In making his choice of where to play football, a recruit has left a trail of bad feelings in his wake.
That’s the subject for tonight’s “On the Mark”. In early December, Wichita Northwest quarterback Chris Harper donned his K-State cap and told anyone who would listen that he was going to be a Wildcat.
When Wildcat assistant coach James Franklin departed for Maryland, Harper re-opened his recruitment.
For the moment, Harper has decided on Oregon.
In the days before internet recruiting services made the inner thoughts of teenagers common knowledge, an athlete changing their minds would have hardly been news.
But since Harper was so willing to express his feelings as to why, the loss of an in-state recruit to a Pac-10 school has raised all the wrong questions.
Harper pointed to facilities, and his lack of knowing Ron Prince, while curiously, also admitting that he had grown tired of how many hours the Wildcat Coaching staff had spent at his school. The difference between Harper’s change of choice, and the hundreds of other athletes who will do the same, is two things that should never occur.
Harper has a handler, a family friend who absorbed far too much of the spotlight during this way too public recruiting battle.
And secondly, that handler orchestrated a public oral commitment ceremony that today, ends up embarrassing Kansas State. The residue left on Harper is of little consequence. But for K-State football, it’s tough to lose a recruit to anyone, let alone a kid who inadvertently bad mouths your program on the way to somebody else’s letter of intent. That’s “On the Mark”.