National Signing Day

Yesterday was National Signing Day. It's the day that high school seniors announce whether they'll be coming to play for Bama or not next year. It's a big day around here. Some people have even been known to take off work.

One local headline I saw yesterday read: "Make Signing Day A National Holiday." And while there's absolutely no truth to the rumors that I started that grass roots campaign, I could not agree more. It's hard to imagine that workplace productivity was very high yesterday. I had four or five browser tabs open most of the day. I was emailing, texting, and watching live press conferences online.

National Signing Day is the college football equivalent of Election Day. Rivals.com is my cnn.com/politics. ESPN2's Todd McShay and Tom Luginbill are my John King and Bill Schneider. Unfortunately, there is no football recruiting equivalent for Campbell Brown.

Around 2:30 PM, word came down the pike that the battle for 2009 National Recruiting Champion was down to a two-team race between LSU and my beloved Crimson Tide. It all hinged on one final announcement. The #2 rated running back in the country. He was scheduled to announce his intentions at 4 PM. Say it with me. Yes. We. Can.

What follows is a crude timeline of the events occurring between 3:54 PM and 4:12 PM yesterday afternoon:

3:54 PM - My sister calls. She has the link for the live press conference online, but it's blocked from her place of employment. "Watch it and let me know what he says."

3:55 PM - I log into the live feed. There is a counter that says there are currently more than 15,000 people watching online.

3:56 PM - The female portion of Kywana IMs me. She's watching, too.

4:02 PM - The press conference still hasn't begun. My sister calls again.

"Has he announced?"
"No. All I see is a table, five empty chairs, and a bunch of microphones."
"Oh. I read online that his mother's car stalled so that's why it's running late.
(At this point, I cannot express to you the pride I feel about my little sister.)

4:03 PM - I am a giant bundle of nerves. I call Axl just to have someone to chatter to.

4:08 PM - People start arriving at the table. The press conference is beginning. The counter says there are now more than 23,000 people logged on.

4:09 PM - My sister beeps in. I click over and stay on the phone with her. Blood is thicker than water. Here it comes...

4:10 PM - "YES!!! YES!!! YES!!!!" I begin to yell as he makes the announcement that he is "gonna roll with Alabama." Booyah!

4:12 PM - Axl calls. "What happened?" Whoops, forgot I was on the phone with him.

And so, for the second year in a row, Bama wins the recruiting national championship. Not quite the same as the real on-field national championship, but something to cheer about nonetheless.

OK, I'm off to google image Campbell Brown or something. We now return you to your regularly scheduled February sports programming of Winter X-Games and the NBA regular season.

Yawn.

"If we took a holiday, took some time to celebrate, just one day out of life, it would be, it would be so nice..."