Lee Jenkins of the New York Times (who used to be the UCLA beat writer for the OC Register) has written a profile on the Juice Deuce. Southern Cal is out there to take on UNC in East Rutherford, NJ. The article is factually challenged, but it has some eye opening details on the shady "recruiting" that resulted in the thug Baller's commitment to JustSC.

Apparently some "stranger" came into Floyd's office last summer. He presented himself as some sort of rep. for OJ and dangled the troubled recruit to a desperate coach of a pathetic basketball program:

Mayo was entering his senior season as a point guard at Huntington High School in Huntington, W.Va., but Floyd said he did not bother to call him. He did not even send him a U.S.C. brochure.

What was the point? Major universities had been courting Mayo for four years. Floyd had been at U.S.C. for fewer than 18 months. Besides, Floyd had only recruited two top-100 players in his life. He had no business going after Mayo, the No. 1 player in the country, especially being from a football college that was 3,000 miles away.

"O. J. wanted me to come here today," the man told Floyd. "He wanted me to figure out who you are."

Floyd was desperate enough to play along. His starting point guard, Ryan Francis, had been murdered two months earlier. The backup, Gabe Pruitt, was in academic trouble. The third-stringer, a walk-on, was leaving college. Not only the whole story is shady Jenkins got few key facts wrong. First, Jenkins is totally wrong in reporting that major universities had been recruiting Mayo. None of the elite basketball programs (Duke, UNC, KU, UCLA) had any intention of touching this kid. The only program that was showing any interesting in Mayo last year was Bob Huggins's KSU.

Second, Jenkins goofed on the name of the "stranger" who presented himself as OJ's rep. From "RussSmith" on Bruinzone: Aside from the factual errors, it's Rodney Guillory not Ronald, Mayo was not a senior guard at Huntington Highschool, at the time he was still at North College Hill and trying to get into Oak Hill, it's an interesting story.

I don't know all the NCAA rules but one has to wonder how a guy the NCAA has already determined to be a representative of a sports agent, Rodney Guillory, can contact Tim Floyd on behalf of OJ Mayo, and not be jeopardizing Mayo's eligibility? I would assume it's legal or none of them would be stupid enough to tell a NY Times reporter it's what happened, but it sure does sound odd?

Someone on a USC board said it was Taj Gibson that recruited Mayo, they knew each other from camps or something which didn't sound right to me given Gibson didn't play in most of the big HS camps. But this article says Mayo recruited Davon Jefferson which does make sense since they've been on the same AAU circuit and all star camp scene for years. I wonder if any one in the Trojan Times will ever followup with questions.

Back to the story in NY Times. It gets even weirder: "Let me call him," Floyd said.

The man shook his head again. "O. J. doesn't give out his cell," he said. "He'll call you." Uh yeah. OJ doesn't give out his cell. Yeah that would go over will with credible coaches such as Howland, Williams, and Pitino.

It is just really disgusting to see how Trojies are whoring themselves for this kid. Just one more example of a school and its cultish fanbase having no morals whatsoever for the sake of athletic glory. Guess it's not a surprise. These are the same losers who are willing to be ok with graphics of black babies in handcuffs as a "joke," just so it could coddle the losers from its thug dominated football program.

Go Bruins!