The Tarheels

It's really amazing how far some programs will go to try to win. Internet courses to get a player qualified. Just man up and admit you are bringing in 'tards in the hopes you can beat TOB.

 

To be fair, it could be argued that Butch is just full of compassion and wants to help these guys get into college since no other school will admit them (like Clemson, I mean my God: CLEMSON!!!, passing on Dwight Jones due to grades).

 

Don't KNOW, but they NEVER offered a kid who spent his Saturdays in CF for MANY years,. Hey just maybe TOB and staff don't feel like hes the "second best" O lineman in the state, because they could have had him if they wanted. Guess the staff doesn't read your publications.

 

Yes, that was stupid no matter the situation. Why apologize in the first place for something like that?

 

here is the letter and it sure sounds like an apology to me and damn near 2 pages on Microsoft Word

"My son is a Tar Heel. My son is now a Tar Heel! No matter how I say it. No matter how I phrase the statement, it is a sound I find so very unfamiliar and strange. You see I am a Wolfpacker. I love North Carolina State University. I am a 1979 graduate. My wife graduated in 1980. We have been members of the Wolfpack Club since 1984. No ordinary members mind you. We have season football and basketball tickets with paid up life time rights. I have been a Wolfpack Club representative and recently raised thousands of dollars in the solicitation of leases for suites at Vaughan Towers. For God’s sake, my screen name on Pack Pride is “Wally Wolfpacker”! But my son is now a Tar Heel!

As a Wolfpacker, I hate Carolina. I have cussed Tar Heels with my all my heart and soul. I owe my feelings to something akin to a religious experience which occurred the first time I heard 12,400 people shout “Go To Hell Carolina” in William Neal Reynolds Coliseum in the fall of 1975. I raised my children as State fans. Since they were old enough to sit on my lap in Carter Finley Stadium, they have cheered the Wolfpack. I love my Wolfpack but I love my son more, I'm sorry Wolfpack Nation, he is now a Tar Heel!

My son is a gifted athlete, an aspiring offensive lineman. He stands over 6’7” and weighs 290 lbs. He is strong and mean. He wears a size 17 shoe and shaves once a month whether he needs to or not. Feeding him has required his mother to make three trips a week to the grocery store. He has an affinity for Carhart jeans, Justin boots and 4x4 trucks. As such he believes he may qualify to attend Carolina as a minority student. Football is his passion. Since the end of the high school season he committed himself to three a day workouts in order to lose 30 pounds to improve his footwork. He has the unique opportunity to play Division 1 College football – something he dreamed about on those many Saturdays with me in Carter Finley Stadium cheering the Wolfpack. No doubt we both thought, or at least hoped, that he might play there one day in the Red and White of State. If not there, maybe he would wear the Black and Gold of Wake Forest. It would have been an honor to have played for Tom O’Brien or Jim Grobe, but that will never happen for my son is now a Tar Heel. It all happened so very quickly.

The University of North Carolina is rebuilding the football program. My little boy is among the first offensive linemen to whom they offered a scholarship for 2009, the receipt of which has changed the way I think about Carolina. Playing for the Tar Heels was an unexpected opportunity, one we received with some degree of skepticism. To my amazement, in the ensuing weeks, we found the coaching staff at Carolina to be honorable men of great class and dignity. They were forthright with us and offered to my son an opportunity to join a team which aspired to lofty goals. The staff is comprised of men who are comfortable within their own skins. These men are passionate about the sport and understand that football must be played with young men of character. They understand that winning is but a byproduct of the development of players into men who care more about each other than they care about themselves- a noble task indeed.

Try as we might to consider other opportunities, we found the path of our decision led again and again back to Carolina. So, on a warm March afternoon on the practice field outside of Kenan Stadium, my son extended his hand to Coach Butch Davis, looked him in the eye and said, “Coach I want to accept your offer to play football at Carolina. I want to be a Tar Heel.” I watched from the sidelines as Coach Davis embraced my child and quickly led him to the center of the field. Gathering the team around him, the coach introduced my son to his new teammates who immediately erupted with claps and cheers, followed by individual embraces and congratulatory handshakes. I must admit I shed a tear. The emotion of the moment overwhelmed me. My son was no longer just my son anymore. My wife and I and his sister were no longer his only family. In that brief exciting moment my little boy grew up and embraced a new family. It was a fulfillment of a father’s dream-a poignant moment of exhilaration mingled with sadness wrapped in profound pride. You see at that moment my son became a Tar Heel.

Friends tell me that some of my long held perceptions must now change. One even suggested that I must now believe that “God really is a Tar Heel”. If so, she has a real nice sense of humor. Most of my Wolfpack family has offered their congratulations, a few still sit bewildered. I have told them that my son is now a Tar Heel and as such must be the object of their profane ridicule. This is the nature of things between Tar Heels and Wolfpackers. Yet, on game days, as they curse him, I hope they will remember an observation by the late Jim Valvano. Coach V told us that “for forty minutes, he wanted his players to play the game as if it was the most important thing in the world, but when the game was over, he wanted them to always understand that what they just did was not very important at all” Indeed this should be the nature of the rivalry.

In the coming fall, when the Wolfpack lines up to play the Tar Heels, my fellow Wolfpackers will have to cheer a bit louder than normal. Although I still love my Wolfpack, I love my son more. My little boy is now a member of the football team at the University of North Carolina. Though I am still not so sure about donning Carolina Blue, I am sure that at least for the next few seasons, many of the Wolfpack voices from his family will be silent. You see we will be cheering for our little boy. For my son is now a Tar Heel."

 

Oh ffs.......

 

Still a stupid letter today as it was when it was written. Don't apologize if your kid took the only offer he had on the table. It was like he was begging for the attention. Sorry but that is just how I see it.

I live within 10-15 miles of Wingate and have been to some sporting events there. My brother played college ball at another school in the same conference as Wingate. I didn't feel the need to write an apology letter to Wingate.

 

That is not a sincere apology. Anyone who thinks so, is an idiot.

 

Oh I know, it just comes across as whining that he is having to justify his kid being a Tar Heel because he is a Wolfpacker. If my kid got a full ride to UNC, I wouldn't try to justify it to anyone. Now, if my kid got a partial ride for some sport, I hope they find academic scholarships for the rest as Daddy isn't sending money to that hole.