Kirk Herbstreit: No, I didn't tell Dylan Raiola to flip from Georgia to Nebraska

kirk-herbstreit

Dylan Raiola flipping from Georgia to Nebraska was objectively a good thing for college football. You read it here first on this very website back in December, when it appeared to all the world that the No. 2 quarterback was in the process of doing.

But an opinion column hoping a certain event comes to pass is an entirely different thing than using one’s influence to try to will that event into life, especially if you are the most powerful media member in the entire sport.

That’s what Kirk Herbstreit is accused of doing.

The story starts with this clip. Dylan’s father Dominic appeared on Rivals’s Signing Day show, where he said this:

“When this was happening, I’ll bring up one guy’s name, his name is Kirk Herbstreit,” Raiola said. “When he saw the smoke about Dylan entertaining Nebraska, he was like call me, he was like ‘Dude if this is true, he’s gotta do it.’ His affinity for Nebraska, for a guy like that to tell me and get behind me, you know I knew he needed to do it, but I wasn’t going to sit here and say you need to go change that place or be a part of the change of that place. So when Kirk told me that, you know I was like man, I had other coaches reach and say the place is special and coach Rhule is a special leader.”

The story starts around the 6:45 mark.

On Thursday, Herbstreit did a damage-control appearance on Finebaum:

“My question to you or anybody is… if somebody calls and says, ‘What do you think of Matt Rhule?’ and you like Matt Rhule, are you supposed to say Matt Rhule is a bad guy? Matt Rhule is an idiot? Matt Rhule is a bad coach? Or do you say ‘I like Matt Rhule. I think Matt Rhule is a good coach?’

“And then the other part of it that he said was, I think the family legacy — I think he mentioned he had a brother that was an assistant coach at Nebraska, and of course Dom was a great player there himself. It sounded like the family, they were really torn. I just thought, as a guy that went to Ohio State and a lot of that had to do with my dad, I just said that your son can go to any school, any powerhouse and because of his respect for his own dad, he’s thinking about going to Nebraska? A place that hasn’t competed for national titles in over 20 years? That says a lot about who the kid is, as far as what he wants to do. It’s not just about trying to go to NFL. I just said, ‘Wow, that’s a powerful thing if he ended up doing that.’

“I of course did not try to sell Nebraska and try to tell anybody not to go to Georgia. That’s the most ridiculous thing that anybody would try to do. But I did compliment Matt Rhule. If I’m guilty of anything, I said that Matt Rhule is a good coach and he’s a good man.”

So, in Dominic’s telling, we have Herbstreit calling Raiola and saying, “Dominic, I saw Dylan was considering flipping from Georgia to Nebraska. He should do that, and here’s why.” In Herbstreit’s telling, Raiola called him asking for perspective, which Herbstreit provided, with some general encouragement on what a neat thing it’d be if Dylan’s flip came to pass.

Honestly, I’m not sure it matters.

My stance is clear: I think college football is in a better place because a player of Dylan Raiola’s talent is a Cornhusker, and not a Bulldog. Typically in this scenario we ask ourselves who stands to gain more by lying, but I’m not sure anyone stands to gain anything here, and I also don’t think anyone is lying either. I think Kirk and Dominic are both giving us their versions of the truth.

None of that will stop certain Georgia fans tying in some time Herbstreit inevitably picked against the Dogs as evidence for some anti-UGA conspiracy, but if anything the evidence points in the other direction. Disney no longer owns the rights to Big Ten games, so if Herbstreit was on the recruiting trail here, he was recruiting Raiola off of his own airwaves. As it stands today, the only way Herbstreit will ever call a Dylan Raiola game is if Nebraska makes the College Football Playoff.

But I’m applying logic to a conspiracy theory, and that’s no fun. Maybe Herbie really loves the Tide that much that he’d negative recruit their rivals.

Even still, the impact of losing Raiola, highly rated as he was, is minimal. Georgia’s No. 1 class fell all the way to No. 1 without him.

If there’s anything we can take away from this, it’s that Kirk Herbstreit might be too influential. We’re nearing the 30-year mark of his ascension to the most powerful voice in college football. Between his longevity, his role in college football’s flawed postseason system, and the too-online nature of college football fandom, and every fan base in the sport now legitimately thinks Herbstreit hates their team.

Someone will read that tweet and tie into their own conspiracy that, by defending the Florida State fan base, Herbstreit must clearly hate Florida.