This is a response to the Thayer piece on the NYT website. Follow this link
The Link then scroll down the responses. Kemp's response to Diane from OK is also pretty good.
Updated 8:25 p.m.: As you all know, I’ve been fortunate to gain a couple sources in Lufkin that are extremely close to this recruitment, and I just talked to them about the NY Times story.
A couple very key notes:
1. This is pretty much common knowledge, but it’s important to note the party in Dallas that was alluded to in the story was obviously not a party in which the Texas program was affiliated in any way. The game was in Dallas and OU was the home team, so McFarland was a guest of OU’s (neither team could actually talk to him). My sources weren’t 100 percent positive but it was their understanding that it was McFarland’s mother that took him to the game. As for the Texas team, the entire team left the stadium shortly after the game was over on chartered buses to make their way to the airport and back to Austin.
2. In talking to my sources, they said the talk of Mack comparing houses to those of other coaches was absurd. Anyone that has ever been around Mack knows that’s not something that he would say, and my source said that topic had never been mentioned by anybody before it showed up in the story. It’s just not plausible, and that comes from a person that’s known Mack directly for years and I believe has talked to him about the NY Times story.
3. There’s a part in the story where McFarland’s mom alleges that she called Mac McWhorter and he refused to put her in touch with Mack Brown. According to my sources, McFarland’s mother had Mack’s cell phone number and called him regularly throughout the course of last summer. And my source said to his knowledge, she very rarely even called McWhorter.
4. There were comments in the story from McFarland’s mother about Texas’ effort, and them going by the school instead of the home, no calls, etc. Again, my sources in Lufkin all indicated that the Texas coaches tried everything they could to do a visit at the family’s residence, but McFarland’s mother wouldn’t let them in.
Just a few notes that are worth putting out there.
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6:55 p.m. update - Congratulations to Jamarkus for ending what has obviously been a stressful recruitment and congratulations to OU for gaining a big commitment.
I’m not going to get into specifics, but as for the NY Times article, I can tell you that people at Texas would dispute an awful lot of that information, and from various sources that I’ve talked to both in Lufkin and elsewhere, there is quite a bit of erroneous information in that report.
As always, I can promise you that there are two sides to the story.
— Ken Kemp