Manti Te’o Admits That He Lied a Little Bit About That Whole Lennay Kekua Thing

The Heisman Trophy runner-up sat down with Katie Couric, who is represented as by the same agency as Te’o, for an interview that will air on her syndicated talk show on Thursday.

“Katie, put yourself in my situation. I, my whole world told me that she died on Sept. 12. Everybody knew that. This girl, who I committed myself to, died on Sept. 12,” Te'o said

[Te’o] said he only learned of the hoax when he received a phone call in December from a woman saying she was Kekua.

“Now I get a phone call on Dec. 6, saying that she's alive and then I'm going be put on national TV two days later. And to ask me about the same question. You know, what would you do?” Te'o said.

Not surprisingly, Te’o’s father has his son’s back.

“People can speculate about what they think he is. I've known him 21 years of his life. And he's not a liar. He's a kid,” Brian Te'o said with tears in his eyes.

Part of me wonders if doing this interview was a good idea. It seems like the furor has subsided and that people were already moving on. The other part of me is happy we have more claims to dissect and more inner-office arguments about Te’o’s involvement in this whole deal.

How about y’all? Does this small mea culpa change your view of Manti or do you think he’s still not telling the whole truth?

[H/T: CBS News]