Lane Kiffin is the head football coach at Florida Atlantic University and he’s had his share of controversy over many years involved with intercollegiate football.
Now come reports that Kiffin is robbing the cradle in search of football players.
He reportedly is going after middle school students. One of them is reported to be a — sheesh! — sixth-grader.
Kiffin has been known in football circles as a hothead and a loudmouth. He coached the Oakland Raiders; he was head coach at the University of Tennessee; he ventured to the University of Southern California as head coach; then he wound up as an offensive coordinator at the University of Alabama. All along the way he managed to anger folks with whom he was associated.
Someone might have to explain to me: How does a college football coach know what kind of player a sixth-grader is going to be when he comes of age?
Maybe more to the point is this query: Why can’t an intercollegiate football coach let a kid be a kid without exerting recruitment pressure on him?
I will concede that there’s a lot about football recruitment I don’t understand. What I’ll never get is why a college coach would spend time recruiting someone who is barely pubescent.