Against Mother's Wishes

[AUChizad]

Nothing shady here at all.



http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/7492921/ncf-alabama-bound-safety-landon-collins-picked-tuscaloosa-lsu-mother-dismay-espn-magazine

One mother of a recruiting battle
Every commitment invites backlash. Landon Collins just didn't expect it to come from his own mother.

By Christopher Schultz
ESPN The Magazine
Archive

Collins' mom got the recruiting world buzzing about her son, just not the way he wanted.

LANDON COLLINS, the nation's top-ranked high school safety, rides shotgun in an old Jeep Cherokee headed toward his mother's house in Harvey, La. Collins is not pleased with his mom. Four days ago, on Jan. 5, at the Under Armour All-America Game in St. Petersburg, Fla., he became the most recognized recruit in the country, and not because of the interception and touchdown-saving goal-line tackle he made that night. Collins is famous because his mother upstaged him, on live TV, in the biggest moment of his life.

In the fourth quarter of the game, with Collins' family and friends crowded around him on a makeshift stage, ESPN's Dari Nowkhah asked the 18-year-old senior what school he would attend; he had narrowed the choice to LSU and Alabama. Nervous, excited, Collins drawled out an "I'm gonna go 'Roll Tide, Roll.'" His mother, April Justin, sitting next to him, placed a hand on her temple and shook her head. As the rest of Collins' family tried to applaud the awkwardness away, Nowkhah put the mic on Justin.

"There was not a lot of joy here," he said. "Can I ask why?" With a defiant look, she replied, "I feel LSU is a better place for him to be. LSU Tigers No. 1." Then she held up her index finger.

Collins, unsure of what else to do, fit his hands into Alabama football gloves and made a diamond, showing the calligraphic "A" on each palm. His mom saw the LSU gloves that Landon had left on the table and, eyeing the camera mischievously, picked them up and jiggled them for everyone to see. Meanwhile, Jamie McQuarter-Collins, Landon's stepmother, reached across Justin to hug him. Landon's father, Thomas Collins, standing off camera, strode into view and embraced his son. But during the roughly two minutes on air, there was no hug between April and Landon.

The video clip went viral instantly. Sports shows replayed the strange moment ad nauseam. Four days later, the fervor hasn't died down. As the Cherokee that Collins rides in heads over a bend in the Mississippi, he pulls out his phone to show the tweets he's received. Many of them claim that his girlfriend, Victoria Lowery, who also plans to attend Alabama, influenced his decision. Holding the phone warily, as if it might detonate, Collins reads a few of the nastiest messages, spelling out A-S-S and saying "eff" to avoid repeating the numerous profanities.

It's impossible for Collins to know whether this is just the typical vitriol that greets any high-profile commitment or whether his mother's actions added a dimension to it, gave people a license to unload on him. Either way, he's not about to second-guess his decision. Four years ago, he had another tough call to make: where to live after Hurricane Katrina tore his home apart. That episode divided his family in a different way but also built his trust in himself. That trust is what he has to lean on now. As he approaches his mother's house, the loss, hope, frustration, jealousy, love, protectiveness and pride that collided within Justin on a national stage -- all the emotions that unite and fracture football families as the recruiting process plays out -- thicken the air like unfinished business.

This will be Collins' first visit with his mother since St. Petersburg.

WHEN COLLINS WAS 6 YEARS OLD, his dad gave him some advice before one of his Pee Wee football games. "Do you," Thomas said. "Don't try to do what somebody else is doing. Just do you and everything will turn out fine."

Landon did the best he could to embrace that message of self-reliance through his childhood in Algiers, directly across the Mississippi River from the French Quarter. His mom, a medical assistant, and his dad, a safety inspector, split up in 1995, before Landon was 2. Justin had begun a relationship with another man, Gerald Willis Jr., and she had a son with him, Gerald III, before the divorce was finalized the next year. Landon spent the next decade living with his mom and his new family, which would come to include his half sister, Gerrah, in 1999.

