EH's Recruiting News and Notes from 1/23
Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2009 12:22 am
Alright let’s get this out of the way…
Greg Reid: I don’t blame him one bit for the 2nd guessing his UF commitment. Several other factors besides the lack of playing time hurt us here:
1) The departure of John Hevesy, his main UF recruiter
2) The lack of turnover on the UGA staff. They came very close to losing Stacy Searles (OL) and Rodney Garner (DL) and probably at least considered getting rid of Willie Martinez (DC). No changes at all on their staff. Garner has been involved in Reid’s recruitment, even though I believe Coach Bobo has been the main contact
3) The presence of another Valdosta recruit (Mike Gilliard) on the UGA commit list. I don’t know when the last time UGA pulled someone from Valdosta but they have not had anyone from Valdosta in the last 7 classes. Surely, they’ve gotten someone from Valdosta since Brice Hunter in the early 90’s. Figures, there’s one this year and it’s a buddy (but not a teammate) of Reid’s.
4) UGA has a corner (Asher Allen) turn pro even though the NFL Advisory board supposedly told him he was 3rd round material
5) Reid gets invited to the Under Armour game instead of the US Army Game. UGA has 6 commits playing in the game, UF had 3 (2 plus DeBose). In the US Army game, UGA and UF each had 3 commits
I’ve seen some Gator fans try to rationalize a UF decision by saying he could play the “nickel”. Huh? Isn’t that how we are getting Will Hill on the field? Anybody care to guess what we are probably telling Adrian Bushell and Jeremy Brown, who don’t even have the luxury of redshirting in 2009 that Reid had to separate another year from Jenkins/Haden? My guess begins with an “N” and ends with an “L”. The other rationalization I’ve heard, “he is one injury away from starting”. With 7 returning CB’s (2 will be sr’s in 09), that’s a tough sell. More like you are a “team bus crash away”. UGA only returns 4, 2 of which will be seniors. Their group of 4 (Bryan Evans, Prince Miller, Brandon Boykin and Vance Cuff) strikes fear in no one. Sure, Branden Smith and Jordan Love are in this UGA class as well, but as a general rule of thumb most recruits care more about the competition already on campus than the one in their class. Most feel they can compete with anyone on equal footing.
One of my mantras in recruiting is “stay thin but talented”. We chose to sign too many CB’s (was a NSD offer to Moses Jenkins really needed?), which is fine if that’s one of your goals, to throw ships at a problem, but don’t complain when guys like Greg Reid and Brandon McGee have issues with going your way. I’ve said many times that you don’t continue to sign players at a certain position due to uncertainty. There will always be uncertainty that is the nature of college football, players graduate and younger players step up. Keep in mind that the 7 CB’s could easily have been 8, if the 5’9 Ahmad Black had not moved from CB to safety when Dorian Munroe got hurt or even 9 if Jacques Rickerson doesn’t go Ike Turner on his girlfriend.
None of these things helped. Waiting to involve Coach Bedford in Reid’s recruitment looks to have been a mistake as well. Sure, many thought he was pegged for the offensive side of the ball, but in light of his recent performances it would seem hard to rationalize any evaluation that doesn’t have him slotted at corner. We have a phenomenal staff, but this possible misevaluation with the supposed mixed thoughts on Nick Kasa (a TE, are you kidding me) coming from our staff, has to leave one scratching their heads. No staff is perfect and it’s clear they get way more right than they get wrong.
Look, if Reid goes to UGA its not the end of the world. We’ve lost battles to them before and we will continue to lose our share in the future. It’s the nature of the game. They aren’t going to ask us to return the crystal ball just because UGA beat us for a Valdosta recruit. No shame to be had here. Swallow your pride and focus on the recruits we have commitments from and those we may still get. UF currently has 4 top 50 recruits (only USC has more) and 6 top 100 recruits (only USC has more). Not a bad freakin haul and we aren’t finished yet for a year with no class camaraderie.
