It’s almost astounding that USC is preventing recruits from visiting other schools.
This is hardly an unprecedented policy. Schools have tried it in the past.
But we are in an era where commitments are not just worthless, signing a letter of intent is worthless. Showing up and enrolling at a school means nothing. Signing an NIL contract means nothing.
This semester, players have transferred to schools and already left. Or in the case of Madden Iamaleava, graduated high school, enrolled at Arkansas and transferred to UCLA.
“You lose players sometimes trying to hold on too tight,” a Big Ten coach told me Thursday morning of USC’s policy to prohibit other visits.
USC thinks it is reinventing the wheel when it comes to recruiting. Part of the reason is that there is nothing but “yes men” in the McKay Center to every idea that comes from Chad Bowden or Lincoln Riley.
If you disallow other visits, it feels like you are insecure about your own program. Maybe it will work. Maybe it won’t. But it’s already cost USC a five-star prospect.
I mentioned Pete Carroll encouraged recruits to visit other schools. I remember during his tenure there were some schools that forbid making visits. He loved it because he thought it made the other school look small.
Now it’s USC that looks small.
InsideUSC with Scott Wolf 
Not true. Recruits can take as many unofficial visits they want. There is no need to take official visits to other schools, if you are truly committed to another school. USC got tired of being leverage, for a recruiting team to get a better deal with someone else.
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College football programs should not take commitments from out of state high school students UNLESS they have already made other visits first. It’s kind of like an arranged marriage by your parents then you realize you have a choice of Number 10 beauty queen back in your own state and start questioning whether you made the right decision. Modern society has too many choices.
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Back in the day when you got a recruit and he stayed for 3-4 years, I get it. But now, why be beholden to some 4 or 5* recruit (see Julian Lewis) while after committing, they shop their wares to all these other schools?
Chances are, they will transfer at some point anyways.
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Because all the schools like USC obsess about their recruiting ranking and don’t care if it is not real and is not going to hold up when the recruits bail?
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KAM: Another policy that could backfire…Democrats in Minnesota are saying they will fight “until the very end” to provide taxpayer-funded state healthcare for ILLEGALS. Unreal.
DON 21% approval rating for a reason…
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This is a bad policy by USC. So a 5 star says I love the university, the NIL is fine, I want to commit but I still want to take 3 more visits. Are you seriously going to turn him down? The objective is to land the 5 star. If he publicly commits it is more likely that he stays committed. Your odds of landing him go up. And if it appears that he is just leveraging the commitment to get more NIL from other universities, than drop him. Asking to visit other universities is a reasonable request. Perhaps ask him for a final commitment deadline and then hold him to that self imposed deadline.
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