Landon and his younger brother Gerald were particularly close, competing in every imaginable sport together, all day long. Justin, who ran track, played volleyball and swam while growing up in New Orleans, swears her sons' athletic ability comes from her. That's perhaps why she was so forgiving when she discovered holes in a wall one day, after the boys had played football in the house. Rather than punish them, she told them to go outside, and when each was old enough, she signed them up for park ball.

In New Orleans, park ball is a community touchstone: Kids from ages 5 to 14, representing various neighborhood parks, square off every Saturday morning in organized games across the city. By the summer of 2005, a few months before his sixth-grade year, Collins was to start at linebacker and running back for Norman Park, with his dad serving as coach. But the buzz about the new season quickly faded as Hurricane Katrina raced up the Gulf of Mexico.

On Sunday, Aug. 28, 2005, the day before Katrina made landfall, Landon, Gerald, Gerrah, April and an aunt and cousin inched north on I-55 with thousands of evacuees, having packed a few days' clothes. Four hours later, they made it to the two-bedroom, one-bath home that a relative owned in Sicily Island, a small town about 200 miles north of New Orleans. Expecting a short family reunion, 13 aunts, uncles and cousins from southern Louisiana settled in as best they could.

The next night, New Orleans was 80 percent underwater. They couldn't go back anytime soon. The kids had to enroll at a local school, and Collins hated it. On one of his first days in class, he was handed a couple of bags from Walmart. He looked inside and saw school uniforms, burgundy shirts and khaki shorts. He was furious: Did he look like a charity case?

It was almost Thanksgiving before Collins' family could return to New Orleans. The loss of power had turned their refrigerator into the worst sort of science experiment. The house still had no electricity, so they used candles and flashlights. They bathed in the morning, when they could see. They ate out at night. Collins couldn't fall asleep, his city suddenly alien, so much of it destroyed, just gone, much like the park ball season that never happened.

One day during the holiday weekend, Landon's dad and stepmother, Jamie, took him to Port Sulphur, a community on the west bank of the Mississippi where the couple once lived. Their house had been split in two by waters from the breached levee; half of the home sat on the street. Thomas gripped his son's shoulder tightly and held it for a long time, the three of them looking at the surreal destruction in silence. "We took Landon because we lost everything," Thomas says. "He saw the pain. He felt it in us. I wanted him to know that things that make you weak make you stronger in the long run."

THE FOLLOWING YEAR, Thomas and Jamie built a home in Geismar, a small town about 60 miles west of New Orleans. Thomas picked up Landon for weekend visits, and on Friday nights they'd drive past Dutchtown High School, its stadium lit up like a spaceship, cars overflowing from the vast parking lot to both shoulders of the road, no patch of grass visible. Landon asked his dad what was going on, and Thomas told him it was for the football team. "Wow," Landon whispered.

Back in New Orleans, park ball eventually returned, but the team was different: New kids started fights and didn't practice hard. Some of Landon's cousins had moved to California. Collins was 14 now. He regretted that he saw his dad only on weekends and in the stands at his games. "I missed him a lot," he says.

After much deliberation, he told his mom he wanted to move to Geismar with his dad to attend Dutchtown. He braced himself for her reaction. Would she make this a fight? Lash out? As it turned out, that's not how Justin reacted at all. She agreed the move was for the best. Her world had been turned upside down by the storm too, and she was still trying to establish the stable life she'd once known. Her son needed a different kind of guidance than she could offer. "Thomas could show Landon how to be a man," she says. "I couldn't do that."

With 1,900 students and a college-style campus, Dutchtown overwhelmed Landon at first. Making friends was hard; he was shy. His grades suffered. But it all turned around when Collins became just the fourth freshman in head coach Benny Saia's 10-year reign to dress for varsity football games. That season, he played on special teams and occasionally at safety. It wasn't long before he found friends and brought his grades back up.

