*** SOAPBOX ALERT*** The Problem with High School Signing Day Coverage

In sports, there are non-stories (anything involving Tony Romo and Jessica Simpson), stories that are covered in excess (anything involving the NFL Draft...just 79 days away!), and stories that should simply be relegated to the "news and notes" section of the newspaper.

In that third category I'd place coverage of high school football signing day, which just passed. In what's now an annual rite of passage, highly touted college recruits hold press conferences and surprise the media by donning the hat of the team of their choice. It's good television, to be sure. But it's also bad form for journalists to spend so much effort reporting the decisions of 17 year olds, most of whom will be destined for the regular-ol' job market (rather than the NFL) much like their future college classmates.

I'm hardly the first person to rant about this issue. Still, it seems like the critics are fighting a losing battle. Chalk it up, perhaps, to the villain of all villains, the 24-hour news cycle. But then how to explain recruiting Web sites that track these happenings year round? There's a market out there, no argument.

But when the media fawn over prospects and reward the young athletes for drawing attention to themselves, you know who else wins -- the brokers who charge for highlight videos and the coaches who resort to diry tricks.