THERE they go again. It’s OK for prep
recruits to wanderHawaii's best high school football prospects are getting ready to sign their names on letters of intent to accept scholarships at Nebraska, Northwestern, Colorado, Arizona, Utah, and the University of Nevada-Las Vegas.
As usual, most of these players are big, mobile linemen whose role models are successful former Hawaii residents like Colorado's Chris Naeole, on the verge of a big NFL contract, and former San Diego State star Pio Sagapolutele, who appeared in his first Super Bowl at age 27.
They want a piece of what Naeole and Sagapolutele are getting, and they don't think it's going to come their way if they stay home.
Maybe we should try to forget these guys. Pretend they never lived here.
If you see them on the street, just go "tsk, tsk, tsk," and keep walking.
And we certainly don't want to write anything about them, because it might encourage others of their caliber to escape.
If we keep discouraging them and making them feel disowned, future generations might stay home and play for the University of Hawaii.
WELL, of course, that's a lot of malarkey.
But there are still people in our midst who think that way.
The issue of loyalty to one's native land is as old as civilization.
Stay to prosper or suffer with your people.
Paul Tsongas, an old acquaintance from my home area, rose from bending coat hangers at his dad's dry cleaners to become a U.S. senator and later held the early lead in the 1992 presidential primaries.
Paul, who died last week after a long bout with cancer, never left his hometown of Lowell, Mass., a place I spent much of my childhood. He turned a depressed textile mill city into a National Park and created jobs. He built gardens where there was decay. He lured minor league baseball and hockey franchises to the city.
I admire his loyalty, and what he did by staying. But he was a rare individual, an influential man who could make things happen.
Most of us don't have that kind of control over our hometown's destiny, and we sometimes have to migrate to improve our position in life.
THE fact is that our world revolves around those who dared to uproot themselves and go where their interests were better served.
The pilgrims left England and landed in Plymouth. The Polynesians voyaged across uncharted waters. And here we are.
So our young athletes leave Hawaii and play for a team in the Big 12, the Pac-10 or a mainland Western Athletic Conference rival. They play their hearts out and get exposure they never could expect from this staging ground. Washington's Ink Aleaga, Brigham Young's Itula Mili and Naeole suddenly find themselves high-round NFL draft prospects.
Good for Hawaii? You bet it is.
No matter where they go or how long it's been since they lived here, they're still products of Hawaii.
And being from Hawaii is not like being from New Jersey or Michigan. Hawaii kids don't forget their roots, no matter how high they climb. Note that Sagapolutele wrote "HI" on his wrist tapes at the Super Bowl.
Fred vonAppen knows how much it'll take to keep the Mike Souzas, Ed Taamus, Steven Graces and Dominic Raiolas home. He's certainly not surprised that they'd want to play elsewhere right now.
He also knows that even if he successfully wrestles the funds to make UH a highly competitive program, the siren call of the mainland will always be hard to resist for kids who've never been anywhere else.