Thursday, April 26, 2012

Counterpoint: They're just kids

I grew up off of 38th street in Indianapolis. And like most of the guys Purdue is currently recruiting, I was a pretty good student.  But that didn't stop me from talking in a way that didn't indicate that when around my friends.  I used to make my parents and older brother pretty angry with my talk, and the way I walked and dressed...but honestly, I didn't give a damn.  And I don't think a recruit should care too much about what a website says about the way he Tweets, either.

J asked me to look over one of our new contributor's posts yesterday...and my first response was that I thought she sounded like my Mom.  One of my pet peeves is when people switch 'there' and 'their' or 'your' and 'you're'...but when a teenager's grammar isn't up to snuff on Twitter, honestly, I could care less.

There is a lot of absolute garbage on Twitter-  It can be the worst of people's emotions displayed in a uber-condensed 140 characters at a time...But I haven't seen that from any of the guys Purdue has offered.  Perhaps that's because I don't really tend to follow these kids too closely until they're nearly on campus, or maybe it's because most of Purdue's recruits don't post in this way all that often.  This idea comes from me not wanting to sound like Rabjohns (or others) chasing around a guy that's less than half of my age...it's pretty creepy.  But also, I don't want to look like a buffoon and feel like one if they decide to play elsewhere.

A 14, 15, 16 year old kid loves the attention received virtually and elsewhere because he's good at playing a game...and gets plenty of it elsewhere.  If Nikki tweaks a guy a bit because she doesn't like his grammar, I guess it's not a huge deal.  I disagreed with her post, but I don't think it's the deal that some of you are making it out to be. At BS, we've always prided ourselves listening to other opinions...even though our new contributors are posting on the site, we don't agree with everything they think/write...this morning's post is an example of that.

If you don't like it, by all means, let us know...discussion and even argument is a good thing.  But if you could, don't respond with curse-laced, name-calling diatribes...We don't have any time for that.

We've decided to pull the post from earlier this morning- not because of the disagreement it brought up, but because we feel it didn't represent what this site stands for.

We have a couple bedrock foundations that we live by- we'll always rip on the administration and coaches before going after a kid.  The guys that are paid a decent wage should be able to take the criticism of a couple of alums, especially if it's level-headed and reasoned.  We don't like criticizing current players, generally...unless they're doing something personally that's detrimental to the team or the university.  A recruit that doesn't use correct grammar isn't really hurting anybody...that's why we pulled the post.  Plus, a kid who might be interested in coming to Purdue to literally sacrifice his body and all of his free time for the name on the front of the jersey shouldn't be the topic of a negative post, unless there's a character issue...I have no reason to believe there's one here, so the post is gone.

Thanks as always for coming to the site.

22 comments:

Hooba said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Hooba said...

Thanks for pulling the post as it did not place on this site. I do look forward to future articles by Nikki!

Benjamin said...

Says a lot about one's ingenuity, if a debut post is about this. I can't wait to see what the next one is. Perhaps a post pointing out that Aristide had too many tit flexes in his PSG video? Or maybe trashing Matt Painter for saying "Ummm" too many times in a press conference?

Tons of exciting things are happening in the world of Purdue right now: finals, commencement, Boiler Baseball, the new logo, grand prix stories, or Cordova retiring. Christ even talking about JJ and Smooge getting Celtics minutes would have been more informative.

Nikki, I really hope you put some real thought into your next post.

zlionsfan said...

I think there is a reasonable question at the heart of Nikki's post, but there are a number of controversial topics surrounding it (as we can see both from the comments that were posted and from the subsequent removal of the post), and I'm not sure that her approach was the best. (I would also question the methods that some commenters used to respond to the post, and appreciate boilerdowd reminding us of the rules we're expected to follow here.)

I think that the academic background of current and potential Purdue recruits is a legitimate source of concern, particularly with the NCAA coming down hard on schools with low APRs (hello, UConn). Basketball's OK for now thanks to two solid years, but it wasn't that long ago that they were down a scholarship due to low APR.

It may even be possible to question the pursuit of individual players, if it's done carefully. Some kids just need the right opportunity to succeed, others probably need to be a little older to handle college well, and a few simply aren't cut out for college at all. (Insert UK joke here.) I would guess there are majors at Purdue that don't require a lot of effort, as there are at every other school in the country, but that doesn't mean that's a good idea for some kids. They might be better off at a different school, and the NCAA doesn't make it easy for kids to figure that out. (And transferring itself is no small change.)

I'd be reluctant to draw conclusions about specific players from things other than what contributes directly to college eligibility. It seems to me that you can spot a couple of different methods of communication, looking at Facebook, Twitter, texts, and so on: one is less formal because of the medium, and one is less formal because of the knowledge of the person in question. You can even draw accurate conclusions about a person, sometimes, by seeing a pattern in their communication styles. However, it's also easy to draw an inaccurate conclusion, and it's even more difficult to retract statements that you make based on that conclusion, especially given the way that information spreads. (For example, I still have the original post in Google Reader.)

