RM Keegan Hicks is another scholarship crunch casualty

and lights up BYU for pulling his scholarship.


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It's too bad but I don't think he is being totally fair to the team either. Sitake didn't overbook the scholarships--he is making the tough cuts where he feels they need to be made. It's too bad but is also real life.

The fact is that this is looking worse and worse for BYU. It's going to happen with any staff change as they cut the kids that they don't want, but it raises a whole new generation of anti-BYU LDS families.

I hate that they're doing this with mission kids. He probably timed his mission so that he'd be home to start school on Monday.



I don't think it's bullying, but I do think he has a point with your word is your bond. One of our head coaches said that within the last 24 hours.

This is bad - As in "I'm Hoppin' Mad" bad. If a school's Athletic Director and an Assistant coach tell you that you have a scholarship, and you're returning from a mission, you should have a scholarship. This move by coach Sitake is stupid stupid stupid. One scholarship will not make or break your team next year, but every recruit between BYU and Utah will now be shown this and it will be used when BYU is recruited against.



Coach Sitake, If you cannot honor the word of your assistant coach or athletic director, Then you really are a bad decision maker.



I'm calling this strike one for Sitake. I'm not impressed.

My heart aches for this young man. These next few years direct the rest of his life in a powerful way. A BYU experience is like none other. It's clear he's been waiting to suit up as a Cougar since before his mission. His apartment, classes, books, and even employment were likely established before he arrived. Can he walk on? If he was good enough to get recruited by BYU maybe he can compete well enough to play.

So did they tell him his evaluation was poor but he still had a scholarship and then say we don't have one? He's attached letter says you still have one but you'll have to work hard.



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Was he cut? Maybe he would be better served to go to a JC and then come to the Y. Sitaki should have offered that alternative. Less years of scholarships and he would be a better player his last two years.

Lots of Pac12 and western coaches will be using this example as a reason not to trust BYU when they say sign here but go on a mission first.

Except there was a change in coaches. That would not be the case with future recruits.

Doesn't matter that there was a change they'll use anything they can to get an edge in recruiting.

I can see pulling an offer before it was signed but this is not right. This kid has every right to be upset. Like was pointed out by other posters, if the athletic director told this kid he had a scholarship, he should still have a scholarship. This is the worst kind of press and this kid is in the right.

scott715 wrote:
Except there was a change in coaches. That would not be the case with future recruits.

Exactly.



I really feel for the guy and I'm a little surprised though that the new staff is reviewing the old films on some of these guys and not offering previously committed scholarships, but I've always believed that you should have to earn your scholarship now and occasionally at BYU there has been some "dead wood" floating about, where it seemed like other universities were on a program to eliminate those that didn't meet the expectations.



If they are doing this to cut down because CBM over extended, that's one thing. If they do this, and TH did commit to any of these players after CBM announced his departure, yes, then the right thing to do is to honor the commitment.



With BB, Coach Rose has cut some loose, but in a more controlled way and none have ever not landed soundly.



Somehow I trust their judgement and your agreement with a university is generally at the mercy of your coach and not the institution. I have no idea if this is from a push to retool for different offensive/defensive schemes, or what.

stuckinbig10country wrote:
I hate that they're doing this with mission kids. He probably timed his mission so that he'd be home to start school on Monday.



I don't think it's bullying, but I do think he has a point with your word is your bond. One of our head coaches said that within the last 24 hours.

Agreed. Both parties gave their word - a LOI is signed - done deal. He coordinates a mission to get back and be a productive member of the Coug football team - it's wrong. I thought BYU stood for integrity and honor? This is just bad cricket. I feel for this kid and he has every right to be angry.

I'd like to hear BYU's side of things before I comment on this. So far, all we have is the side of the story from an angry student athlete. If his account is true, then BYU handled things badly, and that needs to be rectified. However, we don't know if he's modified the account of how things happened so as to make BYU look bad. If someone's bitter enough about something, I wouldn't put it past them to change or omit a few details.