Over the next few years, Collins would call home often to talk with his mom and Gerald, who was developing into a football star in his own right. But as he grew more rooted in Geismar, he phoned and visited his mom less. It wasn't that he didn't miss her. But in the face of space and time, all relationships erode, at least a little. And there was so much in his new life commanding his attention, directing him to move on.

About town, grown men often tell Collins that they're huge fans. He gets out of his car at home and girls on his block scream Landon!

After games, students flank the walkway to the locker room and chant Lan-don Coll-ins! He's the first player in Louisiana history to be named all-state on both offense and defense. Nobody, including Collins, can list all the schools that have courted him.

Watching him against Ponchatoula in the first round of the Louisiana 5A playoffs this season, it's clear why Les Miles and Nick Saban wanted him so much. In the second quarter, opposing running back Mark Holland turned the corner and sped down the sideline. Nobody had an angle; he was going 80 yards to score. But Collins turned and gave chase from the 30-yard line, eight yards back. He caught up to Holland around the 10-yard line, where everybody expected him to dive and save the touchdown. But he ran a little farther, gaining more ground on the running back before dislodging the ball with a right-arm swat, bringing Holland down for good measure with his left. Dutchtown recovered the ball in the end zone, and the crowd roared. Collins ran back to the sideline more excited than he'd been after the two rushing touchdowns he'd already scored.

In the stands, his dad had a that's-my-boy smirk on his face. A few rows away and a few minutes later, Landon's mom approached her other son, Gerald, who'd just arrived. "Did you see that play?" Justin screamed.

COLLINS KNEW HE wanted to play for Alabama when he saw the Tide beat Florida 31-6 in Tuscaloosa his junior year. "I just felt the love when I got there," he says. "I stepped on the field and it just felt ... big." His dad was with him on that trip and on all of his visits, acting as his lead adviser. He was the one who returned coaches' phone calls when his son was busy or disinterested and hosted them in his home. He was the one who helped his son break down the pluses and minuses of all his suitors and made sure he wasn't being overwhelmed by the attention.

Landon included his mom when it came time to finalize his decision. That's how, with Collins leaning toward Alabama this fall, Saban came to visit Justin. She says the coach offended her during his stay by promising that her son would be a high NFL draft pick and receive a multimillion-dollar contract. "I think he stereotyped me," Justin says. In her mind, Saban had told her what he thought she wanted to hear, when her real concerns were about academics and how a program would take care of her son.

Saban's visit left a permanent mark in her mind. After Collins arrived in Orlando for the week of practices before the Under Armour Game, he called his mom to make it clear that he would likely choose Alabama and that he had reached this decision on his own. Justin responded with a text that said she couldn't support his choice and wasn't going to come to the game. Collins texted back about how he loved her and that she wasn't that kind of mom -- that's why he knew she would come. She arrived the afternoon of the game.

If you talk to Justin now, she will tell you she had her reasons for saying what she said on Landon's big day, that she had been set off before the cameras even came on. Shortly before the announcement, Landon's girlfriend, Victoria, was urged by her sister to stand onstage. Justin said only family would be in front of the camera. A confrontation ensued. Thomas intervened. Moments later, Landon arrived and the recording started, Victoria directly behind Landon, and Justin, now stewing, sitting next to him.

Maybe this all seems like nothing more than a petty family drama. But it was not petty to Justin. Something was eating at her on camera: She saw this girlfriend she didn't know at all, who lived five minutes from her son in Geismar, acting, in her eyes, as if she helped shape Landon's choice. And where did that leave her? Four years after letting her son go, the most selfless thing she could do, she was an outsider. She could see that now. It was staring at her. "There's going to be a lot of people who come in your circle and try to be manipulative," she says. "You've gotta keep your circle small."

Justin has always valued a tight-knit family. She and her children go every winter to Florida and spend a few days at theme parks like Universal Studios. She has a photo from several years ago of her and her three kids screaming during a free fall. The picture sits in a prominent place in Justin's TV room. This year was the last opportunity for such a trip, before her son headed off to college. But with all the hoopla surrounding Landon, Justin knew the trip wouldn't happen.

