Make Desipio.com your one stop shop today for all of the important news, today, National College Football Letter of Intent Signing Day. Or, as it’s known in the south, Redneck Christmas.

Oh, screw that. You can tell the normal football fan from the rabid, annoying, fly-the-team-flag-on-your-car fan by the way they react to the news that 17 and 18 year old high school kids will be gettin’ free schoolin’ at their college.

If you read all of the experts every year you’ll find that these schools always have highly ranked classes: Notre Dame, Alabama, Tennessee, all three Florida schools, Texas and Oklahoma. EVERY year. Even when Notre Dame had to bring Ron Powlus back for a fifth year because they didn’t have another quarterback and ‘Bama was starting Andrew Zow and Miami was on the wrong side of Virginia Tech’s shoe.

It doesn’t take a genius to just rank the traditionally successful schools in the top 15 every year.

But take a closer look at that list. What do they have in common? Uncommonly rabid fan bases who buy recruiting magazines and subscribe to recruiting Web sites. So even when Notre Dame was using scholarships on guys like David Miller, Jim Sanson and the immortal Clifford Jefferson they were in everybody’s top ten. Why? Because fans don’t spend money to read that their team is recruiting a pile of crapola.

And what kind of job do guys like Tom Lemming and Allen Wallace have, anyway? They call high school kids on the phone and ask them which way they’re leaning every day? If I ever had that job I’d put a gun in my mouth.

It’s like they hope to grow up some day to be Mel Kiper, Jr.

If you go to a Notre Dame fan Web site today like www.uhnd.com, you’ll read about how excited everybody is that Maryland prep defensive end Victor Abriamimimimi or somebody has picked Notre Dame. They’ll say that he made the class for Notre Dame. He might be a studly player, who comes in next year and starts right away at defensive end. He might suck to high hell. I have no idea. And frankly, I just don’t care. I leave that stuff up to Ty Willingham. Then, on fall Saturdays I sit and yell at my TV. I’m an American college football fan. And I don’t have a Notre Dame flag on my car.

…but I do have a sticker in my window.

I distinctly remember that in my days as a student, or should I say “student” at Northern Illinois University, I read an article in the Northern Star one of the better daily college newspapers in the country, about one of our fabulous football recruiting classes. Our coach at the time, Charlie Sadler (a former Barry Switzer OU assistant–if that tells you anything) had decided to till the fertile recruiting soil of Canada for talent.

Canada? For high school football players? The Huskies signed a dozen of them that year. They formed the nucleus of the teams that went 1-21 at the start of current coach Joe Novak’s tenure.

I’m not saying. I’m just saying.

The White Sox are closing in on a deal to sign country western star Kenny Rogers to join their pitching staff.

Everything I’ve read says that Kenny’s a lefty, but you can clearly see in that picture that he throws right handed. Hmm.

In related news, the Cubs have signed three of the Oak Ridge Boys to compete for spots in the bullpen.

Cubs manager Dusty Baker says that the Cubs would have signed all four but that, “the one with the beard didn’t pass his physical. And, he’s creepy as hell.”

ESPN, CNNSI and the AP all reported yesterday that when LeBron James pled his case to have his amateur status reinstated that he “did not cry.” Huh? Now after all this, they expect him to act like an 18 year old? Whatever.

I think that no matter what LeBron does in the NBA, his legacy to me will always be that he made it possible to make an endless string of “getting a Hummer from your mother” jokes.

My Jimmel Kimmel Live streak was extended to eight shows in a row last night. And while it’s true that no celebrity co-host will top Snoop Dogg’s week one performance, I have to give Kathy Griffin credit. She managed to tell a fascinating story about Corey Feldman last night, that would not have been told without her because Corey wouldn’t tell it and Jimmy didn’t know about it. Kathy got Feldman to confirm that after a September 10 Michael Jackson tribute show, that Feldman and his wife were stranded in New York City on September 11, 2001. Guess how they got back to California? Well, almost back to California?

Jackson gave them a ride on his bus. Can you imagine Michael Jackson and Corey Feldman on a cross country road trip? Somebody has to make this movie. Especially, since we learn that Feldman managed to piss Jackson off, and got thrown off the bus in Arizona.

Jeff Ross did stand up last night on the show. How obvious was it that last night was “Let Sports Guy pick the guests, night?” Corey Feldman, and the man the who made the single funniest Friar’s Club roast joke since the roasts have been televised on Comedy Central?

Enough of this nonsense. It’s time for the Dose. Besides, you need all the late-breaking signing day news you can get!

Andy singing: You’ve got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em, know when to walk Andruw Jones with the bases loaded to lose the pennant…

Steve Rosenbloom on “long suffering Sox fans”. I looked up “long suffering Sox fans” in the dictionary. Found it under “moron.” However, one of the listed synonyms was “long suffering Cubs fans.”

One city. Two teams. No pennants. Sweet.

This just in: the Bulls are not good on the road.

KC Johnson says the Bulls “are dangling Jamal Crawford.” I thought they were just screwing with his playing time. That sounds more painful.

What can we do to make this Greg Blache to the Niners thing happen? We should send the Niners some flowers and bath soaps and stuff that those froo-froo Bay Area types like.

This is just me, but if Greg Blache does get miraculously hired away, my defensive coordinator search starts with former Cowboys offensive coordinator Bruce Coslet. Nobody can stop an offense from moving the ball like Coslet. I’m brilliant!

Rashidi Wheeler’s mommy wants Northwestern to fire all of the coaches.

Noted NBA strategist Stephon Marbury doesn’t like the triangle offense. Oh, shut up. The only thing Stephon knows about offensive plays is that number four is a clearout for him.

SIGNING DAY NEWS! Notre Dame and Illinois are supposedly sitting pretty.

Rick Morrissey wonders how crazy an NFL player has to be to get some help. Oh, come on Rick. Alonzo played for Dave Wannstedt and we know what a caring guy Wanny is. Oh, wait. Hey, did anybody ever stop and wonder if maybe Wanny drove Alonzo insane? It’s highly probable.

Mariotti puts down the doughnut to send an early Valentine to his sweetie, Jerry Krause.

Brian Hanley doesn’t think a college hoops team can make it through a season unbeaten anymore. And he blames those damn VCRs. Man, just think what TiVo will do to the sport? Shudder.

John Jackson says that Notre Dame hoops are getting so hot that they compare to a huge ND-Rutgers tilt now!

The Wizard of Roz with some surprisingly sensible quotes from The Hamster himself, Jerry Krause.

Jayson Stark found Ken Caminiti’s crack pipe. He wants to change the intentional walk rule.

Wow, more of Jayson on crack. He proposes 25 new rules changes for baseball. I’ve got one for you? Reporters with bad perms have to watch games on TV at home instead of at the park where they might accidentally get a little kid high from the residue in their bong?

Ric Bucher is out looking for his missing k and I think he wrote this column on the back of an airport bar napkin.

CNNSI is going goofy with SIGNING DAY NEWS! GET IT WHILE IT’S HOT!

CNNSI with the top 25 classes. I think they prove my point.

CNNSI with a list of everybody who’s committed, anywhere.

EW on the best and worst mid-season replacement shows.

“And my next slide, this is me and the wife at Hoover Dam, no wait, that’s an Iraqui chemical weapons plant. Hold on. Just a second…”

Police are getting fired up about watching this Michael Jackson interview thing tomorrow night.

The Evening Standard is reporting that the shuttle crew may have known for as many as 60 seconds that they were about to ‘crash’.

The Onion is reporting that the Yankees have clinched the World Series title by signing “every” baseball player.