-Penn State caught a break when Larry Johnson Sr decided to stay with Penn State instead of accepting the Illinois DC job. Johnson’s wife supposedly put the kibosh on the deal overruling Larry’s desire to take the job. Johnson is so respected in that area it likely would have hurt their chances for Jelani Jenkins. It may not make a difference, but every little bit helps.
-Is it me or does UF seem like the perfect fit for Orson Charles. The other teams on his list don’t use the TE as much as we do and their depth chart isn’t as thin as ours. I don’t understand how this kid didn’t commit to us 3 months ago. There’s got to be more in play than we know about. There has to be. On the positive side, the last time a choice seemed this logical (system + opportunity= no brainer) it happened as it should have: DeBose to UF. Hoping it happens here as well
-Seems to be slipping away with Denard Robinson. I’ve had my doubts on Robinson for the longest time. It’s as if he was using the UF offer and attention to leverage other opportunities. Here is what I said on my 11/24 part 1 update: I can’t help but think Denard Robinson is waiting for a better opportunity. I’m not 100% sure he trusts that we will give him a shot at QB and until he does he will continue to weigh his non-QB (like UM as a CB) offers against what UF is offering. Maybe the Newton issue will convince him. It seems like Denard is not worried at all about recruiting, not only did he miss the UF-S.Carolina game, he was supposed to be at that Michigan-Michigan St game I mentioned above with those South Florida guys and no-showed for that as well.
-I know everyone was expecting this huge avalanche after winning the National Championship, but I really think most recruits put personal goals as a higher priority than team goals in the decision making process. Not to mention many recruits realize (or rationalize) that what has happened in the past, even the recent past, doesn’t necessarily mean the same will happen when they get to college. I’m pretty sure Andre DeBose made a similar comment (it’s the future not the past that counts) about LSU when asked about their losses this past season. I would suspect our season had very little to do with DeBose choosing UF and more important factors were the opportunity to showcase his talents and location.
-Lots of people on these boards are lamenting that all this wavering and decommits is only happening to UF. Not true at all. Since the Championship game Oklahoma has had 2 decommits from my Composite 375 list: Eric Ward-#247 and Darius Jones-#161. A 3rd commit, Brandon Mahoney (#310) admitted he is wavering and that he may decommit also. What about USC? USC has had 2 top 100 decommits: Shaquelle Evans- #64 and Morrell Pressley #45 and has another 2 top 100 commits who are very possible decommits in Randall Carroll #53 and Alshon Jeffrey #78. Even long time commit Vontaze Burfict (#17) visited Arizona State last weekend (yes USC commits take visits after committing just like everyone else’s commits) and he is having 2nd thoughts, though I expect him to stick with USC. I had them penciled to get Corey Adams from Arizona and he committed to Arizona State last week. I don’t want to exaggerate USC’s plight because this is still an awesome class, but at one point it looked to be a monster class and a sure #1, which I’m now predicting it doesn’t happen (more on that later). 23 decommitments from the top 150, 30 of the top 200, 36 of the top 250 and more are expected by NSD. Decommitts are here to stay and will become and even bigger issue in future years
-UF has 67 returning scholarship players (66 if John Brown is gone) by my count, add in the 16 commits and that only leaves us 2 under the 85 limit. Sure, there is likely to be some attrition between now in August, let’s say 6 move on and you add 4 more commits (very conservative), that would put us at 81. Not a bad place to be, considering it would provide you the opportunity to reward 2-3 Cade Holliday types for a 1 year ship, while also providing a little more wiggle room for the 2010 class, which looks to have the potential to be one of UF’s best classes ever. If we don’t leave wiggle room the upside for the 2010 class isn’t as great because there are only 15 seniors (though 2-3 may turn pro next year) and we may have gotten rid of most of our issues in this Spring’s projected (guess) attrition of 6.