She knew she would fly home without him.

FOUR DAYS AFTER the biggest moment of his life, Collins pulls up to his mother's driveway and gets out of the Cherokee. He and Justin have agreed to pose for photos for this magazine, and she's standing outside waiting for him. Collins appears at ease. That is, in hindsight, one of two remarkable things about this visit: He has moved past the episode that made him famous. They exchange hellos, and Collins lets her fuss over him and joke with him; she's clearly trying to apologize in her own way. Justin brings up when her son got some muck on his face recently. "Landon won't even let me wipe his face," she says. "I can't be Mama to him."

"I'm old," Landon says.

"You're still my baby," Justin says. "Always."

"That's it," Landon says, smiling. "Mom issues."

The photographer makes Collins hug his mother, and there it is, the second remarkable thing about this day: Justin has chosen to wear purple pants and a gold T-shirt. LSU colors. She explains that they're the colors of Gerald's school too, which is true. But alongside Landon's Alabama hat, Alabama sweatshirt and Alabama necklace, it's true in a willfully provocative, mom's-not-letting-this-go kind of way.

Yes, she has her reasons for doing what she did. But she doesn't need to explain anymore. The poses tell you everything you need to know: A mother in purple and gold, hanging on; her child, in full Alabama gear, breaking free of her grip, smiling as he goes.

[RWS]

If the kid wanted to go to LSU and the mother said she thought he should go to Alabama you would think it's shady too. You have no problem bitching about Peaches steering Calloway to Alabama. But now it's a tragedy that this kid is doing what he wants to do on his own free will, and isn't going where his mother wants to steer him? It's a clear double standard. Just curious, but did you read the entire article? The whole thing? Especially the part about the girlfriend at the commitment announcement?

You're reaching.

[Kaos]

If the kid wanted to go to LSU and the mother said she thought he should go to Alabama you would think it's shady too. You have no problem bitching about Peaches steering Calloway to Alabama. But now it's a tragedy that this kid is doing what he wants to do on his own free will, and isn't going where his mother wants to steer him? It's a clear double standard. Just curious, but did you read the entire article? The whole thing? Especially the part about the girlfriend at the commitment announcement?

You're reaching.

^
Fucks goats.  Can't be trusted. 

[AUChizad]

If the kid wanted to go to LSU and the mother said she thought he should go to Alabama you would think it's shady too. You have no problem bitching about Peaches steering Calloway to Alabama. But now it's a tragedy that this kid is doing what he wants to do on his own free will, and isn't going where his mother wants to steer him? It's a clear double standard. Just curious, but did you read the entire article? The whole thing? Especially the part about the girlfriend at the commitment announcement?

You're reaching.

Hmmm...I wonder why his girlfriend's attending Alabama? Wonder why she's calling the shots?

Couldn't be that she's getting something out of it, and perhaps the mother didn't get a housesitting job this time?

[El Guapo]

Hmmm...I wonder why his girlfriend's attending Alabama? Wonder why she's calling the shots?

Couldn't be that she's getting something out of it, and perhaps the mother didn't get a housesitting job this time?

Fact: No one outside of the state you reside can be a fan of another university outside of your home state.

[The Prowler]

Fact: No one outside of the state you reside can be a fan of another university outside you state.

Only scared goats understand what you just posted.

[Godfather]

^
Fucks goats.  Can't be trusted. 

That needs to be RWS's avatar

[Kaos]

That needs to be RWS's avatar

[djsimp]

Gonna have to get someone with admin power to do that...like Chizad.

[Snaggletiger]

I saw the announcement live and immediately thought....shenanigans.....balderdash.  Even the kid didn't look comfortable at all with his decision.

[ssgaufan]

I saw the announcement live and immediately thought....shenanigans.....balderdash.  Even the kid didn't look comfortable at all with his decision.

Maybe the Mother was promised something from the LSU side?

[Kaos]

Maybe the Mother was promised something from the LSU side?

The boy is erring on the side of pussy. 

