Kevin Hart’s Pants Must Be “En Fuego”
The year’s weirdest sports story has just taken an even weirder left turn. It’s the sort of thing that might tempt a hack blogger such as myself to claim "you couldn’t make this stuff up!", but that would betray my lack of imagination, because non-recruit Kevin Hart, who wanted to play Division I football "more than anything," apparently did:
"When I realized that wasn’t going to happen, I made up what I wanted to be reality. I am sorry for disappointing and embarrassing my family, coaches, Fernley High School, the involved universities and reporters covering the story," Hart said.
Please join me in a round of "Whaaaaat?"
So, not only did he make up the scholarship offers, but when the schools involved went "who?", he made up the "fake recruiter hoax" as well. Lies built upon lies. Built upon a desperate and bizarre perception of reality.
In one sense, Kevin Hart had clearly done his homework. His story had all sorts of details consistent with the recruiting process. He had the hats of the "competing" schools (did he have to eBay a Cal and an Oregon hat just for the press conference?). He mentioned his "personal experience" with the coaches as being the deciding factor. He even claimed to have accepted a loan from the alleged recruiter, which of course would have been a recruiting violation, assuming, of course, he were actually being recruited. Which he wasn’t. And, of course, assuming that the alleged recruiter existed. Which he evidently didn’t.
Even stranger, Kevin Hart claimed that the man recruiting him was named Kevin Riley. Yeah, you’ve heard that name before. As in the Cal quarterback. Coincidence? I think not. Clearly, Mr. Hart has long been a fan of Cal football, and when pressed to come up with a name for this alleged fake recruiter, this was the first name that came to mind ("Nate Longshore" being too obviously a fake name).
Of course, this sort of thing could only happen in a town that had never sent an athlete to a Division I school. There were all sorts of things Kevin Hart couldn’t fake, like the fact that the schools and coaches named never talked to his parents or the high school coach, or any of his teachers. Any coach who had dealt with college recruiters before would have been immediately suspicious, and never would have let this get to the press conference stage. In fact, Hart apparently never pursued the NCAA Clearinghouse, meaning he wasn’t really eligible to compete as a collegiate student-athlete anyway. But apparently, no one in Fernley, Nevada knew any better, which is how Kevin Hart got to a press conference in his high school last Friday, picked a hat, and let the web of lies spin out of control.
"Oh God, I’m in deep here. Better keep lying, I guess. Maybe Cal will give me a pity scholarship?"
Of course, the biggest mystery here, one that we may never know the answer to, is "Why did he do it?" What led him to lie in the first place? According to this story, Hart claimed to have been "heavily recruited" by Oregon as early as last September. Was it his idea to set up the press conference in his high school gymnasium? Did he ever think he was going to get away with all of this? Or is he merely the functional equivalent of a seven-year-old, to whom inventing your own reality, and then continuing to tell lies to support that reality, is standard behavior?
I suppose the difference between Hart and a seven-year-old is that Hart is about to graduate from high school, is probably old enough to have voted in the recent Nevada primary, now has his name in the national news media, and can be held accountable for his actions. Not that there needs to be legal recourse. I’m sure the years of shame and ridicule he’ll receive from friends and family will be enough.
What a sad, bizarre tale. Kevin Hart will probably regret this decision for the rest of his life. Of course, if he’s not a fan of crushing guilt, I suppose he could always continue to invent his own reality. I hear that’s worked in the past.
