I was fortunate enough to be the first ever guest on Adam Nettina’s show Under Center to discuss National Letter of Intent Day which is February 6, 2008. During the interview he asks me about where I think Terrelle Pryor will go, along with what I think about recruiting in general. To listen to the interview click here. A special thanks to Adam for having me on the show.

Remember, if you want the podcast you must subscribe to the Feedbuner but if you want to subscribe to the blog please use the RSS feed. This is for iTunes to be able to archive the shows. Enjoy this week’s episode of In The Bleachers and if you have any questions or comments to the show please email them to inthebleachers AT gmail DOT com.

All the speculation will end promptly tomorrow, February 6, 2008 at approximately 12:05 p.m. EST on ESPNU. According to this article, just posted on Rivals.com, Terrelle Pryor will sign and one team has waddled (hint hint) its way out of contention.

A lot of times it isn’t getting the best recruits or athletes to come to your school as much as getting the ones that will fit your particular system. For example, a running quarterback at West Virginia (and now Michigan), a pro style passer at USC, or a combination runner/passer like at Florida. Some coaches can adjust their offense to the types of players they get, but for the most part teams will recruit kids that fit their system. Chris over at Barking Carnival is going to be doing a multipart series called Let’s Build An Offense. The first part is called Building A Base and in part 2 he will look at Basic plays installed, and counters for the looks defenses would give us. This is a series that football fans should seriously look at because it is really well written and the analysis is great. Articles like this are one of the main reasons why Barking Carnival was my choice for top new blog of the year.

Pryor still undecided 1 day before LOI Day

Speaking of building an offense around a talented player, it is day…um…who really cares at this point, of the Where will Terrelle Pryor go watch. What we do know right now is that tomorrow is National LOI Day. That I know for certain, but what we do not know right now is where, when, or if Pryor will sign his LOI tomorrow. Three conflicting reports have come out, all saying different things. The first one came from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette saying that Pryor would sign on Wednesday and that he had called Oregon to tell them that the Ducks were eliminated from the running.

A few hours later Rivals.com came out with a report from their staff saying that Pryor still may not sign on Wednesday, and that he had not eliminated Oregon. Pryor stated in this article that there is a 50/50 chance that he would sign his LOI tomorrow. Finally, another Pittsburgh paper, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review states that Pryor said there is an 80% chance he will sign his LOI on Wednesday and that he has not eliminated anyone out of Ohio State, Michigan, Penn State, and Oregon. Also, he says that he does not have a leader at this point.

So what does this all mean? I have no freaking idea. I’ve followed his recruiting closer than any other recruit, mainly because he plays football close to my home town and the media attention he gets is non-stop. Pryor is either really media savy for an 18 year old or he really has no idea where he wants to go. I presume to think he still hasn’t made up his mind and with the pressure culminating of LOI day being tomorrow, it is making it worse on him. If I were to make a prediction right now, I suspect he doesn’t sign tomorrow. He will make a trip to Oregon to see what Eugene is all about, come home and sit down with his family, and make his decision.

Don’t forget tonight I will be a guest on the show Under Center, hosted by Adam Nettina. I will be discussing more Terrelle Pryor news, along with some other Big Ten information that I have about recruiting. I have gotten the go ahead from Adam to tape my segment on the show and post it as a podcast for those who cannot listen to it live. For a full list of his guest check out his blog Under Center.

One last reminder that In The Bleachers will be live blogging LOI day tomorrow, starting at around 7:30 am est and continuing through most of the day. Any time I hear any rumors or infomation of note such as signings or where people are leaning, I will post them on the blog. If you have any tips please email them to me at inthebleachers[at]gmail[dot]com.

Like many of you around the country, we are all sitting at our desks, drinking an extra cup or two of coffee this morning to try and be some what functional at work the day after the Super Bowl. With the football season officially over, unless you are a fan of the AFL, we all now have to look ahead to late summer to when our teams go to camp or when preseason practice starts around the country. In The Bleachers will hopefully help that time go quicker by bringing you up to date news throughout the offseason.

- Wednesday February 6th is National Letter of Intent Day. I will be live blogging the event the entire day, keeping you up to date with all of the change of hearts, and shocks that occur during the day when 17/18 year old kids make the biggest decisions of their lives with grown men trying to push them to follow their agenda.

- Tuesday night I will be one of the first guests on the show Under Center, hosted by former Pitch Right blogger Adam Nettina. Adam is doing his own college football show on WCUA from 8pm EST to 10pm EST every Tuesday. As of right now I am slated to go on around 8:20pm EST and you can listen live to the show by clicking here. If Adam doesn’t have a problem with it, I will record the interview and post it as a podcast for everyone to check out.

- Speaking of podcasts, if there is anyone out there writing a book or a blogger that wants to just talk football, please shoot me an email. I am looking for guests for the podcast because I’d like to do at least 2 a month during the offseason.

- In case you haven’t heard (or lived in a cave for the last 2 years) Terrelle Pryor is the #1 recruit in the nation. Last Friday was his last high school basketball game and a wrestling match almost broke out between the coaching staffs of Michigan and Ohio State. Okay, I am exaggerating a bit, but both teams had their head coaches and coaching staffs there at the game. If you still don’t have enough of Pryor, here is a slideshow of his career.

- Finally, congratulations to the New York football Giants for doing something that nobody else could do this year, beat the Patriots. I still haven’t figured out if there was more support for the Giants winning or for seeing the Patriots lose. Either way it was a great fourth quarter capped of by a Super Bowl play that will be remembered for ages. Also, if you haven’t yet, don’t forget to thank the Boston Globe for jinxing the Patriots.

And your synergy just plain sucks!

The curse of being a football fan is that you have to put up with all the window dressing that is needed to entice non-football fans these days. I know I’m not breaking new ground with this statement, but for me to not say it in some medium would just be wrong.

I woke up from a nap and switched over to Fox to see what was going on, and Alicia Keys performing. I think she is an incredible artist, but am I the only one that just thinks there’s something wrong with a performance on a football field. That, of course, doesn’t include marching bands. Because marching bands are tradition. Their popularity doesn’t diminish over time. Their popularity doesn’t disappear with age. It actually grows. They play the same songs in the same formations with the same movements every week and it never gets old. If you’re like me, your schools marching band actually invokes emotions in you that you don’t experience anywhere or with anyone else. Simply put, it’s special.

But something about a pop artist performing on a field just reeks of bad. Of course, the last thing I saw before my nap was Before the Music Dies, a documentary on the devolution of popular music. It’s running on IFC this month and I would strongly urge you to take 90 minutes of your life to check it out. So yeah, I’m sure that skewed my thought process a little bit. But still, the corporate mega forces that control the music industry are the same types that control the broadcast industry that feeds us what they want us to like on the TV side. And they seem to work well together to bring football fans what we least want to see on Superbowl Sunday. Although I’m sure it’s exactly what all the test markets are telling them it’s what they need to show to bring in the non-football fans.

Still, it is the Superbowl. Which is going on as I type this. So I should probably get in front of the TV so I don’t seem like a complete dweeb tomorrow at work. But before I do, you should really check out this video from the documentary I was telling you about. This is why people lip sync.