Kids will be kids.
No matter how you slice it, high school football players are teenagers. Teens sometimes make bad choices.
It happens here in Southeast Texas and it happens around the country. That is why National Signing Day is such a big deal.
This really is the one time an athlete gets a choice. Where will this player decide to play his college sport?
If the player is good enough in college, the pros draft the player whether they like it or not. Well, unless the player is John Elway, Eli Manning or Jim Kelly.
Once drafted, a player is stuck until he becomes a free agent.
So Feb. 3 is a big day for athletes.
Take a look at today’s feature story on Port Arthur Memorial senior Kameron Martin. ESPN.com has 28 schools listed as interested in the four-star running back and only three have not made an offer to him — Alabama, Texas A&M and LSU.
Martin has been verbally committed to Baylor since his sophomore season with the Titans.
The struggle is the fact he loves the Texas Longhorns. Martin, since he was a kid, has loved the team over in Austin.
So, when coach Charlie Strong and the Longhorns started to press, Martin was in a unique position. He sports a huge tattoo on his arm with ‘BU’ in bold letters to represent his commitment to coach Art Briles.
Story over, right? Wrong.
The Longhorns do not care about tattoos. They really don’t one bit.
Martin holds tight that he is headed to Waco, but there is that small chance on National Signing Day he flips and chooses Texas.
He wouldn’t be the first to do something like that. Anyone else remember Central star P.J. Locke and his decision last year?
Locke was a given to head Eugene, Ore. to play for the Ducks. Then, right before the deadline, Locke flipped and is now a defensive back for the same Longhorns. Locke was then on the receiving end of countless Tweets bashing him and his family.
That is where sports fans need to be the grown-ups and not the teenagers making these life-changing decisions.
Remember that when one of these players who is thought to be headed to your favorite team and he switches, the decision is not yours to make.
It is his life and, in the end, kids will be kids.
•
Gabriel Pruett can be reached at 721-2436 or gabe.pruett@panews.com. On Twitter: @PaNewsGabe.