It's a current Bama trend to identify the girlfriend and/or entourage and find scholarships for them -- IF big boy is persuaded. 

It's prostitution is what it is. 

[AUChizad]

http://dev.chuckoliver.net/2012/01/did-job-offer-to-girlfriend-in-nick-sabans-office-tip-landon-collins-commitment-to-bama-over-lsu/

Did Job Offer to Girlfriend in Nick Saban’s Office Tip Landon Collins’ Commitment to Bama over LSU?
January 27, 2012 | 12:46 PM

Was there anything else that didn't sit right with April? As it turned out there was. It had to do with Landon's girlfriend, Victoria. ESPN The Magazine reported about a confrontation between April and Victoria at the All-America Game after Landon's sister had urged her to stand onstage for his big announcement. April wanted only family in front of the camera. Landon's dad, Thomas, ended up having to intercede. When the cameras began rolling, there was Victoria standing directly behind Landon.

What the article didn't mention, however, was the reason April was apparently upset, which may have tipped the scales in Alabama's favor. According to April, Victoria had allegedly been offered a job to work in head coach Nick Saban's office.

In all fairness to Saban and Alabama, I have been unable to independently confirm April's story on this point (Citing NCAA rules, Doug Walker, Associate Athletics Director, Communications, at the University of Alabama, stated in an email to MomsTeam that the school "would not comment on anything relating to the recruitment of a prospective student-athlete."  Asked if Landon's girlfriend had been offered a job, he stated, "I have no information regarding that.").  All I know is what April told me.

[Kaos]

It's coming

[Townhallsavoy]

http://dev.chuckoliver.net/2012/01/did-job-offer-to-girlfriend-in-nick-sabans-office-tip-landon-collins-commitment-to-bama-over-lsu/

And in typical recruiting scandal fashion, it's nothing but "he said she said." 

[JR4AU]

We at least do our deals with bagmen in smoky backrooms at casinos.  Saban is driving 150mph down the interstate, with a dead body strapped to the hood, waiving and smiling at troopers who simply wave back. 

[AUChizad]

http://collegefootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/01/27/recruits-mom-miffed-over-sabans-focus-on-nfl-over-academics/

Recruit’s mom miffed over Saban’s focus on NFL over academics
Posted by John Taylor on January 27, 2012, 10:18 AM EST
Landon Collins

If you recall from back in early January, the mother of five-star recruit Landon Collins was not pleased with her son’s televised announcement during the Under Armour All-America Game that he would be attending Alabama over her choice of schools.

“I feel LSU is the better place for him to be,” a visibly perturbed April Justin, Collins’ mother, said Jan. 5 during the broadcast. “LSU Tigers No. 1.  Go Tigers.”

Aside from the fact that the family is from around New Orleans and she wanted the top-rated player in the state of Louisiana to stay closer to home, there was, as it turns out, another reason for the mom’s distaste toward her son’s selection of the Tide.

In an interview with ESPN the Magazine, Justin explained that an in-home visit conducted by Tide head coach Nick Saban last June was something she couldn’t shake.  Specifically, Justin was put off by the coach going with his “I can get your son into the NFL” pitch:

    Landon included his mom when it came time to finalize his decision. That’s how, with Collins leaning toward Alabama this fall, Saban came to visit Justin. She says the coach offended her during his stay by promising that her son would be a high NFL draft pick and receive a multimillion-dollar contract. “I think he stereotyped me,” Justin says. In her mind, Saban had told her what he thought she wanted to hear, when her real concerns were about academics and how a program would take care of her son.

    Saban’s visit left a permanent mark in her mind. After Collins arrived in Orlando for the week of practices before the Under Armour Game, he called his mom to make it clear that he would likely choose Alabama and that he had reached this decision on his own. Justin responded with a text that said she couldn’t support his choice and wasn’t going to come to the game. Collins texted back about how he loved her and that she wasn’t that kind of mom — that’s why he knew she would come. She arrived the afternoon of the game.

