Gather around, laddies, for today marks the countdown when we are officially fewer than 100 days until the start of college football season.

Yes, I know. That’s still a long time, too long probably. But if this heartwarming tale doesn’t tide you over with an overdose of the warm fuzzies, nothing else will.

Finally a recruiting story with a happy ending, one in which everybody got what they deserved.

It was hot news on the murky recruiting trail early this week.

Somewhere, probably living in his mom’s basement, there’s a little millennial snit feeling pretty smug about himself right now.

And I wish I could shake his hand and wish him well. It figures to be a long and productive life, always with an eye on the betterment of decent society.

OK, not to stereotype, but I’m assuming it’s a kid, a wiseacre one at that.

Details are still sketchy. But it would fit the profile.

It all started Monday.

It’s what’s known in the recruiting media as a “Boom!!!!” mostly because the recruiting media doesn’t have anything better to do.

But this talented lad, aptly named Unique Brissett II, took to the Twittersphere to announce that — drum roll — he’d narrowed his football suitors to 10 colleges.

It was hot news.

There were some heavy hitters on his list, most notably Michigan State and Miami, not to mention Nebraska, Penn State, Duke, Kentucky Maryland and Indiana.

Unique was already coming off a visit to Michigan State, complete with pictures.

Included in this particular “Boom!!” was a link to his personal highlight reel from his days at the Globe Institute of Technology.

Pretty impressive stuff, if you’re into that sort of thing, and, yes, a lot of people are. The highlight suggests that Unique can play just about any position on the field Globe Tech.

The Globe Institute of Technology, which apparently is a fairly obscure school in New York, is probably better known for technology than football.

Actually, it’s best known these days for having shut down whatever learning it was providing last fall.

(So you already know where this is headed, but play along anyway; in the end you’ll feel way smarter than the average schmuck).

“(Michigan State coach) Mark Dantonio offered me,” you could learn via Unique’s Twitter account. “I just got a random phone call and things went from there. It was shocking. Michigan State is a good college.”

One of the side effects of a “Boom!!!” is that it sends shockwaves through the cyberspace where most of the recruiting media and its well-fed junkies live.

A site dedicated to Michigan State recruiting went into full nuclear catch-up mode when it learned the Spartans had made the final list.

It’s web headline promised a visit from Unique, although beyond that required a pay wall subscription, and I’m a little short this month so I can’t provide any further details.

A Miami recruiting message board went into full debate about how much Unique might benefit the Hurricanes next year.

One of the more creative Hurricanes fans speculated that he might even bring a “unique skill set” to Miami.

Then it all start unravelling — oh, the humanity.

One of the sharper knives among the recruitniks noticed that the pictures Unique posted of his Michigan State visit weren’t really unique — they were another recruit’s pictures from a previous visit. Being able to remember another recruit’s pictures from memory should have be more embarrassing to the snoop than letting Unique’s legend grow any taller.

But, sadly, the whole thing began to fall apart.

It appeared — OK, it’s very likely, but I don’t wish to pass judgment — that the whole Unique saga was a sham.

Unique’s Twitter account quickly shut down and any trace of him, no matter how tantalizing he was for Miami fans, has apparently vanished.

But his work — somebody’s work, at least — did not go in vain.

For a brief, fleeing moment, college football recruiting media got punked.

And that can’t help but be beneficial to the common good.

Several recruiting sites were forced to devote actual man hours to the story.

One of SI.com’s reporters spent a good four or five phone calls trying to track down the Globe Institute of Technology … and reported in hushed tones with all due seriousness that it appeared that it might not exist, at least not anymore.

A USA Today web headline went out on a limb to scream, “Unique Unique II recruiting tale appears to be a ruse.”

Appears to be? You think?

These are news outlets we’re trusting to solve the Russian influence on Washington.

So the recruiting media basically got punked.

So there’s hope for our future. Make Recruiting Great Again.

And bless you, Unique, wherever you are. Whoever you are.

 

Scooter Hobbs covers LSU athletics. Email him at shobbs@americanpress.com