Moving On From Sedrick Irvin Jr. Was A Necessary Move For Notre Dame
There are certainly parts of the recruiting business that can be ugly, and parts I do not like. One of them is when a school drops a player that has already committed to the program, and that is what happened last week when Notre Dame dropped running back Sedrick Irvin Jr.
Irvin had been committed to Notre Dame since September, and since making that pledge he had done everything right, and by all accounts he's a top notch young man that would fit in quite well at Notre Dame as a young man and student. In most instances dropping a committed player in this fashion is something I would disagree with, strongly, but the reality is in this particular case it's absolutely what Notre Dame needed to do.
It's obviously best for Notre Dame, and ultimately if Irvin cares about having a successful football career in college it's best for him as well. It wasn't an easy decision but it was the correct decision.
Irvin committed to a position coach (Lance Taylor) who had a previous relationship with his father, former Michigan State and NFL running back Sedrick Irvin Sr. That position coach and that relationship are no longer at Notre Dame, neither is the head coach (Brian Kelly) who signed off on that commitment.
Notre Dame's current running backs coach, Deland McCullough, has been able to get the Irish involved with a number of backs who are simply much better than Irvin. It's obvious from the recent moves that McCullough and offensive coordinator Tommy Rees don't see Irvin as a player that moved the position group forward.
As great of a young man as Irvin is, and despite how well he'd fit at Notre Dame as a student, he's just not a Notre Dame caliber running back on the field. Notre Dame needs better players at the position, and McCullough has Notre Dame heavily involved with much better players.
So Notre Dame was left with one of three choices:
1) Honor Irvin's commitment with the knowledge that he isn't a fit for what your program is looking for on the field. Perhaps he could have surprised the staff down the road, but the reality is he was the lowest graded player on the Irish Breakdown board and the gap between him and the other backs on the board for Notre Dame was significant. Barring him turning out to be much better than expected, Irvin was destined to be buried on the depth chart should Notre Dame "honor" his commitment.
2) Continue to over-recruit him and either hope he gets the point and de-commits, or tell him you'll honor the commitment but that you're still going to recruit at least two more backs, and then hope he de-commits.
3) Be honest with him now that you don't have a spot for him in the class, giving him five official visits and at least seven months to find a school that gives him a better chance to not only get a great education, but also gives him a chance to find a place where he can get onto the field.
The first two options are incredibly unfair to Irvin and are even worse options. If you don't think a young man can play for you, but you keep him in the class simply to honor the word of someone else who is no longer in your program you aren't doing the honorable thing, at all. You're basically hurting his chances
Option three might come with the most public sting from a perception standpoint, but it's the one that was the right decision for both parties. As I mentioned earlier, making this decision now removes the unnecessary and awkward "Let's drop enough hints in hopes he eventually chooses to leave the class" moments, and it also gives Irvin the entire month of June to take all five of his official visits, should he choose to do so.
I understand why Irvin and his family might have some bad feelings towards Notre Dame, and why some fans might not like the decision. The reality, however, is the staff did the right thing, and the hard thing, by telling Irvin they didn't have a spot for him in the class moving forward.
In the end, Irvin now gets to find a program that thinks he can play for them and a depth chart that is far more favorable to his skillset. Notre Dame can now focus on players it views as gap closers in the program's chase for a championship.
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