Camp Fevah: Catch It!
Camp fever doesn’t just happen at camp.
It speaks to a broader mindset in recruiting philosophy. It speaks to your relative understanding of the negotiation process, leverage, your personal tolerance for chaos, and your comprehension of who holds the cards in an interaction.
Camp fever is the mentality that you should hook up early in the night with an average girl because she’ll go home with you that instant and then you make her your girlfriend - rather than wait for Minka Kelly who is planning to come by your place at midnight. You’re not sure about Minka though. No guarantees. Minka gets lot of attention. Can you close the deal with her? How you respond to that situation speaks to your camp fever mindset. I’m a wait for Minka guy. At least I am now. I disavow anything I did before age 21. 23. Probably 25.
Texas football wants the sure thing. Especially if the sure thing has a Vince Young poster on the door, a steady gaze, a firm handshake, and reminds Mack at some subliminal level of Kris Stockton or himself. Mack’s signing day press conference spoke to that point clearly:
Texas is a different place, the tradition here, the history here, if you didn’t grow up with our history and tradition and you don’t know how special this place is, then you’re one-of-five (choices for a player). I don’t want us to be one-of-five. I want us to one-of-one or one-of-two. Maybe that’s wrong, but I want guys that love it here, I want guys that are crying when they walk out of that tunnel. On senior day, I want all the moms and dad there. That’s just the way I am and the way I feel. When they say we are one-of-five, then I say you’re (down to) one-of-four because I’m out.
I don’t fault that. I respect that. I want kids who want to be here too. I also know that a lot of the kids we’re recruiting don’t have parents who were Texas Exes. Nor are they willing to make a four year commitment at 16 years of age. I’m a massive Longhorn homer and I wouldn’t be ready to do that. If USC and Stanford offered me ’ships, I’d check them both out.
Kyle Kriegel and Patrick Nkwopara are camp fever commits (though both are legitimate D-1 guys). I suspect Dominique Jones, and I know that Calvin Howell, are a cut above in desirability. Excepting Howell (DT is at a premium this year) they were all going to be available four to eight months from now if we want them. Or if they’re not, there’d be a guy just like them available.
My point is not about any individual per se. It’s about the timeline. It’s about measuring opportunity cost.
This is what is at stake. I say we wait until midnight and see if she shows. We’ll seal that deal more often than not.
Why? We’re Texas. We have game. We’re a billionaire Christian Bale writing love poems with our twelve inch johnson. If Minka doesn’t dig us, we can always get the average girl we met earlier to come by at 12:45. No harm done.
I guess what I’m saying is: Mack - we’re so money and you don’t even know it.
February 23, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Nice tie-in to Swingers there, Scip’. Very applicable, too.
February 23, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Reminds me of this.
February 23, 2008 at 5:26 pm
Minka will get pissed after a couple of years and make your life hell. After that first night you probably won’t remember what a BJ is in 6 month. Ms. Now will hang on for the duration and give you as much as you want.
Saith Mack.
February 23, 2008 at 8:13 pm
I agree with you from a recruiting standpoint but a coach also has to think about how the players will bond as a team for the next few years. It helps to have the common bond that (almost) everyone wanted to go to UT.
To continue your relationship metaphor, most people are happy when they are first dating or married but a long-term relationship usually works better when each person is with their first choice. In general, the feeling is stronger and the commitment lasts longer than when you’re with your 3rd choice out of 5.
February 23, 2008 at 8:20 pm
“When they say we are one-of-five, then I say you’re (down to) one-of-four because I’m out.”
Yeah, Mack. Tell that to Mason Walters.
February 24, 2008 at 7:06 am
Except for special situations, everyone on a team does want to play for that team. It’s just that some of them didn’t know it during February of their junior year. That’s where recruiting comes in. You sell your school and program and convince them that they want to play for your school.
Earl Campbell didn’t know he wanted to got to Texas until signing day. Vince Young didn’t know he wanted to go to Texas until his senior year. Imagine if we had stopped recruiting them because they wouldn’t commit during February.
February 25, 2008 at 10:14 am
Supposedly you can add in a CB whose name I’ve never heard before.
February 25, 2008 at 10:29 am
I could buy into Mack’s philosophy if by committing a class early, he was freeing up time during the season for intensive and focused game-planning and scheming (i.e. instead of calling recruits three hours per night, his coaches could be working the chalkboards). Unfortunately, I think his best skill is working the recruiting, and he shouldn’t be averse to mixing it up during the fall.
February 25, 2008 at 10:44 am
The latest Camp Fevah catch:
Eryon Barnett DB 6-2 180 4.5 - Euless, TX
February 25, 2008 at 11:03 am
He’s long and lean.
February 25, 2008 at 11:28 am
Well, we’ve really been pushing the bad safety angle of lot lately, so, stealing this guy from Baylor makes a lot of sense.