge and recruiting info is everywhere, from rivals.com to scout.com to fan blogs. It’s everywhere.
One of the funnier moments of the morning was hearing a story about Cardinals linebacker Corey Sones. His grandpa is Ward Sones, a former Conway Springs mayor and one of my most favorite people. He’s one of the reasons I love covering Conway Springs games. Anyway, it turns out that Ward beat his grandson in arm wrestling this past Christmas. So I asked Corey about it. Corey, who has SONES tattooed on the back of his right arm, said, yep, it was true. He did clarify that Ward put his whole body into it — so there’s an expected rematch at Christmas.
