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The Intertubes is aflutter with Tobias Harris news. Ah, recruiting. Such a weird topic worth discussing. This fascination with 17-year-old boys and their bodies.
Something worth noting as we travel down this path, a reminder from The Glaude posted in the comments last night.
People are making it out like this guy is Basketball Jesus. If he commits to Syracuse, fine. If not, fine. I just don’t care and I’m sure Boeheim and Syracuse will be OK.
These guys just don’t matter to me until they get on campus and start running with the roster. There have been so many flame outs over the years that I just can’t get worked up about a teenager anymore.
The obvious question becomes, when COULD you get worked up about a teenage boy?
Fair enough, keep that in your back pocket as we delve into The Madness of King Tobias.
The folks at Orange Fizz have been all over this one and they boil down what's happened in the last 24 hours thusly:
The New York Daily News is reporting that 6'6" forward Jayvaughn Pinkston (pictured) will sign with Tennessee this afternoon.
How does this affect the 'Cuse? He plays the same position as Tobias Harris, and that's critical.
So, like The Merovingian taught us, the natural cause and effect of that decision would mean that Tobias is going to cross Tennessee off the list. And since UT has arguably been one of the front-runners in the Tobias sweeps, that would be a big deal for Cuse.
So why did Tobias visit Knoxville yesterday?
Tobias was visiting Georgia Tech, which apparently still has a basketball team, and decided he's just jaunt two hours on over to Tennessee. The rumor virus spread like wildfire and it wasn't until late at night that Tobias put the kibosh on it himself:
"I was in Knoxville, but I am not committed to Tennessee. I still have to talk everything with my family."I told him that rumors were circulating that he had chosen Tennessee and he simply stated, "No, that is not true."
Harris was also asked by Anthony Wireman what he liked about each school. For Syracuse, it was "the style of play and their facilities." Just in time on that Melo Center, huh.
Now comes word that Pinkston's decision on UT might not actually be happening at all, thereby erasing everything you just read and putting us back at the starting line. And now, my head hurts.
My advice to Cuse fans who are concerned? We should probably just put our heads down and ignore the rumors from now until tomorrow at 5:30pm EST when Tobias announces. If you want to read into the fact that Tobias is making his announcement in Manhattan the same day the Orange are there to play Cal, read into that. Like Glaude said, sometimes we get the Greatest Player Ever, sometimes we don't. But we always seem to do fine. And judging by the recruiting class we have in place, we're going to be all set either way.