-How will UF finish? I’ve seen all kinds of numbers being thrown around, but my number is lower than most. Right now my predicted finish is Jarvis Jones, Jelani Jenkins, Frankie Telfort and Josh Evans. That makes 20. Could we add more than 4? Sure, but we could also lose a current commit, so net/net is 20. Some may view this predicted finish (and many of the thoughts above) as pessimistic, but I actually feel pretty good about this class. I’ve been vocal about the lack of cohesiveness of this class, so I have been fearing the worst, so if the class shakes out like I predict it will be very comparable to Meyer’s past classes. To compare this class to a Purdue class like someone did on another Gator site is utter foolishness. I looked back at the past 2 classes to see how this class (based on my predicted finish) compares relative to my Composite lists for the last 3 years. Keep in mind I consider the 2007 class the best UF class of all time (based on how the class looked on NSD not how they performed).
-----------top 50-------top 100--------top 150--------top 200
2007-(27)---7-------------11---------------14----- ---------16
2008-(22)---4--------------7----------------8----- ----------10
2009-(20)----6--------------8----------------9---- -----------9
The 2008 had 2 JUCO’s among the 22 signees, who were not eligible for the Composite list and the 09 class has 1. The 2007 class was all high school kids. With the 4 above additions, 3 of them are planning a NSD decision, which in this instance I think is a positive because all 3 could be slotted for linebacker and they likely can’t be impacted by the other’s decisions. I’ll be looking to see the exact times of the Jelani Jenkins and Frankie Telfort decisions because they are both weakside linebacker types, though my guess is Frankie Telfort may end up at strong safety.
-Where does UF’s class stack up Nationally?
This is my predicted top 10:
1. Georgia
2. USC
3. Ohio State
4. LSU
--------------------------- (dropoff)
5. UF
6. Texas
7. Alabama
-----------------------------(dropoff)
8. Miami
9. FSU
10. Oklahoma
This isn’t too much different than what I said back on 12/3: http://mbd.scout.com/mb.aspx?s...0&t=3531231
I truly believe the foundation is there next year to make a run at the 2007 class for the best UF class of all time. Too early to tell if there’s enough there to take a swing at the best class of all time: FSU 1993 class (The Gold Standard).
Greg Reid: I don’t blame him one bit for the 2nd guessing his UF commitment. Several other factors besides the lack of playing time hurt us here:
1) The departure of John Hevesy, his main UF recruiter
2) The lack of turnover on the UGA staff. They came very close to losing Stacy Searles (OL) and Rodney Garner (DL) and probably at least considered getting rid of Willie Martinez (DC). No changes at all on their staff. Garner has been involved in Reid’s recruitment, even though I believe Coach Bobo has been the main contact
3) The presence of another Valdosta recruit (Mike Gilliard) on the UGA commit list. I don’t know when the last time UGA pulled someone from Valdosta but they have not had anyone from Valdosta in the last 7 classes. Surely, they’ve gotten someone from Valdosta since Brice Hunter in the early 90’s. Figures, there’s one this year and it’s a buddy (but not a teammate) of Reid’s.
4) UGA has a corner (Asher Allen) turn pro even though the NFL Advisory board supposedly told him he was 3rd round material
5) Reid gets invited to the Under Armour game instead of the US Army Game. UGA has 6 commits playing in the game, UF had 3 (2 plus DeBose). In the US Army game, UGA and UF each had 3 commits
I’ve seen some Gator fans try to rationalize a UF decision by saying he could play the “nickel”. Huh? Isn’t that how we are getting Will Hill on the field? Anybody care to guess what we are probably telling Adrian Bushell and Jeremy Brown, who don’t even have the luxury of redshirting in 2009 that Reid had to separate another year from Jenkins/Haden? My guess begins with an “N” and ends with an “L”. The other rationalization I’ve heard, “he is one injury away from starting”. With 7 returning CB’s (2 will be sr’s in 09), that’s a tough sell. More like you are a “team bus crash away”. UGA only returns 4, 2 of which will be seniors. Their group of 4 (Bryan Evans, Prince Miller, Brandon Boykin and Vance Cuff) strikes fear in no one. Sure, Branden Smith and Jordan Love are in this UGA class as well, but as a general rule of thumb most recruits care more about the competition already on campus than the one in their class. Most feel they can compete with anyone on equal footing.
