But he looks like he's put it behind him.
We really should celebrate his performances for the Irish.
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTj-jHfhdzo
still a virgin (strict LDS upbringing) who was duped, and very embarrassed by the episode.
I also think it impacted him, and the team, on the field.
It's their job to make sure than anything that involves the team or player is throughly vetted. That's was their most important job, and they completely failed. For months, this dead grandma/dead gf story made international news. and no one bothered to ask Manti, prior to the story breaking, to clarity details before the SID cleared him for interviews. No one at ND can be this stupid, they intentionally rode this bullshit because it benefitted the institution. Stanford was involved, as well, because the supposed gf was enrolled at their school. They played their part, too.
What's amazing is that it took Deadspin almost no time to unravel the canard. It wasn't due to Pulitizer Prize investigative journalism. All they did was conduct basic background, ask who, shat, where, when, how, and why, and it all fell apart in less than a few hours. That was what the SID was supposed to have done, as well as NBC/ESPN. How the hell does ND claim they didn't sit down with Manti, ask him for background before they sent out press releases, and if they heard the same story that broke later, why didn't the adults say, "This is the stupidest fucking thing I've ever heard. We can't run this, they'll think we recruit morons," Manti isn't a moron, ND hung him out to dry...
I know the NCAA felt differently after the Dunbar investigation, but intruding in their personal lives is not something I do not think anyone would be in favor of.
Teo gave them no choice but to make a statement after $#%! hit the fan, and the story broke by staying silent about it. Also, credit to Swarbick for hiring an investigative firm after he was notified.
Life a national story. Manti doesn't have access to press releases, nor new rooms, printing presses, video and audio transformers. Manti had no capacity to make this an international story. Only ND and MSM had that ability. Your post is straight up a bowl of horseshit...
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And that includes the investigative firm hired by N.D. to look into it once he realized he'd been catfished. That said, there are 2 places where he could have prevented this from turning into the fiasco it became.
First, when the story broke that his girlfriend had died, he could have quickly downplayed it. I get that he was likely embarrassed to admit that this was a purely virtual relationship, but he could have squashed the notion that he was grieving over a close loved-one. A simple correction to the magnitude of it would have been adequate, and it never would have ballooned. Instead, he let the story become a national headline attached to his Heisman candidacy.
Second, after the investigation was completed and N.D. was comfortable with the facts, he should have cleared the air immediately. As I recall, in his conversation with Swarbrick and others, he was given the green light to do so, and there was an expectation that he would do just that. Instead, he remained quiet. Again, it's understandable that this was embarrassing, and no one wants to have to admit they've been duped (and that his girlfriend was a purely virtual relationship and not the love of his life that we'd all been led to believe). But the fallout was far worse when it was uncovered by the media later and he'd appeared to be hiding it. That left Swarbrick to have to be the one to make an after-the-fact statement, which wasn't ideal.
nice to my daughter when she was a freshman at St. Mary's9later transferring to ND) on a chance meeting in which she told him of her cousin who died from cancer after beating it the first time and which he offered great empathy. He invited her to where he was going to meet his then real girlfriend at St. Mary's and had a picture taken with her.
We all know 22 year olds are not adults yet. And who has not put off something that is embarrassing and unpleasant? Now multiply that times the entire US population, the media, the haters, etc. I don't blame him for a misstep or two along the way. Let's not forget that Manti was the victim of a very cruel endeavor.
An infatuated, strange stalker and creep tricked a 22-year old famous guy upon whom he had developed a twisted crush. The guy was humiliated and failed to respond with the cool of, oh, let’s say Nixon, or Biden, when they are caught off guard. And I am supposed to think the ensuing media blitz on him was therefore his fault? Geez. So many people with way more cunning and experience have botched unforeseen media crises that I really cannot blame Te’o.
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