Perspective

If he's that good, you may not want to use his name and the word "transfers" in the same sentence.

I think that kid already is at IMG.

And I'm guessing the schedule was finalized even before half of the Hallandale defense transferred over to Central.

I'm just hoping his last name is "Bates."

What fun is that?

MC Rocket, I see you're on here this morning. What do you know about Hallandale (and, more particularly, the Hallandale to Miami Central pipeline)?

Add me to the list . . . a 5-minute highlight reel where every time the guy touched the ball, he scored a touchdown?!?! (Oh, spoiler alert). Taking nothing away from the guy, but those were some pretty well-designed plays with some outstanding blocking, but a lesser running back would not have done what that kid did time after time. Impressive to say the least.

All to often, we focus on the teams that are getting the transfers. Typically, those teams pick up a guy from here and a guy from there. In looking back over this thread, however, it appears that one team has basically lost it's starting defense to transfers. Assuming the twitter announcements are correct (especially The Crib South Florida that we see compliments of Columbia Fan), and I have no reason to suspect otherwise, Hallandale has lost the following players (and I don't know which service is passing out the stars down there): 6/12 - a 4-star DB and a D-1 commit DB (both to Miami Central) 6/16 - two LB's (both to Central) 6/16 - another 4-star DB (to Central) 6/22 - an OL/DL (to South Broward) 6/29 - a 4-star safety (to Central) 7/11 - three DB's and a DL (to Killian). What the hell is going on? Did a Hallandale coach recently switch over to Central? Do they grow DB's on trees in Hallandale? By my count, Hallandale has lost 11 defensive players, including 7 DB's in the past 30 days. SEVEN!!! a three of them apparently were considered 4-star players according to somebody. Seriously, what's going on down there? Is this just a classic case of the mice jumping ship once one or two leave?

Interesting article. But here's what the cynic in me got out of that article: His senior year, ARod quit on his football teammates.

Ray and Hornet, I'm trying to find some middle ground here. Can the two of you at least agree that, regardless of their respective schedules and regardless of who the quarterbacks are, Winter Park and Dr. Phillips would both get blown out by Madison County?

This is a quote from the article: "A perennial football powerhouse, Dr. Phillips was searching for a current roster player to step up and take solid control of the offense and the QB position. Senior quarterback Joe Joe Patti, who is also a lacrosse standout, struggled a bit in the quarterback role the past two seasons and will likely switch to slot receiver." This quote definitely gives me the impression that Hayes (the reporter) has been talking with someone on the DP staff, if not the head coach himself.

Measurables. n. The thing that lazy coaches can hide behind; a filter used by coaches of all sports. All kidding aside, measurables don't make the player. But, if you're a college coach (of any sport) with a limited number of scholarships/roster sports available to you, who are you more likely to take a chance on -- the kid that checks off all the boxes, in terms of size and speed, or the kid who doesn't? Don't get me wrong; I love stories about kids who overcome their predetermined genetic shortcomings and eventually excel on the field or the court. But I also understand that it's awfully tough for a coach to look through hours and hours of recruiting tapes and film trying to find that diamond in the rough.

Quick question: did Patti play in the Spring Jamboree? Chris Hayes' article mentioned that Patti also plays lacrosse, which is a spring sport. If DP had any success in lacrosse this year, their season may have run over into spring football, causing Patti to miss spring practices. Even if Patti played in the spring game, he may not have had much practice (and probably wasn't doing much 7 on 7 leading up to that game).

Nolebull, sincere question for you: Do you know if the Georgia schools handle their own scheduling or is the scheduling done by a central source (or even a district source)? I ask because I think Hillsborough public schools schedules are done and have been out for a while. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it the responsibility of the member schools to post their schedules on MaxPreps (along with rosters and possibly stats)? I'm just trying to understand where the system is breaking down. Whose fault is it? The schools? The FHSAA's? MaxPrep's? Or do they all share the blame?

Well said, Dillard. The boys from old Florida have been saying a shorter version of this for years: "In all kinds of weather, we'll all stick together."

