The Annual Day Of the Insane

Today is the annual day of the insane commonly known as Signing Day in college football. Millions of college football fans get excited over 17 to 18-year old high school kids faxing their letter of intent to their favorite schools. And when a certain player doesn't go to their school, fans get angry over those teenagers.

It's insane that anyone would get upset over where a kid decides to attend college. I can't say that I haven't been upset this year especially since Cal was embroiled in the Tosh Lupoi-to-Washington saga that saw most of Cal's top recruit flee Berkeley to Seattle. That was a bitter pill to swallow but as Yahoo's Mike Silver pointed out, Silver is also a Cal grad, the two best players on Cal's best team in the past 10 years, Aaron Rodgers and JJ Arrington, were both JUCO players.

Then you look at coaches and schools who seem to pull in top ranked recruiting classes year after year and do nothing with those players (Cue to Illinois fans crying). So why do we as fans follow this day so closely and invest so much time? I have a few theories .

Promise: Like drafts in the professional leagues, recruiting classes bring promise to your school. The promise of new blood either continuing a winning tradition or starting a whole new tradition. Promise is also a very dangerous recipe. When those players don't pan out for one reason or the other, the situation for your school/team can become very toxic. But being a sports fan is being a rube and promise is a poisonous apple we can't resist eating.

Rankings: Much like how the NFL has Mel Kiper and the NBA has Chad Ford, we have Rivals.com and Scouts.com in college telling us who had a great recruiting class or who didn't have a great recruiting class. Like how Kiper or Ford sucks us into believing our team had a great or bad draft, recruiting websites do the same damn thing. Once again sports fans are rubes and we actually fall into the trap of believing our school just had a great or bad recruiting class when no of that matters unless you have a great coaching staff actually teaching these kids how to play.

In the end does rankings and promise get you anything? Absolutely not. There are only a few coaches who are both great salesman (recruiters) and great teachers (coaching). Ron Zook is a tremendous salesman who cannot coach to save his life. Then you look at Chris Petersen at Boise State who doesn't bring in high ranking recruiting classes every single year and yet Boise State is constantly in the top 10.

At the end of the day coaching matters in football. Coaching matters more in football than any other sport. I witnessed the 49ers go from a mediocre team from a team that was a fumble away from the Super Bowl in one year and the only major change the 49ers made to their team was bringing in a new head coach. Football teams need great coaching as much if not more than talented players.

So enjoy recruiting day, worry about which high school senior has sent his fax to your school, and go crazy when someone breaks a verbal agreement and goes to your rival school. And while you're at it, mark down February 1st on your calendars for the next 50 years to remember the annual day of the insane.