One of my mantras in recruiting is “stay thin but talented”. We chose to sign too many CB’s (was a NSD offer to Moses Jenkins really needed?), which is fine if that’s one of your goals, to throw ships at a problem, but don’t complain when guys like Greg Reid and Brandon McGee have issues with going your way. I’ve said many times that you don’t continue to sign players at a certain position due to uncertainty. There will always be uncertainty that is the nature of college football, players graduate and younger players step up. Keep in mind that the 7 CB’s could easily have been 8, if the 5’9 Ahmad Black had not moved from CB to safety when Dorian Munroe got hurt or even 9 if Jacques Rickerson doesn’t go Ike Turner on his girlfriend.
None of these things helped. Waiting to involve Coach Bedford in Reid’s recruitment looks to have been a mistake as well. Sure, many thought he was pegged for the offensive side of the ball, but in light of his recent performances it would seem hard to rationalize any evaluation that doesn’t have him slotted at corner. We have a phenomenal staff, but this possible misevaluation with the supposed mixed thoughts on Nick Kasa (a TE, are you kidding me) coming from our staff, has to leave one scratching their heads. No staff is perfect and it’s clear they get way more right than they get wrong.
Look, if Reid goes to UGA its not the end of the world. We’ve lost battles to them before and we will continue to lose our share in the future. It’s the nature of the game. They aren’t going to ask us to return the crystal ball just because UGA beat us for a Valdosta recruit. No shame to be had here. Swallow your pride and focus on the recruits we have commitments from and those we may still get. UF currently has 4 top 50 recruits (only USC has more) and 6 top 100 recruits (only USC has more). Not a bad freakin haul and we aren’t finished yet for a year with no class camaraderie.
-Penn State caught a break when Larry Johnson Sr decided to stay with Penn State instead of accepting the Illinois DC job. Johnson’s wife supposedly put the kibosh on the deal overruling Larry’s desire to take the job. Johnson is so respected in that area it likely would have hurt their chances for Jelani Jenkins. It may not make a difference, but every little bit helps.
-Is it me or does UF seem like the perfect fit for Orson Charles. The other teams on his list don’t use the TE as much as we do and their depth chart isn’t as thin as ours. I don’t understand how this kid didn’t commit to us 3 months ago. There’s got to be more in play than we know about. There has to be. On the positive side, the last time a choice seemed this logical (system + opportunity= no brainer) it happened as it should have: DeBose to UF. Hoping it happens here as well
-Seems to be slipping away with Denard Robinson. I’ve had my doubts on Robinson for the longest time. It’s as if he was using the UF offer and attention to leverage other opportunities. Here is what I said on my 11/24 part 1 update: I can’t help but think Denard Robinson is waiting for a better opportunity. I’m not 100% sure he trusts that we will give him a shot at QB and until he does he will continue to weigh his non-QB (like UM as a CB) offers against what UF is offering. Maybe the Newton issue will convince him. It seems like Denard is not worried at all about recruiting, not only did he miss the UF-S.Carolina game, he was supposed to be at that Michigan-Michigan St game I mentioned above with those South Florida guys and no-showed for that as well.
-I know everyone was expecting this huge avalanche after winning the National Championship, but I really think most recruits put personal goals as a higher priority than team goals in the decision making process. Not to mention many recruits realize (or rationalize) that what has happened in the past, even the recent past, doesn’t necessarily mean the same will happen when they get to college. I’m pretty sure Andre DeBose made a similar comment (it’s the future not the past that counts) about LSU when asked about their losses this past season. I would suspect our season had very little to do with DeBose choosing UF and more important factors were the opportunity to showcase his talents and location.
