Watched it last night. Gives me a different perspective on it. Still think he went on with the story to the media after he knew it was bogus during the heisman ceremony, but I can totally see now how I dont think he did it for any other reason than he didn't know what the fuck to do. I feel bad for him, seems like he was a hard working good man, and this completely railroaded him at the peak of his career. I have questions about if he ever would have been any better in nfl without this stuff, but it clearly didn't help him out at all
I don’t know if the producers even considered getting disco bob to sit down for an interview, but man, what a missed opportunity.
Watched part 1 last night. Didn't know how in-depth this catfish was. I thought it was just a fake profile. Didn't realize there were multiple fake family profiles and even some of Manti's friends/family had talked to "Lennay"
I remember when the story initially dropped a few players were interviewed and mentioned they had spoken with “her” on the phone. So while I think many of them were skeptical of the long distance nature and her never visiting, they all seemed genuinely surprised she flat out didn’t exist.
I feel sorry for Manti, he was naive and put in a really tough spot. Naya is an awful person and should feel bad.
I agree with both points, as the doc really changed my perspective. It’s clear he was a highly sheltered kid with very little life experiences. Naya took advantage of that for her own gain. While I’m sure it’s easy for any of us to say he shouldn’t have kept the lie going, I do understand that he really was in a no-win situation. He was just a kid on a grand stage with nowhere to turn. I’m not sure how much it really affected his pro career but I do think it impacted his draft stock and took money out of his pocket, which sucks.
Started watching tonight. Wow. The thing I didn't appreciate at the time is how uninteresting this story actually is.
Just now got around to watching it. Manti genuinely seems like a good dude and I hope he’s able to laugh about it now.
Weird the doc didn't mention Teo having a real life gf right after Lenay died. He started dating a girl a couple weeks after finding out she "died." He had a gf during the Heisman and during the national championship game. I don't remember hearing about that at all at the time and wouldn't know if she wasn't married to one of my best friends now. Just weird how big the story was and how much he talked publicly about Lenay and when he had a current real life gf and that was just glossed over.
Team Manti. Obviously he wasn’t involved. Seems like a good extremely naive dude. It seems like the world is so jaded we can’t believe someone can be that naive.
It’d be a lot easier to criticize him for not disclosing when he found out had it happened at another point during the season. I don’t blame him for not being like, “Well Chris I actually have reason to believe she’s actually not real” during the ceremony. Damned if he did, damned if he didnt. Also once again, our media fucking sucks Spoiler He had no business being invited to the ceremony that year anyway
So i get what youre saying but there are always 3 guys up there and who wouldve been there otherwise? Marquise Lee who was amazing, but for a 7-6 USC team, he was next in the vote. I honestly think a person of the ND defense wouldve made it to the ceremony anyways and Teo was the most likely (although Nix RIP was the actual best player that season iyam). Its just that Teo wouldve ended up well behind Klein for third, instead of getting quite close to 1st
I don't think he was in on it, but I do think he milked it. He literally had a new gf like 3 weeks after Lenay "died." In interviews, he acted like his world ended but didn't mention his new gf at all. All of those interviews leading up the Heisman and national championship game where he went on and on and about a girl he'd never met, he literally already had a new real life gf. That's the part that doesn't line up to me. He moved on privately very quickly but publicly he was in mouring for the entire season.
The media does suck though. You had the likes of Katie Kouric calling his new gf's house so they knew he had a new gf but I don't remember that being part of the story at all back then. They all glossed over that to go along with making his dead gf be a much bigger story than it should have been.
I'm pretty sure there was more than one real life "girlfriend " during this whole thing Atleast girls who thought they were
Yeah they touched on it a little bit. That there was a window where the two didn’t talk much and Manti was having fun on campus. Most likely he just needed someone he could talk to, be himself with. They had similar backgrounds and probably shared a lot of the same feelings and emotions. I could see how he got caught up in it. Fish out of water at ND, celebrity status, pressure and here is this “girl” that basically had the same childhood he did.
My wife found this on Netflix yesterday and asked if I knew anything about this. We watched the first episode last night, finished the second a short time ago. My big takeaway? Manti should've gone to SC. A university of experts at covering up scandal would've served him well. Also, no mention of the fact that ND cheated in 2012 and had to vacate that whole season.
An underlying narrative throughout the whole doc was that going to ND was a bad thing for Manti. Kid felt so homesick and away from his culture that he got catfished. No chance it happens to him at USC. Objectively, that’s where he went wrong first. Had a helluva career for us though!
TBH the dead spin guys seemed like they really wanted to prove he knew all along and actively tried to spin it that way.
the deadspin guys went into it with less than noble intentions. In the doc they are framing it like they just wanted to embarrass ESPN, which of course they did. But they also wanted to embarrass the fuck out of Manti and didn't have much an interest in trying to find out if/how he was the victim in most of this. They wanted to blow the whole thing up and soak up the clicks, they did not give a shit if it ruined Teo's life in the process.
Yeah their TV spot on CNN where they’re acted like giggling schoolgirls and basically said “we blew this story open and now are going to prove he did this himself for Heisman votes!!” was cringeworthy and ultimately led to nothing.