South Carolina is so salty

Message boards have a tendency to bring out the worst in people. It’s a breeding ground for trolls and one of the best locations for a hive mind. If you’re into that. Fans pretend they have inside sources and throw around opinions which often contradict each other. It’s a nice community in theory, but often times the practice is just messy. So when I set out to explore the depths of a South Carolina message board for kicks and giggles, I did not expect to find Nobel Prize winning writing. I was looking for a good laugh, and some serious sour grapes. What I found did not disappoint. There were 16 threads on the first page of one free forum that detailed Drew Barker, the USC quarterback situation, or Kentucky in general. Allow me to share my findings, beginning with a bang.

bigrus126: “He will be a Gamecock.”

Short and sweet.

WSPCock11: “It's almost a given he will commit to Carolina here in the next few mins...”

These comments obviously came before the announcement, but you can see confidence was not lacking in some of the South Carolina faithful.

Poultry King: “Why would Barker want to waste his years in school merely being the starter/star of a team that is (maybe) Papa John's Bowl bound?”

Great point. I suppose the same argument can apply to Damien Leonard, the four-star shooting guard from Greenville, South Carolina who chose to play basketball for the Gamecocks in 2011.

TN--Gamecock: “Rumor here in Tennessee is that he is leaning to the Vols...I don't know, I keep hearing it's down to UK and us, then on the sports radio show out of Knoxville states Barker is UT's to lose...hum...”

Wait, what?

Birdiecock: “Congrats to KY fans.  You still have a pitiful program and your coach has a real uphill battle to get even with FL, UGA and us. Heck you have a climb to get even with Vandy-Vandy!  All four of these programs will pound you the next few years.  So I could care less if you got a local kid away from us.”

U MAD.

sclawman77: “Not to mention the kids graduating now are too young to remember seeing Tim Couch play or know who he is-even around Lexington-considering he's twice their age”

Interesting thoughts, because Barker had this to say about Couch who encouraged him to be a Wildcat and break his school records: “That’s pretty cool,” [Barker] said. “Tim Couch is a legend, probably one of, if not the best player to come out of Kentucky, and he went to UK and was the No. 1 draft pick. That’s awesome that a quarterback like him would say that about me or talk about me.” Okey-dokey then. Moving on…

gamecocking: “Too bad for the kid... Settling for less than the best rarely pays off long term....”

According to Emory University, Kentucky is the best place to play football if you want to be drafted... That’s right, the Wildcats football program have converted more prospects to picks compared to the number of four- and five-star players than any other school in the country. It seems “settling” for Kentucky is a pretty solid career move and won’t cost him anything less than it would at USC.

trae172001: “If he chooses Kentucky he will be losing a possibility at making a lot of money in the NFL one day. I hope the pressure there to commit to the in state school doesn't end up costing this young man.”

Stephen Garcia. Chris Smelley.

Stubbytwo: “Afraid of competition.”

Kentucky will feature Maxwell Smith (three-star), Patrick Towles (four-star), Jalen Whitlow (three-star), Reese Phillips (three-star) and Drew Barker (four-star) in a five-way quarterback competition with nothing but three- and four-star players. South Carolina competition will be Connor Shaw (three-star), Dylan Thompson (two-star), Brendan Nosovitch (three-star), and Connor Mitch (four-star).

Roostersrule: “Spurrier will more than likely retire by the time Barker is ready to play. I am certain Spurrier has not promised Barker he will be here.”

Hitting the recruiting trail by telling future players you won’t be coaching in a couple of years. That’s a bold strategy, Cotton. Let’s see if it pays off for them. 

usctim: “He would have redshirted at USC. I'm sure Stoops promised him the starting job if he came to UK”

The current plan is for Barker to red shirt at Kentucky.

Gamecawks: “Am I the only one that's glad we didn't pick him up?”

Ah yes, the old backtrack maneuver. Glad that your team didn’t get a player the coaching staff pursued with full-force and clearly desired to have suit up in a uniform. So glad. That’s a lot of hurt butt over in Gamecock land. Go Cats.