Let me start off by saying I agree with your last sentence. Their job is to recruit so recruit. No issue there.
Now I do not know and I doubt you do either the amount of time, money and resources being used on Smith. To say he is "merely hosting him on some official" I think is downplaying it. He is a stud, he likely gets stud treatment whenever on campus. I doubt most unofficial visitors get to chill in Mario's office. The issue I will have is if we miss on a plan B that we could have landed if we spent less time chasing waterfalls. (figured you would appreciate the musical reference)
I do have an idea of the time, money, and resources. Resources is not a big deal anymore, certainly not as big as it once was when we had a LOT fewer people employed in Hecht. Are we scouting the kid? No. We know who he is. Are we making daily phone calls/tweets? Sure, just as we are with plenty of other recruits.
Money? Again, not an official visit. Can you impute some value associated with the time that coaches spend? Sure. But, again, this is what Mario does. He lavishes time and effort on plenty of kids, even those who are supposed to be "lost causes". Get used to it.
Time? I've kind-of already addressed that, but I'll also say this ONLY MATTERS if you can establish that the time spent detracted from the recruitment of another kid. And if there's anything that Mario has proven, it's that he has boundless energy to recruit every 4 and 5 star kid in the country. Now, if this was Manny Garcia, then maybe all the time he spent chasing 4 and 5 stars DID DETRACT from his eventual pursuit of 3-star diamonds in the rough. But so far, so good, under Mario.
Finally, who knows what the future holds? I certainly think that it's possible that the Cleveland Browns offer a ton of money to Hartline, and I'd certainly like to be Smith's "second-choice" if it comes to that.
We just need our fans to stop acting like pussies. Or the French in WWII.
