Some top local athletes are ‘verified’ on Twitter with coveted blue check mark

high school and college football players, given that they elected to enroll early at their respective colleges. Wade, a Rival.com fivestar at Penn State with more than 13,000 followers, is verified while Jeter, a consensus four-star at Michigan, is not. What’sup with that?

“I’m wondering the same thing,” Jeter said shortly after arriving at Michigan in January, around the same time he created a new page in hopes of verification. “My old account, I had almost 8,000 followers, they still wouldn’t verifyme. I tried to get on this one, they still denied me. I don’tknow why they’re denyingme.”

These days, Jeter has built his follower count back up to around 2,500, but still no dice. Whereas someone like fellow 2017 product Ford said being un-verified doesn’t matter much to him, Jeter hopes he gets there — if only for what it could do for his social life.

“It’s not a super big deal, butit’d be a lot easier with the girls,” he said. “I’m good at getting girls, but if I slide in the DM’s” — that’s Twitter slang for direct messages — “with a check mark, they’re like, ‘Oh, he’s important,’ so I’m like, ‘What’s up?’ It’s easier to get the girls with the checkmark, to be honest.”

Twitter has traditionally kept the process confidential, but last year announced that users are now able to apply for it. Lee even tried that himself once, but got denied. He thinks it took winning a third world title and going to the Rio Olympics as a training partner to put him over the top.

Often times, Lee could do without Twitter and some of the headaches it can bring. He saw one firsthand last month. Someone created a fake account of himself and claimed that he switched his college choice from Iowa to Penn State, so Lee had to reportit and get it shut down.

But he tries to use his real account to promote the sport he loves, and if being verified can help with that, he’s all for it.

“If I didn’t have that goal personally, I wouldn’t have social media, because I don’t really care about it,” he said. “I only have Instagram and Twitter, because obviously the more followers you have or whatever, the more people listen to your opinions, and I want to grow the sport of wrestling.”

Justcall him a verified ambassador.