johnny manziel

NCAA Bans Johnny Manziel From Tweeting At Recruits While Texas A&M Has Solid National Signing Day
8 years ago

johnny manziel

Life after college has not been so kind to Johnny Manziel. But the Heisman Trophy winner and Texas A&M standout still has clout as an Aggies legend and has flexed that status, firing off tweets to top recruits left and right in an attempt to get them all aboard that hype train to College Station ahead of today’s National Signing Day.

Not surprisingly, the NCAA isn’t cool with such shenanigans and essentially told Manziel to cease and desist with the recruit-targeting tweets, which he revealed, fittingly, via tweet.

From Sports Day:

NCAA bylaw 13.02.13 (c) states that former players cannot “be assisting or to have been requested (by the athletics department staff) to assist in the recruitment of prospective student-athletes.” This means that contact may only be initiated by prospective players.

As the recruiting season heated up, Manziel took to Twitter to pitch his alma mater, Texas A&M, to several of the Aggies key targets, including four-star safety Leon O’Neal, who is expected to sign with A&M at 10:30 a.m., and four-star wide receiver Jaylen Waddle, who will decide between A&M and Alabama at 3:30 p.m.

By most accounts, A&M still came away with a pretty solid National Signing Day, nabbing more than 20 recruits including O’Neal.

Waddle ended up signing with Alabama, but hey — you can’t win ’em all.

Obviously Johnny Football doesn’t hold ultimate sway over where recruits decide to take their talents; Jimbo Fisher has that. And while the NCAA will be keeping a closer eye on Johnny’s recruitment tactics going forward, I don’t doubt that he’ll be able to find and exploit at least a couple loopholes.

The question, though, is whether or not it’s good for A&M in the long term to have a pro bust as one of its biggest recruiting tools. Depending on how Johnny’s comeback tour pans out, it may be A&M telling him to cease and desist.

[via Sports Day]

Image via Shutterstock

  2. 50NosAndAYesMeansYes

    Manziel is no longer an NCAA player or a Texas A&M student, so I fail to see how the NCAA has any authority to “ban” him from doing anything. He’s a private citizen now, so he can tweet at whoever he wants. The NCAA’s rules don’t apply to him anymore.

    8 years ago at 4:45 pm
  3. jizzrag69v2

    What an amateur. The UT coaches give me a list of the players they’re targeting. Then I conduct my own evaluation and give each of my favorites $100k. Works like a charm. BTW, the Manziel family is in a cash flow bind, What with WTI around $62. No problem, though. I loaned the family enough to cover their operating expenses for the rest of the year. Johnny and I are set to party in Vegas later this month. – Jizz Out

    8 years ago at 4:46 pm