UPDATE (B): While Tracy Pierson should get credit for breaking the story, the MSM (including LAT) is confirming that Seto is out as a candidate for the DC vacancy.
2nd UPDATE (A): Here is the report from the LA Times on the Morgan Center dysfunction:
Rocky Seto is no longer under consideration for UCLA football's defensive coordinator position, according to a person close to the negotiations who was not authorized to speak on the subject.
Seto, as assistant coach with the Seattle Seahawks, was offered and accepted the job Tuesday night, but the offer was rescinded the following day, according to the person close to the negotiations. The person said that no reason was given other than UCLA officials decided to go “in another direction.” UCLA officials claimed Saturday that no “official” offer had been made.
That is a laughable official response. Thanks again to everyone in this community who stepped up and chipped in this past week.
Folks following yesterday's post from Meriones on Veto Seto we received a request from Tracy Pierson from Bruin Report Online to remove it because he claimed it was premium content. We think at that point given the dramatic reaction to his post, the news was fairly obvious. You can see the reaction to his post here:
Note there was also no request from Tracy to his readers to not change the subject header (which is sometimes done on BRO to keep premium stories guarded). Given the reaction from that post and subsequent threads it was not difficult to discern that the Seto story had taken a dramatic turn.
Still since we have nothing but respect for Tracy we are going to remove Meriones post and let everyone else figure out the news. As Achilles blogged this am:
Tracy, as Meriones noted, is the best UCLA related reporter in the country. His sources are better than anyone else. He is also an extremely sharp, decent, and hardworking guy who is a tried and true Bruin.
That said what M said about the effort in this community remains on point. From Meriones' observations:
In the past three days alone, we have had over 50,000 unique visits on BN, with over 150,000 page views of the stories following breaking Bruin developments in recruiting, our payback victory over U$C, and the entire Seto situation. THANK YOU to everyone BruinsNation for your continued energy, enthusiasm, and commitment to UCLA Athletics -- especially UCLA Football. Without such passion, it's doubtful that CRN and the Administration would have been moved to reconsider this important decision.
And special thanks to Tracy Pierson-- the best in the business -- for his hard work and dedication to not just getting stories right away, but to getting stories RIGHT. If you aren't a subscriber already, it's times like this that definitely make it worthwhile.
Of course, we're not out of the woods yet. We still need CRN to find a qualified, experienced DC -- one who will bring solid teaching to the practice field, energy and insight to the recruiting trail, and cunning and aggressiveness to the field of play. Whether it's Randy Shannon or a candidate we haven't even heard of yet, let's keep our fingers crossed that CRN makes a home run hire.
That all remains true.