Keeler: The young & restless: Who is fit to commit?

By SEAN KEELER
REGISTER COLUMINST

August 17, 2005

The summer before my freshman year of high school, the most profound decision I made was to start a Monkees cover band. It was the first in what would become a series of bad ideas that led to my current station in life.

So when Ballard of Huxley freshman-to-be Amanda Zimmerman committed to the Iowa State women's basketball team late last week, I tipped my cap. You have to be unusually mature to make that phone call and mean it. At 14, I couldn't get dressed in the morning without falling over and the fate of the universe hinged upon whether I could convince Marianne to slow-dance with me to Chris de Burgh's "The Lady In Red." (She did. The Earth kept spinning.)

"I knew it was the right thing to do," Zimmerman says. "I can enjoy my (prep) years and not have to worry about it later on."

"I think it depends on the kid and their situation," says Matt Gatens, a sophomore-to-be at Iowa City High. He committed in May to join the Iowa men's basketball program in ... um, 2008. "I knew exactly where I wanted to be and I had an opportunity to do that. Kids have to know for sure. I did."

Here's what I knew for sure at 14: Teddy Higuera was going to be a first-ballot Hall of Famer. Lafester Rhodes was going to break all of Wilt Chamberlain's records. Debbie Gibson was going to change the world with mall pop. I was going to marry Marianne. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

Funny things happen in young people between ages 13 and 18. It's called puberty. Johnny may have already had his growth spurt. Jenny may shoot up another five inches. Mother Nature's paint is still relatively wet.

"I really believe that the junior year of high school should be the earliest to begin the selection process," says sports psychologist Chris Carr, whose clients include the Kansas City Royals and Purdue University. "I think the greater the 'pressure' to perform, then the greater the risk for potential issues."

"When are they gonna sign a kid out of kindergarten?" asks Richard Lustberg, a sports psychologist who runs the Web site www.psychologyofsports.com. "You're going to high school for an education, but you already know you're 'in.' There is a kind of sadness to it. What are you saying about the high school experience and learning?"

What indeed? How young is too young? The summer after ninth grade would seem a sensible low bar. Jeff Horner pledged to Iowa at 15, just as Dean Oliver and Ricky Davis did before him. They turned out all right.

But then you have Damon Bailey, linked with Indiana basketball while he was just in junior high, cast onto a bridge of hype he would never completely cross. The earlier the commitment, the greater the risk. And rarer the reward.

The Gatens situation is unique. In addition to being a bright kid and a fine player, Matt is a legacy. His father, Mike, was a basketball letterwinner at Iowa; his mother was a cheerleader there. His older sister plays volleyball for the Hawkeyes. Why delay the inevitable?

"I didn't want to waste people's times," Mike says. "Some (parents) don't care, but these coaches spend a lot of time on you. And if you really know whether you're going to go, you've got to let them know."

On one hand, if you're a player, you've gotten the most difficult decision of the first quarter of your life out of the way - the letters, the calls, the Internet soap operatics. On the other, how many things in your life looked the same as a senior in high school as they did when you were in eighth grade?

"Getting involved in recruiting at an early age is part of the process now," Iowa State women's basketball coach Bill Fennelly says. "I think young people are more attuned than ever before because they're playing organized basketball at a younger age."

AAU and comparable elite-level leagues give more coaches chances to see more talent. But if you can observe a 13-year-old for a couple of days and comfortably project how they'll play at 20, you shouldn't be running a basketball program. You should be running a psychic hot line.