Two portions of the post today. Part one is that Maryland’s #1 basketball verbal recruit for 2010, Terrence Ross, has de-committed. Terrence is a super-star guard from Oregon who plays at Montrose Christian.
Terps still have Terrence Stoglin (PG, Tucson Arizona), Mychal Parker (SF, Crozet VA) and Ashton Pankey(PF, Jersey City). A good haul of recruits on their own.
Terrence Ross was the 5-star of the class. His verbal commitment months ago was the crown jewel of the 2010 class. In fact, the Terps stopped recruiting for that position, as it was his. When signing day came and went a few weeks ago, it was said that T Ross did not sign because his family could not make it from Oregon.
We were told to just wait, he will sign in the next open period in the spring. Now, the word is that T Ross had his mother email Gary Williams to de-commit. Since it was a verbal and not written commitment, T Ross is now a free man.
According to the rumor mill, Maryland’s association with Under Armour had something to do with T Ross looking elsewhere. He is said to favor Nike. The rumor guys have him interested in Duke.
So that leads me to point two of today’s column. The value of Under Armour to Maryland. I have been wondering how that is working for the basketball team. UA seems much more of a football brand than hoops. I do not have an answer to whether the brand is hurting Terps hoops, but I will ask around on that one.
UA’s shoe designer Chris Weaver, was the lead designer for Mizuno and Fila. Here are his comments on the UA running shoes that have recently come to market.
We will have two stability, two neutral and two trail shoes (one stability and one neutral). The concept is to build a handful of great shoes and not try to be everything to everyone, but concentrate on these categories that will allow us to work with about 80-85% of all runners in year one.
The stability shoes will have one each housed in our “Protective” and “Efficient” silos. These descriptors are meant to be intuitive, with the protective model being a wider, taller base under foot with more stability engineered in and slightly more support in the upper. Built for the moderate overpronator. The efficient model is exactly that, what you need and nothing more. Built for the mild to moderate overpronator.
The neutral shoes will be built in the same silos, so you’ll have a protective shoe with more of the good stuff under foot and the efficient model will have a little more narrow base and the traditional midsole height.
The trail shoes are meant to go off road and the best comparison is a Hummer (stability) and an FJ Cruiser (neutral). We’ve gone for breathability and water release over waterproof, as there are a ton of waterproof shoes out there built for the trail.
We’ll concentrate on the smaller foot-type categories as we grow the road shoe collection and we’ll explore everything and then some in trail.
adios, chris – UA Run