01-07-2012, 08:16 AM
In a situation like this, it seems appropriate to report that if a recruit is admitted to a school, that is where he will attend. And leave it at that. Because then if the recruit goes somewhere other than the place he would go if admitted, it's obvious he wasn't admitted to where he would have gone if admitted, but nobody has to explicitly say he wasn't admitted, kid of a wink, wink. But even that delves into whether someone was admitted or not.
You also have to keep in mind that whether a recruit passes Stanford admissions, is a pretty big deal on the landscape of college football recruiting. Stanford is always recruiting elite student athletes, many that schools known for academic excellence like California, N.D., U.S.C., UCLA, Northwestern, Michigan, Virginia, Georgia Tech, Duke, and Vanderbilt covet, and other programs like Florida State, Ohio State, Penn State that don't have the academic brands of Stanford, but are battling for the same recruits (Bam Bradley comes to mind). Thus, there is market demand for Stanford admissions news (not just from Stanford fans), and guys like Bonugura are simply filling it.
On top of that, people who follow this stuff from other schools can't stand it when Stanford fans play the "only reason he didn't come here was because he wasn't admitted" card. That may be true as a general statement in the vast majority of cases, but sometimes, for whatever reasons, kids don't want to go to Stanford even if they are admitted (Anthony Sarao is an example), and lots don't even bother with a Stanford application, whether they would get in or not. For example, I learned this week that California OT commit Christian Okafor was offered by Stanford, but I have no idea if he would have been accepted or if he even bothered with an application.
I would say if a kid wants to go to Stanford, he knows he's got to get through the admission gauntlet, and so too does everyone that follows recruiting. If he is a sought after recruit, there is going to be national interest in his admission status, so having your admission status published across the Internet might just be something that goes with the territory, when applying to Stanford. The only way to stop this news from getting out more and more will be for the admissions office to limit who knows about admissions decisions and putting an embargo on all admissions news.
Of course, shutting off the leaks of information about admissions creates its own problems. It breeds speculation and even more rumor mongering, and that isn't good either. To me, the best course of action is to always be transparent and honest. So if it were my call, and as distasteful as it may seem (especially to a private institution), and I was in charge, I would make admissions status of Stanford recruits publicly available, maybe a week after the recruit is informed. That way, everyone would know what admissions status is, nobody would have to speculate, and fans of other schools could tell if a recruit applied, and was admitted or not. This would also stop the complaining from other fans about how Stanford admissions can be used as an excuse for why a recruit didn't choose Stanford, I know not Stanford's issue, but still something that would be nice to see put to bed.
You also have to keep in mind that whether a recruit passes Stanford admissions, is a pretty big deal on the landscape of college football recruiting. Stanford is always recruiting elite student athletes, many that schools known for academic excellence like California, N.D., U.S.C., UCLA, Northwestern, Michigan, Virginia, Georgia Tech, Duke, and Vanderbilt covet, and other programs like Florida State, Ohio State, Penn State that don't have the academic brands of Stanford, but are battling for the same recruits (Bam Bradley comes to mind). Thus, there is market demand for Stanford admissions news (not just from Stanford fans), and guys like Bonugura are simply filling it.
On top of that, people who follow this stuff from other schools can't stand it when Stanford fans play the "only reason he didn't come here was because he wasn't admitted" card. That may be true as a general statement in the vast majority of cases, but sometimes, for whatever reasons, kids don't want to go to Stanford even if they are admitted (Anthony Sarao is an example), and lots don't even bother with a Stanford application, whether they would get in or not. For example, I learned this week that California OT commit Christian Okafor was offered by Stanford, but I have no idea if he would have been accepted or if he even bothered with an application.
I would say if a kid wants to go to Stanford, he knows he's got to get through the admission gauntlet, and so too does everyone that follows recruiting. If he is a sought after recruit, there is going to be national interest in his admission status, so having your admission status published across the Internet might just be something that goes with the territory, when applying to Stanford. The only way to stop this news from getting out more and more will be for the admissions office to limit who knows about admissions decisions and putting an embargo on all admissions news.
Of course, shutting off the leaks of information about admissions creates its own problems. It breeds speculation and even more rumor mongering, and that isn't good either. To me, the best course of action is to always be transparent and honest. So if it were my call, and as distasteful as it may seem (especially to a private institution), and I was in charge, I would make admissions status of Stanford recruits publicly available, maybe a week after the recruit is informed. That way, everyone would know what admissions status is, nobody would have to speculate, and fans of other schools could tell if a recruit applied, and was admitted or not. This would also stop the complaining from other fans about how Stanford admissions can be used as an excuse for why a recruit didn't choose Stanford, I know not Stanford's issue, but still something that would be nice to see put to bed.