Kids need to understand what a scholarship offer is. The school cannot commit to you until NLI day, and you cannot commit to them until NLI day either. Those are the rules. A scholarship offer is not enforceable unless it's an NLI or until you enroll and sign an equivalent agreement at that time. High schools need to do a better job educating these kids as to what these scholarship offers actually mean--"if you send us a signed NLI on signing day, we may thereafter accept it and at that point be bound to give you a scholarship for the term of the NLI, but if (in Hicks' situation) you leave for a mission, the recruiting process starts again and that NLI no longer binds you or us." And those are per NCAA regulations--we can't do more or less than that.



Yeah, it sucks for this kid, but he's handling it all wrong--tweeting the Church, Elder Holland, using lefty buzzwords like "bully" that have no apparent application to the situation outside of the negative emotions they bring out.



With the scholarship situation Sitake inherited, some folks with scholarship offers were going to be disappointed. Bronco's staff over-offered people and didn't address it. The call from Ed Lamb should have set off warning bells for anyone monitoring the situation. I view that call as a harbinger of what happened rather than a "you're still our guy call." It makes no sense for a coach to call and tell a guy "you kind of suck worse than we think a BYU player should and we're not sure you belong here. But don't worry! I was just calling to share that with you, not to let you know we don't think you belong here during this time where we need to cut a few scholarship offers." Amazing he fails to note the role that his shoulder injury he had while boating his senior HS year may have had in the decision--he didn't rehab it right before his mission, so I doubt it got better during his time in Mexico....



Feel bad for the kid, but his tweet comes off as petulant and manipulative, and the staff had to do it to someone given the raw numbers of scholarships available and scholarships offered. I can't wait to see his tweets the first time he gets laid off from a job...

My take is that BYU is not going to be able to do right by everyone in this situation. Sitake of course has some of his guys that he is able to recruit (Tanielu is a good example) that he needs scholarships for. Now he also inherited an excess of committed scholarships anyhow from Mendenhall's staff. Bronco would have been counseling people out of the program this year to free up scholarships. Right now minus Hicks, I still count 87 committed scholarships if everyone including returning missionaries sticks around and there is only 85 scholarships that can be offered (I include Charles West and Jamaal Williams in my list but not Taysom Hill). So there may very well be more guys who are disappointed as well. In the end its competition for spots and the HC has to make some tough and potentially unpopular decisions. I hope Hicks finds another spot and has a great college career.

snoscythe wrote:
Kids need to understand what a scholarship offer is. The school cannot commit to you until NLI day, and you cannot commit to them until NLI day either. Those are the rules. A scholarship offer is not enforceable unless it's an NLI or until you enroll and sign an equivalent agreement at that time. High schools need to do a better job educating these kids as to what these scholarship offers actually mean--"if you send us a signed NLI on signing day, we may thereafter accept it and at that point be bound to give you a scholarship for the term of the NLI, but if (in Hicks' situation) you leave for a mission, the recruiting process starts again and that NLI no longer binds you or us." And those are per NCAA regulations--we can't do more or less than that.



Yeah, it sucks for this kid, but he's handling it all wrong--tweeting the Church, Elder Holland, using lefty buzzwords like "bully" that have no apparent application to the situation outside of the negative emotions they bring out.



With the scholarship situation Sitake inherited, some folks with scholarship offers were going to be disappointed. Bronco's staff over-offered people and didn't address it. The call from Ed Lamb should have set off warning bells for anyone monitoring the situation. I view that call as a harbinger of what happened rather than a "you're still our guy call." It makes no sense for a coach to call and tell a guy "you kind of suck worse than we think a BYU player should and we're not sure you belong here. But don't worry! I was just calling to share that with you, not to let you know we don't think you belong here during this time where we need to cut a few scholarship offers." Amazing he fails to note the role that his shoulder injury he had while boating his senior HS year may have had in the decision--he didn't rehab it right before his mission, so I doubt it got better during his time in Mexico....



Feel bad for the kid, but his tweet comes off as petulant and manipulative, and the staff had to do it to someone given the raw numbers of scholarships available and scholarships offered. I can't wait to see his tweets the first time he gets laid off from a job...

