The Lions' Pride

Good post. I agree completely.

Been saying this for a long time. Nothing good can come of contacting recruits through social media.

When you do, stuff like this happens (NSFW, language).

I know this topic has been beaten to death, but I haven't really chimed in yet, so here's my two cents that's probably already been stated a hundred times.

It's amazing to me that this has to be said even once, much less repeatedly because it apparently continues to be an issue. I don't have a Twitter account, nor do I plan to have one - the whole craze actually really annoys me for the most part. Can't watch CNN or the four letter network for 10 minutes without hearing "Twitter" or "tweet" 15 times. If you want to have an account, great. Even if you feel the need to follow 17 yr olds on it, ok. But how hard is it to not interact with them? I, admittedly, do enjoy the Twitter thread for updates on AB recruiting for us or RD plugging our program, so thanks to those who update it. I assume, and hope, that those who do that only follow the recruits and do not directly interact with them. This is such a stupid problem with such a simple solution. I just can't wait to see what new, ridiculous social media platform follows Twitter. What oh what will they think of next.....

Yep, and I'll be more blunt. When you contact a recruit via social media to try to persuade him to come to your school, you are...

1. Doing something illiegal by NCAA standards.

2. Likely harming your school's chance of landing that recuit.

3. Being very, very creepy.

It also doesn't matter if the kid 'encourages' fans to tweet him or responds to facebook posts. We're the adults. They're the kids. We should know better. Anyone who claims that it's completely innocent is fooling himself.

There is a whole lot of right in this thread. Agree with all. I have been on twitter for about 4 months now following all my favorite athletes, entertainers, etc (yes, including some recruits) but I have yet to even make a tweet and certainly dont plan on it.

I agree in the respect that adults should most certainly not be contacting these kids. That's ridiculous In fact, I think it's stupid for ANYONE to contact people on twitter that they don't know just because they feel "cool" as if they are actually having a dialogue with someone "famous."

With that said.....what do these kids think is going to happen when they open themselves up to this? Like I said, NOT suggesting people should contact them...but there's always an idiot or two in any crowd. Just because a PSU fan may contact a recruit doesn't mean the other million PSU fans are stalkers and PSU should be removed because of it.

I mean let's be real.....many of these kids do the twitter thing and eat up the recruiting thing exactly for attention. It shouldn't be shocking when it gets out of control to any of them. To me, they just have to be strong enough and mature enough to be able to separate the situations and people. Otherwise, don't create a twitter account....don't play the media game yourself if you aren't willing to accept you will face delusional fans at some point: whether in college or the pros if you make it.

I get the "we are adults, they are kids" argument.....but we're talking about 17 year olds, not 8 year olds. At that age they should be mature enough to know they are setting themselves up for situations as well and shouldn't be so quick to pass the blame onto others.

It's almost like the "girls who dress sluttty" argument. Yes they don't deserve to be mistreated or stared at....but they certainly aren't helping the situation.

Just my opinion on this whole thing.

It might be prudent for the coaches to just mention to the recruits that they want to discourage fans from interacting with recruits.

Is the fame really that "sudden" though? I bet most of these upper level "kids" with the big time offers and the twitter pages have known it was coming all along. Many of them have probably been getting the star treatment for years already by their parents, friends, coaches, etc... Probably since they were 10 years old and showed some above average skills. I bet they ate up that attention back then, and now that there is all this social media networking available, they find that as another avenue to soak it up even more. They find it's a way to build a fan base before they are even out there in that big public eye.

For me, it all comes down to the parenting and home-life with these kids. Do they have enough stability underneath them to know the situation they are putting themselves into when making THEMSELVES public like that? Do the parents realize the dangers of this? Do their coaches? It's one thing if you create a Facebook page where only your friends have access too. It's another when you create a more public situation that anyone can have access to.

I have to think most of these HS juniors and seniors realize that they are creating the twitter accounts for the attention. They either a) underestimate that stupidity from others may come with it or b) don't care, unless it gets out of control. Who's to say the negativity that they get on their own account IS coming from an adult? Who's to say it's not just another teenager who happens to be a fan of OSU or PSU?

I don't know......I'm just not so quick to pass the blame off of these kids as others may be. Yes they don't deserve psycho's coming into the situation.....but they aren't exactly helping themselves by throwing themselves out there as well. NOT saying Anzalone is one of those kids, since I never once read a tweet of his. Just speaking in general.

A HS senior who goes out on a Friday night to the mall with her friends, with a little short mini skirt on, has to know someone, at some point someone is going to stare inappropriately. She can't cry foul play because a 25 year old at the mall stared her down. Should the "adult" do that? Of course not. But the kid didn't help herself out much and was being silly if she didn't expect someone in the crowd to be dumb.

I would love to see Anthony Bennett get a hold of that kid and rip his acl out threw his neck. That kid is pretty close to the worst human being ive ever seen. Get a life!

Maybe you are that young...I don't know. I wasn't as mature at 17 as I am in my late 30's. It's pretty simple to stay away from HS kids on social networks for most grounded adults, it really is.

I don't think I said anything about it not being simple to stay away from HS kids on social networks. So maybe you're misreading my posts.

I'm talking about the kids themselves and taking a LITTLE responsibility for creating their sites and allowing strangers to comment to them. NONE of them deserve creepers coming to their sites, I've never suggested otherwise. I'm simply stating they cannot be surprised when it happens, nor should they cast an entire community aside because of that one or two creeper when they are the one's who allowed themselves to be in that public forum to begin with. (Them meaning the kids allowed themselves to be open to receiving those types of comments from others)