IRVINE — These are trying times for high school seniors planning to extend their football playing careers. Transfer portals, which make it easier for players to move from one school to another, have been around since 2018. Now the best players can capitalize financially on their names, images and likenesses (now commonly called NIL), and the havoc that may create is still unknown.
Recruits, more than anything else, want to go to a school where they have the best chance of playing right away. With rosters continually changing, decisions become more difficult.
Such uncertainty brought players like Manaia Ala, who competed in the ultra-tough Trinity League, to the Terry Donahue Memorial California Showcase high school football combine Saturday at the vast Great Park recreation area in Irvine.
The all-league safety for Orange Lutheran High has offers from such Division I colleges as Arizona State, Miami, and Florida State. But he can’t look at a roster and say to himself, “That’s where I have a chance to play right away.” Because that roster likely will be changing.
“I came here to expand my options,” Ala said.
Ala, like others among Saturday’s several hundred participants from throughout California, praised all aspects of the combine. That includes morning drills to afternoon sessions with coaches and recruiters representing Division II, Division III and NAIA schools from all over the country. Local junior colleges were also represented.
This was the 10th showcase combine, now named in honor of its founder, the legendary UCLA football coach who died from cancer at age 77 on July 4, 2021. It is a one-day free event in which participants get advice, instruction and tips during the morning drills from “staff coaches,” who are former college and NFL players, as well as current and former coaches at all levels.
The first showcase combine was held in Houston, and now there are several at various locations around the country. The initial idea was to…
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