It should be noted that, of the 12 schools which make up the SEC, Alabama’s 69 percent was the fourth-highest Graduation Success Rate according to the latest NCAA findings.  LSU, incidentally, was No. 2 (77%), well behind Vanderbilt (86%) and just ahead of Florida (76%) in the conference.

If you read the entire piece, however, it appears that Justin’s dislike of her son’s decision has less to do with Saban “stereotyping” her during an in-home visit and more to do with a mother coming to grips with her “baby” leaving home.  Or, as Collins put it, “mom issues”.

Despite his mom’s well-known reservations, Collins hasn’t been swayed.  The Tide has been his choice since the fall of 2010 — “I just felt the love when I got there. I stepped on the field and it just felt … big” — and, come signing day next Wednesday, Collins still intends to put his Herbie Hancock on a National Letter of Intent and head to Tuscaloosa to begin carving out his own football future.

And, despite those very public reservations, we’re guessing mom will be along for the journey every step of the way.

According to Saban all 25 in this recruiting class are going to be Top 10 NFL draft picks.

[Godfather]

Source Article from the snippet Chizad Posted

What Landon Collins' Mom Understood That Her Son Didn't Say
Submitted by Brooke de Lench

The video clip of Landon Collins went viral almost instantly, not to mention setting the blog- and Twitter-sphere ablaze.

There was the nation's top ranked high school safety announcing his decision to attend the University of Alabama during the Under Armour All-America Game three weeks ago, while his mom, April Justin, looked on with a pained expression on her face, shaking her head in disapproval of his choice.
Brian Denny Stadium at University of Alabama

By now, most of the story of how Landon came to announce that day that he had chosen the Crimson Tide over the L.S.U. Tigers - emphasis on "most" - has been told, including a long article by Christopher Schultz for ESPN The Magazine.

While the "tide" of public opinion (sorry, couldn't resist) has been, as far as I can tell, running against April, much of it portraying her as an over-protective mom unable to let go, my initial, instinctive, reaction upon watching the video, was a bit different. Not surprisingly, as a mom, I viewed it a bit more from her perspective, through the lens of a mom.

I am sure she wasn't thrilled that Landon was going to play his college ball a four and a half hour ride away in Tuscaloosa, Alabama instead of right up the road in Baton Rouge. But that couldn't be it. After all, Landon had played his high school football in Geismar, Louisiana, where his dad, Thomas, and stepmother, Jamie, had built a home after Hurricane Katrina, which was an hour's drive from her home in New Orleans, where April is raising his half-brother, Gerald Willis, III, and half-sister, Gerrah. As April told ESPN The Magazine, she had agreed at the time that the move was in his best interest.

But I knew there had to be much more to the story than that. I have spent years around moms and their athletic kids and have honed a keen sense of awareness of how protective a mother can be of her children, like a Mamma Bear guarding her cubs.

Then yesterday the following Tweet appeared in my timeline:
 
Emily Cohen @gobearsemily
Saw this on #ESPNU. The hurt in the kid's eyes was so obvious. Mom, why can't you support him? ow.ly/8DfMx  #youthsports
 
I wanted to know myself, so I got April's number, and gave her call. I started off by telling her that I was the author of Home Team Advantage: The Critical Role of Mothers in Youth Sports, the founder of MomsTeam.com, and a fellow sports mom.

No doubt sensing that, given my background, I might lend a more sympathetic ear (she was right), we ended up talking for the next hour. Mostly, I just listened. Some of what she told me has been previously reported, but some of it was new, and it confirmed my mother's intuition that there were reasons she wasn't supporting her son's decision to go to Alabama instead of LSU that the rest of us didn't know about.

April expressed some serious concerns about the college choice her first-born son had made, and not just because of the distance between Tuscaloosa and New Orleans. "Every year we as a family develop short term goals and long term goals," she told me. "His choice doesn't fit into Landon's or the family's long term goals. Landon has met all of his short term goals. I am so proud of him and the way he met those goals, but his choice does not meet his long term goals."