FWIW this tweet means that BYU cannot change the situation. Thus guy will never never never get a scholarship to BYU irrespective of what he does at the JC level. BYU cannot now change their position with this guy, because if they do, then all of these things get hammered out in the open.



His BYU bridge is burned. He will be a BYU hater all his life, and honestly, I cannot blame him. When you're told two times that you have a scholarship, that's completely different than being told "That's a good question, you'll have to ask the guy who makes that decision."



Honestly, I have no problem with the kid going nuclear on this. I get the impression that he's not going to be a significant athlete for anyone, so the only way that there will be any “light of day” shed on this will be for the twitter thing to happen. If Sitake was a man of integrity He’d take the Dave Rose approach and let the kid know that he has a scholarship for this year, but if there are no improvements, he will lose it in the future. My understanding is that scholarships are only for one year at a time. If Sitake didn’t have too much Kyle Whittingham in him, he’d be up front with the kid saying that “you don’t lose your scholarship by going on a mission.” He’d say “you lose your scholarship by being passed up. If you’re passed up this year, you’ll not have one next year, but we’re gonna give you the tools to succeed and the rest will be up to you.” Unfortunately, we now have Exhibit “A.” of Sitake’s integrity. I’d like this to be a one –off thing that can be forgiven rather than one of a trend. Time will tell.

No matter how it's spun or what the contractual allowances may be, this is a simple story which has the potential to do far more harm to BYU than having to have Hicks rather than Tanielu (and that's what the real tradeoff here is)



Kalani has said that the key to his recruiting pitch is that BYU is a special place. Part of what makes it a special place is the ability for players to serve missions with the peace of mind that you will have your scholarship and training to help you get back into game shape after two years of self-sacrifice and service to the owner of the university. BYU had a comparative advantage with credibly being able to tell recruits that they handle missions and missionaries far better than any other school.



That advantage has now evaporated. BYU has just signalled that they're going to treat missionaries the same as anyone else. BYU is no longer such a special place.



Not only that, but if a missionary is currently serving and they hear from another school asking them to jump (and you better believe they will), that missionary is going to listen a lot more closely now, knowing that their own future is not secure with BYU. You can absolutely bet that our commits who are currently serving will hear (in roundabout ways, of course, because of the Riley Nelson rule) about Hicks' situation and that there is interest from school X.



This also has the potential to put a damper on mission plans of BYU's recruits. A recruit worried about his position (and they all will be, to a degree) may be more inclined to forego a mission because of uncertainty about what will happen to them when they're gone.



It may be true that this is a new coaching staff, and that there may be some shifting as a result, but there is a huge normative difference between a HS recruit having his schollie pulled at the last minute (bad though that is) and if the dude signed a letter of intent and the only reason that LOI is no longer enforceable is because he answered the call to serve a mission for the church that owns the institution that gave him the scholarship. The "new staff" line isn't going to hold any water in the view of a new recruit, or the pitch of the schools countering an offer to a mission-bound BYU kid. Kalani gave Whit and Anderson a gift with this one. It's almost like he's recruiting like he's still at Utah or OSU.



This has much bigger implications than cutting Hicks, even if he were terrible. Uncertain gain in talent in one of 105 (or 85 if you think that 0.2% makes a difference) is not better than the damage caused to future recruits and current missionaries. I think this was pretty shortsighted by the coaching staff. Really bad move.

ABYUFAN wrote:
[Sitake should] take the Dave Rose approach and let the kid know that he has a scholarship for this year, but if there are no improvements, he will lose it in the future. My understanding is that scholarships are only for one year at a time. If Sitake didn’t have too much Kyle Whittingham in him, he’d be up front with the kid saying that “you don’t lose your scholarship by going on a mission.” He’d say “you lose your scholarship by being passed up. If you’re passed up this year, you’ll not have one next year, but we’re gonna give you the tools to succeed and the rest will be up to you.”

Really great points. That would have been a great way to handle it.



I'm not willing to say that this impinges on Kalani's integrity yet--he could have just been making a business decision. If so, it was a really, really bad business decision.



But yeah, it does have integrity implications going forward.