Northwest Nuggets: Recruiting coverage different 25 years later

Twenty-five years ago, the Northwest Nuggets were born.

Much has changed in how high school recruiting is covered since The News Tribune sports reporter Don Borst released his first class of 24 top football recruits. In the 1980s only a few newspapers covered recruiting thoroughly or on a consistent basis leading up to national letter of intent day in February.

"The Northwest Nuggets were there in the beginning, and I followed it and looked at the other quarterbacks who I was competing with," said Damon Huard, the former Puyallup High and University of Washington quarterback who was in the fourth class of Northwest Nuggets in 1991.

"It was interesting … and a lot of fun."

Now, recruiting websites, backed by billion-dollar companies, have emerged to cover recruiting year-round with real-time updates. Even the athletes themselves get involved on social media.

The Northwest Nuggets are still going strong, the longest-lasting high school football recruiting package of its kind in the region.

Eleven players from Washington, Oregon, and Idaho (and Alaska and British Columbia, if a blue-chipper existed) make up this year's silver-anniversary class – bringing the total to 302 recruits selected by The News Tribune.

"What I think of with the Northwest Nuggets, it shows that people around here really like college football," said Borst, who is now teacher in Federal Way. "And they always have. This (support of the Nuggets) is one of the indications of that. There are a lot of places this would not work … because people would roll their eyes and not care.

"But … this is a real strong college football area and recruiting extends the season. It gives you something to talk about in February."

NUGGETS BEGINNINGS

Three decades ago, The News Tribune covered recruiting the same way many newspapers did across the country. The day after signing day, it listed the players who signed with each in-state university.

That was it. No updates on official visits or the size of potential recruiting classes. That kind of information just wasn't provided.

Blaine Johnson, managing editor of the TNT in the 1980s, thought more could be done with recruiting coverage. He learned about Borst, a college football reporter at the Long Beach (Calif.) Press Telegram who was heavily involved in that publication's popular "Best in the West" recruiting package.

In 1987, Borst was hired by the TNT to cover the UW football team as well as to spearhead its recruiting coverage.

"It was like starting a new franchise," Borst said. "The whole idea of … taking it to a new level with space and color was kind of neat. We had a managing editor who was interested in it. (Scott Oberstaller), our prep guy, he was fired up. Everybody was thinking this is a place where we could make an impact."

At the time, recruiting coverage was sparse. Borst estimated that no more than 10 newspapers in the country went as far to identify blue-chip recruits before signing day.

Recruiting gurus existed in different regions of the country, who distributed their own publications. Max Emfinger patrolled the South. Dave Campbell manned Texas. Al Eschbach monitored the Southwest. Joe Terranova was the expert in the Northeast. And Tom Lemming owned the Midwest.

Some tried national publications in the 1970s and 1980s, but they were short-lived. Terranova was the first with his National Prep Publications start-up. Then it was Ron Touchstone and his "Blue Chips" newsletter that actually garnered advertising from universities before going under.

The longest-surviving national recruiting magazine has been SuperPrep, which was founded by California attorney Allen Wallace in 1985.

"The content back then was so biased … and uneven," Wallace said. "I quickly realized that I was going to have to be a reporter, and find a way to talk to these kids."

The way SuperPrep flourished was the same approach Borst took with the Northwest Nuggets – getting in with NCAA Division I recruiting coordinators and relying on their expertise.

That first Northwest Nuggets class had 24 recruits – guys such as Cheney's Steve Emtman, Seattle's Mario Bailey, Portland's Walter Bailey, Renton's Clarence Williams and Eatonville's Brandon Jumper. The list was compiled strictly on the votes of college recruiters on the West Coast.

"Back then, there was a precept that we were suggesting who the best teams and best players were," Borst said. "We were completely dependent on recruiters."

Shortly after, the NCAA banned recruiters from talking publicly talking about potential prospects. That did not stop some college coaches from staying involved in the Northwest Nuggets – they just could not be identified and became off-the-record sources.

"Don was in on the ground floor (of covering recruiting) … and he was trying to promote high school football in our state," said Dick Baird, UW's recruiting coordinator from 1985-98.

"It did not do me any good not to cooperate."

In addition to the Northwest Nuggets, Borst compiled the Western 100, which highlights the top prospects in the western United States. This feature ran a week after – as it will this year.

By early January, Borst said he would start to receive letters and postcards requesting a copy of the Northwest Nuggets be sent to them – nowadays out-of-state folks send emails, asking for copies.