-Lots of people on these boards are lamenting that all this wavering and decommits is only happening to UF. Not true at all. Since the Championship game Oklahoma has had 2 decommits from my Composite 375 list: Eric Ward-#247 and Darius Jones-#161. A 3rd commit, Brandon Mahoney (#310) admitted he is wavering and that he may decommit also. What about USC? USC has had 2 top 100 decommits: Shaquelle Evans- #64 and Morrell Pressley #45 and has another 2 top 100 commits who are very possible decommits in Randall Carroll #53 and Alshon Jeffrey #78. Even long time commit Vontaze Burfict (#17) visited Arizona State last weekend (yes USC commits take visits after committing just like everyone else’s commits) and he is having 2nd thoughts, though I expect him to stick with USC. I had them penciled to get Corey Adams from Arizona and he committed to Arizona State last week. I don’t want to exaggerate USC’s plight because this is still an awesome class, but at one point it looked to be a monster class and a sure #1, which I’m now predicting it doesn’t happen (more on that later). 23 decommitments from the top 150, 30 of the top 200, 36 of the top 250 and more are expected by NSD. Decommitts are here to stay and will become and even bigger issue in future years
-UF has 67 returning scholarship players (66 if John Brown is gone) by my count, add in the 16 commits and that only leaves us 2 under the 85 limit. Sure, there is likely to be some attrition between now in August, let’s say 6 move on and you add 4 more commits (very conservative), that would put us at 81. Not a bad place to be, considering it would provide you the opportunity to reward 2-3 Cade Holliday types for a 1 year ship, while also providing a little more wiggle room for the 2010 class, which looks to have the potential to be one of UF’s best classes ever. If we don’t leave wiggle room the upside for the 2010 class isn’t as great because there are only 15 seniors (though 2-3 may turn pro next year) and we may have gotten rid of most of our issues in this Spring’s projected (guess) attrition of 6.
-How will UF finish? I’ve seen all kinds of numbers being thrown around, but my number is lower than most. Right now my predicted finish is Jarvis Jones, Jelani Jenkins, Frankie Telfort and Josh Evans. That makes 20. Could we add more than 4? Sure, but we could also lose a current commit, so net/net is 20. Some may view this predicted finish (and many of the thoughts above) as pessimistic, but I actually feel pretty good about this class. I’ve been vocal about the lack of cohesiveness of this class, so I have been fearing the worst, so if the class shakes out like I predict it will be very comparable to Meyer’s past classes. To compare this class to a Purdue class like someone did on another Gator site is utter foolishness. I looked back at the past 2 classes to see how this class (based on my predicted finish) compares relative to my Composite lists for the last 3 years. Keep in mind I consider the 2007 class the best UF class of all time (based on how the class looked on NSD not how they performed).
-----------top 50-------top 100--------top 150--------top 200
2007-(27)---7-------------11---------------14----- ---------16
2008-(22)---4--------------7----------------8----- ----------10
2009-(20)----6--------------8----------------9---- -----------9
The 2008 had 2 JUCO’s among the 22 signees, who were not eligible for the Composite list and the 09 class has 1. The 2007 class was all high school kids. With the 4 above additions, 3 of them are planning a NSD decision, which in this instance I think is a positive because all 3 could be slotted for linebacker and they likely can’t be impacted by the other’s decisions. I’ll be looking to see the exact times of the Jelani Jenkins and Frankie Telfort decisions because they are both weakside linebacker types, though my guess is Frankie Telfort may end up at strong safety.
-Where does UF’s class stack up Nationally?
This is my predicted top 10:
1. Georgia
2. USC
3. Ohio State
4. LSU
--------------------------- (dropoff)
5. UF
6. Texas
7. Alabama
-----------------------------(dropoff)
8. Miami
9. FSU
10. Oklahoma
This isn’t too much different than what I said back on 12/3: http://mbd.scout.com/mb.aspx?s...0&t=3531231
I truly believe the foundation is there next year to make a run at the 2007 class for the best UF class of all time. Too early to tell if there’s enough there to take a swing at the best class of all time: FSU 1993 class (The Gold Standard).