By Joseph Krum
Staff Writer
@joseph_krum

How early is too early? 

The University of Louisville football program struck the headlines the other day with their recruiting, but it wasn’t because they just landed a four or five star recruit. They had offered Tee Webb, a seventh grader from Carrollton, GA, a scholarship to come to Kentucky and play football for their school. That’s right, class of 2020.

Webb, who is a 6’3 170 lb quarterback, announced his scholarship offer from Louisville on Twitter, thanking the Louisville offensive coordinator/quarterback coach Garrick McGee.

The first question that comes to my mind is why? Why would you even think about offering this kid a scholarship this early? What if he injures himself, or even worse, isn’t as good as you thought?

Middle school kids have not played at the highest level of competition yet, and who knows? What if they shine in their respective grades but once they face bigger and better competition, they fail?

In the eyes of coaches and recruiters, I’m sure they just want to be the first college in mind when the athlete thinks about playing at the next level. They want to be the first one to go out and say “we want you”, but I think that it just puts enormous amounts of pressure on the kid to perform and live up to the expectations that have been set on him.

When I was in middle school, I played against an eighth grader who supposedly had an offer from UCLA. His name was Lindell Stone, and he was a one-of-a-kind athlete. He ripped our team to shreds, probably beating us by about 40 points. Even with his skillset, it doesn’t seem right to offer him a scholarship of some kind.

Stone, who has now moved to Virginia, has picked up offers from Temple and Virginia, with schools such as Texas, Notre Dame and Michigan State having interest in him 

The variables that go into giving a scholarship are just too great. If the kid fails all of his classes in high school, it gets taken away. If he gets hurt badly enough, it gets taken away. Even if the head coach of the sport gets replaced, the kid might not even have a scholarship left.

So even though that there could be some advantages to offering some 13-year-old a scholarship, it would be nice for everyone to take a step back. I mean, after all, these kids haven’t even started learning about algebra yet.