I think that in this case, I would have been more comfortable discussing it offline with my friends than posting about it somewhere. If academics is a topic we want to discuss here, I'd recommend doing so in more general terms (do we support/oppose/not care whether Painter recruits a high school star who may not be able to handle college?). Discussing individual cases is probably more trouble than it's worth ... it's really hard to keep the discussion on track in that context.

01Boiler said...

***Grammar Police***
I couldN'T care less, not I could care less.

boilerdowd said...

01- I think you might be missing the point; I'm not the one who called out someone's grammar...in fact, I'm pretty flawed and wouldn't put myself out that way. I design products for a living...I like to write, but it isn't my schtick to call people out in that way.

I could care less about your response.

COD said...

Keady's downfall was when he started recruiting kids that weren't "Purdue kids." One could argue that a lot of Weber's problems at IL originated with him recruiting kids outside of the traditional Keady mold that Weber is most comfortable and successful with.

Painter has obviously had great success sticking to the Keady blueprint of academically motivated and athletically talented kids. So I do think evidence that an incoming kid is not up to expectations academically is a valid concern. However, I don't think a single tweet provides any evidence pro or con on that question.

As a general rule, we as alumni should probably refrain from criticizing recruits at all - no matter how poor their grammar may be.

boilerdowd said...

agreed, COD.

boilerdowd said...

(and zlions, for that matter)

Purdue Matt said...

Nikki is off to a great start, can't wait for her next post.

1) its twitter
2) hes a high school freshman
3) why are you following him or reading his tweets?

Boilergal said...

My 2 cents as a female:

I always hold my breath when there is a female color analyst or sideline reporter. I love when I am pleasantly surprised to find she is knowledgeable and not annoying! There are a few out there (Erin Andrews- I think she does an excellent job… though, I know most of you guys may not hear a word she is saying when on the screen), but there are more that are horrendous (Andrea Kremer!!) It is very disappointing that Nikki chose this to be her first post, let alone one that she would ever post. Would have been nice if she would have chosen to show some knowledge on sports instead of nitpicking some 15-yr old’s tweet!

COD said...

Erin Andrews talks? ;)

Purdue Matt said...

Charissa Thompson > Andrea kremer > Pam Ward > Erin Andrews

01Boiler said...

Dowd-
My comment was misdirected, and I do agree with your post, despite not seeing the subject article.

Boilergal said...

Just a question...

Do your editors have free reign to post at any time or do you control when a post goes up? If you don't have control, I think it would be better if you took that control. I also wasn't too impressed with a lot of the posts Teddy put up last year! Hopefully, these new editors will prove to be better contributors.

Andrew said...

Like others have said, so many better things to talk about than a 15 year old using less than stellar grammar in 140 characters

If we are going to talk about recruits can we focus on their abilities and how they fit into Purdue's system.

boilerdowd said...

BG- they can post, but usually we like to read through first...the problem is, we've both gotten stupid busy. I breezed Nikki's post and missed a few key things...at the end of the day, the error is mine...and I've paid for it by losing my morning.

J and I would love to provide gobs of content...but kids and work (as you know) kinda take all of your time. We really need to clone ourselves, but since I have concerns about another J being let out into the world...we are what we are.

We really like the student perspective as an option...but I think today's episode is an example of how differently we think than students.

We'll figure this out...eventually.

And thanks 01 for clarification.

Boilergal said...

Dowd...

I wasn't suggesting that only the 2 of you should create content, just that you should probably take control of posting said content if you didn't have it. I love this site, just hate seeing you take such a hit over a very thoughtless posting. Like I said earlier, it would have been better had Nikki chosen to exhibit her knowledge or a thoughtful opinion on sports. And, I probably was more upset about the fact that it came from a female... just perpetuates the general opinion that chics don't know their sports.

BTW, J, I am a big Redskins fan... I know (insert laughter)...are you worried about the impending dominance that the Skins will now be exerting over the East?

COD said...

If you moved the site to Wordpress you could have an actual editorial process. Posts by authors would go into draft mode and not be released to the Internet until somebody with editorial privileges approved them.

And under the if you suggest something you are also volunteering to help convention of volunteer efforts - let me know if you want to explore that route.

Oldboiler52 said...

I think she went for effect . Well she got it . I get trashed a few times per post for grammar . But I earn it .

Shawn said...

Old Boiler, you could post in Swahili and I'd still take the time to translate. The hours you put into gathering intel on recruits are worth occasionally reading between the lines.

J Money said...

COD -- Send us a note to discuss further. Interested in your thoughts.