Lee. And the Jacksonville newspapers won't report it.

Madison County will win 1A. Jesse told me.

I didn't bring up Lee in my post for two reasons: First, I knew you would. Second, it doesn't cost $30K a year to go to Lee.

So, now there's a kid at Bolles who plays OL, another who plays DL, another who plays LB and one who plays TE that all finished up their season this past year and all four of them thought they'd be starting (again?) for the Bulldogs this fall. And now they probably won't be. Or they'll be starting at another position but the kids who would have been starting at those positions now won't be. So, conceivably, there are four families shelling out $30K a year in tuition who thought they would be watching their sons playing for Bolles this coming season who, instead, likely will be waving down to their boys during the game, after having told them before the game to "stay ready in case someone gets hurt." Yeah, I understand the reality. I know good schools, good coaches and good kids will always attract kids who want to be a part of a successful program. But, when one school picks up 4 or 5 quality transfers in one off-season, it certainly makes me wonder what's going on just a little.

Yep. But it was a problem that anyone with a brain could anticipate. Heck, even I saw it coming!

Let me rewrite that sentence for you: "Then the state legislature started to get involved and passed legislation that forced the FHSAA to change its policies to allow kids to transfer to whatever school they want (as long as it's not at capacity and they provide their own transportation)." Had the FHSAA not changed their policies to be consistent with the newly-enacted legislation, the FHSAA would have lost their funding from the state. So, I've got a pretty clear picture in my mind of a bunch of folks sitting around in Gainesville saying to each other "So, what do you want to do? Come up with new policies that match the new law or all go out and try to find new jobs?" I know how that one turned out.

With all due respect, I call B.S. on this. That may be how the legislators from Lakeland framed it to get support from their colleagues, but it was all about football . . . and pulling the teeth out of the FHSAA's mouth in retaliation for the FHSAA declaring a group of athletes ineligible for a season (in accordance with existing rules).

Is having a mega screen TV at the stadium "recruiting"? No. Does winning state championships amount to "recruiting"? No. When a 16 year-old contacts his buddy from youth football and says to him "bro, we need a player just like you! The kid we have there now isn't very good. You'll start right away!", is that recruiting? Yes.

Lazy reporters.

ColumbiaFan, I know that Jacksonville transfers (especially into public schools) is a topic near and dear to your heart. But, I don't know if the media should be blamed for not reporting it, as if it's some kind of conspiracy between the media and the schools in Duval Co. In the Tampa Bay area, we've gone from two daily publications to one and home delivery has gone from 7 days a week to 2. During football season, the newspapers used to have stories on virtually every game in the area. Now, they tend to pick out two or three games, cover only those games, and nothing is said about all the others (not even scores). We see absolutely zero coverage of high school football during the off-season. Occasionally, one of the beat writers will retweet something, but that's about it. And the TV stations are really no better. During the season, one of the stations does a "high school windup" in the last 5-10 minutes of it's 11:00 newscast on Friday nights, but as with the print media, they focus on 4-5 games, if that, show a handful of highlights, and give a handful of scores. I mention all of this because the media, and the media's coverage of high school football, in particular, and high school sports, in general, has changed (and by "changed," I mean "decreased") considerably over the years as the whole media landscape has changed because of the Internet. Personally, I don't like it, but I reluctantly understand it. My point is this: the media has fewer and fewer resources and they are unlikely to devote those resources to someone whose main job it is to keep track of high school kids jumping from one ship to another. Fortunately, as represented by the several posts you have included on this thread, there are some people in some areas (like South Florida) that do track transfers and who post the information. (By the way, as an aside, and based on what I've seen in this thread, is Hallandale even going to be able to field a team this year? Seems like every other kid I've seen is transferring from Hallandale to another school.). Bottom line: if there were tens of thousands of people in a metro area who were interested in the fact that some 11th grade kid announced on his Twitter feed that he was transferring from one school to another, the media would report it. But there aren't, so they don't.