The Weirdest Story of the Year

When hearing two days ago about the vapid, airy quality of Manti Te’o’s girlfriend, I immediately called a friend, a rabid Notre Dame alum who spent time as a manager.  His first response: “Gosh, this is so strange.”  He couldn’t believe that a trusting guy could be duped by some cruel prankster.  That said trusting guy played for Notre Dame and competed for a Heisman didn’t enter into our brief discussion, but it certainly could have.  Since then, the sports world has adjusted to what might be considered a tabloid story…with some interesting results.

Just like that, the darling media story of this past college football season, a story that brought the nation out of the Penn State and Petrino sagas to find some goodness in college football, went poof this week.  Much like his girlfriend, we as fans are left with a sense of emptiness…a young man that inspired so many around the country lost his legitimacy under very strange circumstances.

The odd surroundings in this story lead to more theories than can be counted.  Some want to blame the Kennedy assassination on Te’o, likening him to Lance and JoePa despite Te’o perpetrating no federal crimes.  Others see an innocent, heartfelt dude who got caught up in an online friendship and mistakenly labeled it a relationship, only to be dashed upon the shoals of despair in what amounted to a sick joke.  Finally, a third and less followed angle sees Te’o perpetrating the relationship hoax in order to cover up his homosexuality, an uncomfortable situation for a Mormon kid going to Catholic Notre Dame.

I’m giving the third theory credit for originality but not for truth.  How would no one on Notre Dame’s roster, having spent the past four years intimately close to Te’o, not know that he might be gay?  Given the vicious cycle of sports media, we certainly would have heard the rumors earlier.  Without anything corroborating that conjecture, his orientation clearly has no bearing on the question at hand.

Given the other two hypotheses, there can be no doubt that Te’o certainly embellished his “girlfriend” story.  He heard about the hoax on December 6^th, but in interviews on December 8^th and December 11^th he spoke about his love for Ms. Kekua.  In addition, a former teammate told ESPN that players knew the woman wasn’t really his girlfriend.  So Te’o might have been mistaken about the nature of the relationship, but it’s not unreasonable to think he might not have known where he stood with the disembodied voice at the other end of the phone.

What distresses me the most, however, is Te’o’s willingness to not speak about the hoax immediately, waiting 20 days to tell coaches and school officials.  Remember when the Heisman conversation came up?  Notre Dame and Te’o fans spoke often about Manti’s emotional leadership and his consistent production over his career in contrast to the flash in the pan success of Johnny Manziel in the SEC.  The main arguments for Te’o centered around his heart and ability to lead the team under a cloud of dismay after losing loved ones.  Sure, Heisman voting might have been completed by December 6^th, but for Te’o to maintain his innocence now he should have spoken up sooner then.  If the school waited to act after that kind of revelation, we might have a case of the school looking for notoriety after almost 20 years in the wilderness.  Te’o would look like the duped lovesick kid, a pitiable figure but not a guilty one.  Feasible and plausible.

But it didn’t happen.  Te’o did not speak up when he first heard his alleged paramour was 78 percent nitrogen and 21 percent oxygen.  He waited 20 days, presenting a façade to the world and the media, perpetuating his doomed heart storyline.  He might not have covered it up per se, but Te’o certainly did not do all he could to address the story.  By the same token, Notre Dame clearly didn’t want the hype leading to the National Championship to be affected.  Their “internal vetting” had 11 days between Te’o speaking up and kickoff in New Orleans.  And, it’s not as if the school planned to release details…the Deadspin story forced Notre Dame’s hand.  Ten days after the National Championship, nothing was forthcoming from the school.  Clearly, Notre Dame knew about it.  The timeline looks suspicious to anyone with a pocket calendar, so we might take under advisement that the school, like Te’o, waited to say anything until after its media value had expired.

But that does not mean Notre Dame started this hoax to help him win a Heisman…that’s quite a tough endeavor for a guy who until this season was respectable but not otherworldly in the NCAA.  Te’o heard about his loss early on, meaning that Notre Dame bet Te’o would play well enough to be in consideration for a Heisman.  That’s a stretch…no one foresaw Te’o’s season and even fewer thought in August that he would end up sitting in New York during December.  We have heard about this girlfriend for a while now, and the timeline Te’o presented for much of this season goes back to 2011.

In the end, I think Te’o got duped by some cruel pranksters.  He did what plenty of younger guys do every day…he shaved the truth about his girl.  That’s not a federal crime or a real art of deception…it’s a symptom of youth.  Both he and Notre Dame certainly perpetuated the hoax during December and January, and for that they deserve scrutiny.  But to track this thread back to August makes very little sense.  Too many variables, not enough control would have doomed such a venture unless Te’o and the team performed in the perfect manner.  And it would have to be perfect.  No one could have planned for that or, worse, relied on it.

To conclude, we need to move on from this story.  It’s a very weird story and, if still more truth comes out, will shake the faith of some college football fans.  But we have more to focus on than a figment of some young kid’s imagination.  We’re basically watching an episode of Punk’d on the national stage…and that’s it.  It’s time to understand that and move onto the new NHL season, the NFL postseason, and the rest of the sports world.

Bit #1: NFL Carousel Mistakes

In any given year, the list of NFL openings can look fairly pedestrian.  Almost always, the losers from the year before look for replacement GMs or coaches.

But for the first time in a while the coaching market found very experienced head coaches looking for a new house somewhere.  Folks like Andy Reid and Lovie Smith, after long stretches with the Eagles and Bears, looked at the football classifieds.  The Browns, with a new owner, cleaned house to bring in a new coach and GM.  In KC and Arizona, franchises looked to revitalize their fan bases by installing a new regime.

But to my eyes the collective NFL world has lost its marbles this carousel season.  Andy Reid, an experienced and successful coach, chose a team with four postseason appearances in the past 16 years.  Five of those seasons included double-digit losses.  Cleveland, in a similarly porous boat as the Chiefs, hired the offensive coordinator from Carolina…not exactly the second coming of Paul Brown.  The Eagles and Bears hired coaches that, while successful in other leagues, either have no NFL experience or not enough recent NFL experience to matter.

I am shocked about these developments and believe we remain in the Smith-Harbaugh era of coaching, whereby most NFL teams hire relative no names, hoping to land the same success as Atlanta and Baltimore did with their hires five years ago.  While some coaches of this year’s class will undoubtedly be successful, only Arizona’s hiring of Bruce Arians makes very good sense to me.

Bit #2: NBA All-Star Voting a Sham

There’s truth to the NBA being a star-centered league.  To that effect, fans vote for the All-Star starting lineups.  As a result, the lineups often contain stars who don’t deserve it.  Dwight Howard, in the middle of his worst season, will start at center.  Somehow, a team five games below .500 in the Western Conference has two All-Stars…and they will start the game.  Throw in the dubious selection of Kevin Garnett and this year brings a cast of dunces to the table.

Plenty of other leagues use fan voting for their All-Star games, but the inclusion of undeserving stars reaches a new level in the NBA.  A star like Tracy McGrady made two All-Star games despite missing 15 games total before the midwinter classic.  Democracy may be the best form of government, but it clearly doesn’t work for sports.