LSU quarterback Brandon Harris announced this week he will pursue a graduate transfer... and then things went really sideways for his high school coach.
In an interview with ESPN 104.5 in Baton Rouge earlier this week, Parkway (La.) High School head coach David Feaster discussed his level of activity in his players' recruitments, including a story of Alabama's pursuit of Harris and his subsequent banning of the Tide from Parkway's campus.
“That spring, everyone was coming to see Brandon Harris,” he told ESPN 104.5 of Harris's 2013 recruitment (via SEC Country). “They said: ‘We want to offer Brandon.’ I asked how many quarterbacks they had offered so far, and it was 6 or 7, but they said: ‘An offer for us at quarterback is really an offer to come to camp.’ I understand, go meet Nick Saban, but what I told Brandon was he only has so much money and time to spend, so go to a school that has you atop their board. Ohio State, Ole Miss and Texas A&M … LSU wasn’t in yet, and all these other schools said you’re No. 1.
“They told Brandon to call Nick Saban. He says: ‘Brandon, you have a scholarship at Alabama.’ It was a scholarship offer, a committable offer, then we skyped Nick Saban a while later and he said he wanted us to go to camp. When he got there in June — and I’m not saying Brandon was going to commit to Alabama — but it wasn’t an option. When he came back home, they took a commitment from someone else. If you offer Justin Rogers, it has to be a committable offer. That never happened with Brandon. My guys can go to Alabama, but I’m not going to help Alabama recruit my guys.”
Those comments were not Feaster's first brush with controversial headlines, though.
In 2012 he banned visiting opponents from bringing their radio broadcast crews with them, and two years ago all but pleaded Harris to transfer out of LSU.
"Please get out of there," Feaster said he told Harris in a 2015 radio interview. "I wanted him to go to junior college. Go to a junior college, and because he's a qualifier, he can just be there one year, leave at the midterm and restart the recruiting process all over again."
"You've got the worst passing game in the country, and the best quarterback in the country sitting on the bench," Feaster said. "Why don't we even try him against Arkansas? He almost saved you against Mississippi State, did save you against New Mexico State. Why don't we even give him a shot in some of these other games we can't get a first down?"
There is also this:
The school didn't list those comments as the reason it relieved Feaster of his coaching duties (he remains employed as a math teacher at Parkway High School) but, considering the timing, it's hard to see how the two aren't connected.
Update: It appears they are connected after all.