A single mom, and a former athlete herself, April has raised her three children, Landon, Gerald and Gerrah, to put family, education and sports - in that order - at the top of their list of priorities. "I only allow my children to play video games on Saturday and Sunday and never during the school week," she said. She knew that her athletically talented children needed to focus on sports and their academics in order to get a college scholarship.

She said it was really tough not being able to watch all of Landon's games after he moved away to live with his dad and step-mom. "He was playing an hour away, and his games were on Friday night, the same time his younger brother [Gerald] was playing". Factor in the volleyball games that her daughter Gerrah had on Tuesday and Thursday, and I quickly got the sense that April was a mom who has a lot to juggle, and is doing the best she can as a single mom. Not only is it a logistical challenge to get to Landon's games, but it is a financial challenge as well: two hours on the road requires a fair amount of gas in the tank. At close to $4.00 a gallon, the cost adds up fast.

But logistics and expense aside, were there other things that were bothering her? As she had told other reporters, she also told me she was upset about the recruiting process and "the politics that surround it."  Most worrisome, April said, was that "At ‘Bama they want to red shirt - or grey shirt - him and they want him playing nickleback instead of safety. He is the top safety in the country and he will never play a game his freshman year. Now, at LSU coach Les Miles is offering to play him as safety during his freshman year. His (Nick Saban's) goals don't meet the criteria of the family; they meet the criteria of Alabama."

What were, then, her goals? "For Landon to win the Heisman Trophy and to be able to play close to home at LSU with his younger brother, Gerald, who is also an outstanding football player who has offers to play at LSU." She said these weren't just her goals; they were shared by his younger siblings.

I got what she was saying. I think all sports moms, especially those with more than one child playing sports, do. From the time they started playing T-ball when they were five until high school, my three sons all played on the same team. There is something magical about watching your children play together, especially on the same sports team. I remember how tough it was when they were on three different teams during high school and I had to decide whose games to attend. Mama April was hoping to see both of her sons play on the same team at LSU.

Was there anything else that didn't sit right with April? As it turned out there was. It had to do with Landon's girlfriend, Victoria. ESPN The Magazine reported about a confrontation between April and Victoria at the All-America Game after Landon's sister had urged her to stand onstage for his big announcement. April wanted only family in front of the camera. Landon's dad, Thomas, ended up having to intercede. When the cameras began rolling, there was Victoria standing directly behind Landon.

What the article didn't mention, however, was the reason April was apparently upset, which may have tipped the scales in Alabama's favor. According to April, Victoria had allegedly been offered a job to work in head coach Nick Saban's office.  I

In all fairness to Saban and Alabama, I have been unable to independently confirm April's story on this point (Citing NCAA rules, Doug Walker, Associate Athletics Director, Communications, at the University of Alabama, stated in an email to MomsTeam that the school "would not comment on anything relating to the recruitment of a prospective student-athlete."  Asked if Landon's girlfriend had been offered a job, he stated, "I have no information regarding that.").  All I know is what April told me.

But suffice it to say, April appears to have reasons for feeling the way she does about her son's decision, and they have less to do with her being an LSU fan and a mom who doesn't want to let go, and more to do with her understanding what was happening behind the scenes, outside camera range, that may have played a role in that decision that didn't square with the way she raised her children.

Take a look at the video clip again. The focus has been on the reaction of Landon's mom to the news. But Landon doesn't look all that thrilled either.

There is a Jewish proverb that says, "A mother understands what a child does not say."  Perhaps it explains everything.

It would not surprise me if Landon were to step back to try to understand exactly where his mom is coming from before he formally commits to the Crimson Tide. We'll find out if he does on February 1st.

Read more: http://www.momsteam.com/landon-collins/what-landon-collins-mom-understood-that-her-son-did-not-say#ixzz1kgvZBzUp

[Buzz Killington]

And we sit back and say to the rest of the nation..."what took you so long?"

[AUChizad]

So, Goatfucker, still think I'm reaching?