Clemson signee: Negative recruiting vs. Ohio State was 'underlying' factor
Clemson offensive line signee Jackson Carman said Dabo Swinney’s politicking against Ohio State helped him choose the Tigers over the Buckeyes.
Just what was that convincing? Well, according to Carman, Swinney said Ohio State coach Urban Meyer didn’t have too many years left as the Buckeyes’ coach. And that pitch was apparently a factor in the Ohio native’s Clemson decision.
Dabo Swinney told Jackson Carman during his recruitment that Urban Meyer is on the back end of his career in terms of years left. “It wasn’t a major factor, but it was an underlying one,” Carman said.
— Ari Wasserman (@AriWasserman) December 20, 2017
Swinney was then asked about Carman’s comments.
Dabo was asked about this by a group of reporters. Said he didn’t recall exactly what was said but definitely did not deny it. https://t.co/FlVchisc8P
— Dan Wolken (@DanWolken) December 20, 2017
We asked Dabo Swinney about the conversation that Jackson Carman recounted to @AriWasserman about Urban Meyer. The gist of Dabo’s response: He didn’t recall exactly what was said, but in the course of recruiting you generally talk about whatever the recruit wants to talk about.
— Andy Staples (@Andy_Staples) December 20, 2017
Scandalous!
OK, it’s really not. While coaches may gripe about negative recruiting tactics, the reality is that most, if not all, programs will say not-so-positive things about rivals to get a recruit to come to a school. Fans getting outraged at negative recruiting is funny when you consider that most fans generally have no problem with saying bad things about the teams they dislike.
And fair or not, Meyer’s coaching career elicits negative recruiting about his future at a school. After leaving Florida for health reasons in 2010, the coach spent just one year as a TV analyst before becoming Ohio State’s coach in the 2012 season.
We also think Swinney could have simply just said “31-0” (the score of Clemson’s College Football Playoff win over Ohio State a year ago) over and over again to Carman to get him to sign with the Tigers, but whatever works, right?
Carman is a prized recruit in the 2018 class. The five-star recruit is the No. 14 prospect in the country and the No. 1 tackle recruit according to Rivals.com.
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Nick Bromberg is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at nickbromberg@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
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