Karnell Hatcher and More

[tampaboi07]

Losing My Mind

By: Rudy Rodriguez-Chomat

36

 

Karnell Hatcher and More

Tue Dec 4, 2007

If the University of Miami wonders why it's been struggling on the football field, look no further than the story behind Karnell Hatcher.

InsideTheU.com's David Lake reported today that Miami is no longer recruiting Delray Beach Atlantic safety Karnell Hatcher because he had given a "verbal" commitment to LSU. Hatcher said it was not a commitment, but a "soft verbal" (I still don't know what that means). Apparently, UM coaches read that somewhere on some website and didn't follow up on it with Hatcher himself.

If they had read InsideTheU.com, they would have seen that Hatcher was still open as we did a story on that almost immediately after Hatcher's visit to LSU.

To hear that UM stopped recruiting Hatcher based on that is ridiculous. UM recruited LB Brandon Marti and he had been a firm commitment (you see how firm it really was) to Wisconsin for months. Within a week, he had changed his mind and was a Miami commit. Go figure.

Isn't C.J. Holton a “soft verbal†Florida State commitment? Has that stopped Miami from continuing to recruit him and lure him away from the Seminoles? Has Miami stopped recruiting Frankie Hammond who gave one of those “soft verbals†to Florida? Nope.

So what the heck is the deal with Hatcher? Something is quite fishy here.

Hatcher is one of the best safeties in the country and the 'Canes stopped recruiting him because he gave a commitment to someone else. That's weak. It's because of things like that Miami has gone 7-6 and 5-7 over the past two years. While other schools close on guys, we stop recruiting them. Hatcher would make UM's secondary sick within two years and is a guy you can’t stop trying to get until signing day when he decides to sign with someone else.

Why Hatcher gave that silly "soft verbal" commitment to LSU I'll never know. "Soft verbals" are the dumbest thing I've ever heard of in my life anyhow. Why he couldn't borrow a cell phone from anyone of his friends or relatives for five minutes to call UM and actually let them know this as well is rather ridiculous to boot. Hatcher said his cell phone was broken and he couldn't call for a week. That's nonsense. He could have e-mailed, called, sent a telegram by Pony Express, sent a letter via U.S. Mail, anything and it would have takent less than a week. So yes, I put some of the blame on him, but Hatcher is the recruit. It’s not his job to call Miami. It’s Miami’s job to call him.

Either way, for Miami to tell him that they got a commitment from someone else is rather hard to believe. Miami has two commitments at safety, C.J. Odom and Joe Wylie. So who is the third one that they told Hatcher about? My guess is, there is likely no other commitment and it's quite possible that Miami coaches were just pissed about what they read and heard and said to heck with it.

I am purely speculating at what the thought might be, but whatever the thought is, Hatcher is too darn good of a player to stop recruiting just because he gave a "soft verbal" commitment to LSU and it's the exact reason why Miami has fallen on hard times lately.

ANOTHER RANT

I am dumbfounded. Northwestern linebacker Quavon Taylor still doesn’t have an offer. Miami just got a commitment from a linebacker in Toms River, New Jersey, Zach Kane. I won’t even pretend to say I know anything about Kane, but I do know this, Taylor should get an offer.

Kane led his high school to a 12-0 record and the state championship this year. Congratulations to him on that.

Taylor is the leading tackler on the No. 1 in the NATION! He is a two-year starter on a team that was won 28 straight games. Northwestern is 13-0 and playing in the state semifinals on Friday against Deerfield Beach. Maybe Miami coaches should take a ride to the Orange Bowl and watch one kid play, Taylor. The ‘Canes need to take notice of that and stop screwing around with this kid and give him a freaking offer. It’s unbelievable that Taylor has not gotten an offer from Miami.

With all due respect to Kane, football in New Jersey does not sniff football in Miami-Dade County. It’s not like Taylor plays at Barbara Goleman. He plays for the best in the land. What does he have to do to get an offer?

I know where Taylor’s heart is. He wants to be a Hurricane real bad. It’s the reason he hasn’t committed somewhere else, but if I was Taylor, I’d give Miami a deadline and let them know, if I don’t have an offer by such and such date, forget it, keep your offer and stuff it up your you know where. I’d make a point to commit to a school (maybe USF) that has Miami on its schedule in the near future and be sure to knock someone’s head off when I played Miami because Taylor is flat out being done wrong by UM.

What’s killing me is that while the ‘Canes started off this recruiting class exceptionally with commitments from Jacory Harris, Marcus Forston, Sean Spence, Aldarius Johnson, Davon Johnson, Patrick Johnson, Jordan Futch and more, it seems like the momentum is fading. They are throwing out offers to players who are really not on anyone’s board. They offered Marti (who is not better than Taylor). They offered Kane (who I doubt is better than Taylor). They offered John Calhoun (they claim at fulback, but he is also a linebacker). It’s becoming rather ridiculous.

It begs the question for me, have Miami coaches ever seen Taylor play? I would just hate to have to have the ‘Canes play against Taylor in a couple of years because you know he’ll have something to prove.

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[bulls96go]

come on hatcher  replace jenkins