"The Western 100 was going to show the strength of recruiting from a school and position standpoint," Borst said. "The Northwest Nuggets, that was intended to be more personal, kid-oriented which told people about the Northwest.

"In the early days, there was no Internet. We felt like if you wanted to know what was going on with recruiting … you read The News Tribune."

RECRUITING HITS THE WEB

With the 1990s came the need for immediacy in getting recruiting information, among fans and reporters. A few of the national publications offered pay-for-phone or fax (usually 1–900 numbers) updates on oral commitments and class rankings.

The rise of the Internet changed everything.

Dial-up providers, such as Prodigy and AOL, offered a new outlet for recruiting news that could be updated regularly. That's where Dave Samek, a Boeing employee, began hunting for Husky football information.

The web didn't come without drawbacks. Samek was annoyed by argumentative banter in chat rooms and message boards – this irritant still exists – so, in 1994, he created a UW-related page on Prodigy.

"I built a template where it would handle 3 to 5 pages of data," Samek said. "They would remain static until I updated them, which was usually once a week. It was more of a newsletter. It was not interactive."

Word spread of Samek's creation, which was the first website of its kind that covered a Pac-10 school. Samek called the site "Dawgman." Two years later, Samek installed a chat room on the site and fan interest took off.

Newspaper reporters took notice of the crucial recruiting information that was being discussed on Dawgman.

"That is when I realized, these are newspaper guys, so (breaking news) was being used for information by everybody," Samek said.

In 1996, Samek took in a business partner in Kim Grinolds, whom he met in the Dawgman chat room. Shortly after that, in 1998, Rivals.com purchased the website. Dawgman, and recruiting publications across the country, had hit the big-time.

"The big cowboys came in – Yahoo, Fox Sports, ESPN and others, and they changed the recruiting coverage game," Wallace said. "They began investing millions into what was once a mom-and-pop business."

Samek said his "Wow!" moment came in 1998 when he arranged a meeting with then-UW coach Jim Lambright in his office.

"He knew who I was and what we did," Samek said. "That season, we got credentialed (as working press)."

What subscription-based Internet sites such as Dawgman, and many others across the country that covered specific universities, shed light on was the year-round cycle of recruiting and talent evaluation – from summer camps and combines to winter all-star games, all the way to signing day.

More importantly, they not only realized a consumer market for that existed, they astutely packaged that information by posting player ranking systems, statistics, scouting videos and interviews.

"When we first started, we could not imagine it would be that big," Grinolds said. "But it's like hanging out in a bar with all of your friends. It is all about the community. Everyone on the website has a common fashion."

Today, Dawgman is associated with Scout.com. Besides Grinolds, who runs the business side of things, the site has one full-time employee in Chris Fetters, who provides most of the editorial content. Another 25 people contribute as part-time employees or volunteers – including Baird, who is a guest football columnist.

"Pretty soon," Samek said, "it becomes who you are."

SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE FUTURE

Social media – Facebook, Twitter and YouTube – has spawned new wrinkles in the coverage of recruiting. Those sites have enhanced the personal aspect, giving athletes the power to post their thoughts and comments, plus highlight videos, while providing fans a 24–7 vehicle to talk about recruiting with other fans – and the athletes themselves.

This interactivity has caused some friction, at times, and added even more deceit in the reporting of recruiting.

Take an incident that happened this week. On Tuesday evening, UW coach Steve Sarkisian tweeted "Woof, woof, woof," which is believed to signal that the Huskies have received an oral commitment from a recruit.

Sarkisian's cryptic tweet sent reporters searching for the identity of the recruit. Soon after, two UW-focused websites, citing sources, reported that Brandon Beaver, a defensive back from Compton, Calif., had pledged the Huskies.

Later that night, Beaver took to Twitter himself, denying the report and declaring he would take an official visit to Oklahoma this week – which he later cancelled – and would announce his decision on signing day.

Did Beaver actually give Sarkisian an oral commitment? Possibly. Did he deny it in an effort to keep some suspense for his announcement, which will be televised live on Feb. 1? Maybe. Or were the reports correct? Could be.

Such is part of the recruiting-coverage landscape in 2012.

"It has become more about entertainment," Lakes High football coach Dave Miller said, "than substance."

As much as recruiting coverage has evolved, Wallace wonders if it has hit a ceiling with so many websites and blogs popping up to cover this segment of sports.

"I do not see the business progressing any further," Wallace said. "We have so much information … it has become information overload. We might have reached a super-saturation point.

"What else can be exploited that hasn't already been exploited?"

Todd Milles, 253-597-8442
todd.milles@thenewstribune.com