Manti Te’o Talks To ESPN

Manti Te’o met with ESPN’s Jeremy Schaap to talk about the fake girlfriend story.  Te’o said that this was a hoax played on him by Ronaiah Tuiasosopo and two other people and he has no idea who they are.  He stood by his statement that he had absolutely nothing to do with it, but did admit to lying to his father about meeting her.  Why did he lie!? Te’o says “I knew that — I even knew, that it was crazy that I was with somebody that I didn’t meet, and that alone — people find out that this girl who died, I was so invested in, I didn’t meet her, as well. So I kind of tailored my stories to have people think that, yeah, he met her before she passed away, so that people wouldn’t think that I was some crazy dude.”  Great plan.  Who would think someone who made up a girlfriend, a phony car accident and a fake terminal illness is some “crazy dude”!?

Jeremy Schaap does his best to explain his conversation with Te’o, found on espn.com