BillySee58

Great post

It's not that he's rated low in my system. It's that he is rated low in the eyes of FBS coaches who have seen him plenty and aren't put off by his height like Fine. And that's the thing. This doesn't leave guys like you or I to evaluate the recruits. Or even guys who work for recruiting sites. It leaves the evaluating of our recruits to paid, professional college coaches who keep their jobs based on who they offer and sign. For sure. But like I said in the post above, you have QBs who often get underrecruited because they are short, yet if they fit your system and are accurate, they can still become all conference. Then you have scat backs/slot receivers/returners who often get overlooked because they are small but their job of making plays and making guys miss doesn't require them to be big. And sometimes DBs who can get overlooked for similar reasons yet if they can cover and make plays, size is not as important. But for the other positions, of outside receiver, tight end, every-down RB, offensive line, defensive line, linebacker, and DB, the best ones we have had and all CUSA guys we have had in recent years have been "B" or better, often "B+" or better. You can sit back and make the obvious claim that rankings/offers don't matter and only on-field play does, but relying on "C" and "C+" guys to carry you and be your all conference guys is a bad situation to be in.

That's fair. I think Mccarney's staff was awful in recruiting, particularly when Noah Joseph left after the 2013 season. Joseph was a big reason we got the guys we did in 2014. I think you'd be splitting hairs to see if Mccarney's staff was winning more recruiting battles at the end or if Littrell's staff has since. Pretty equally unimpressive in that regard. Both benefitted off of getting guys left at the end with dried up offers, which skewed the offer lists for classes for both. Typically, yes. Tyler Wilson was a scholarship guy. They have done well in this regard. Again, I think that speaks towards them doing a good job in evaluating and developing. They have hit on their top recruits with good offer lists (Guyton, Bussey, Darden, etc), hit on evaluations, developed both well, and most importantly hit on evaluating and developing a QB. Let's be honest, Fine is the reason this was a 9-win team and not a 6 win team. It's not like we have proven to have built a better roster up and down the field than the teams we beat. He put us over the top in the close games and the FAUs and Troys on our schedule exposed where our roster really was at compared to actual top G5 rosters. True. But the point of using the offer lists to delineate recruits originally was to try and identify all conference players before they happened. I found that our all CUSA players were "B" or better recruits who had a season's worth of starting experience and were proven to not be busts. The exceptions are at scat back/slot receiver, QB, sometimes DB, and specialists. These guys are often overlooked because of their size but can typically overcome it. You look at 3-down RBs, outside receivers, offensive and defensive linemen, linebacker, and DBs, the top guys and all conference guys we have had in recent years did have "B" or better offer lists, and typically had "B+" or better offer lists. That's the point, to me. You don't want to rely on "C" and "C+" linemen to control the LOS, or receivers to stretch the field on the outside, or to be your top playmakers on defense. It's a bad recipe. I think that comes down to how you define recruiting. When I see how well a coach is doing at recruiting, I am looking at how well they are doing at convincing recruits to choose their program over other legitimate options. I don't think Littrell and his staff have done a consistently good job of it, though guys like Reggie Williams, Gibbs, and Davis are good signs. I think roster building is made up of a lot of things. Recruiting, evaluating, bringing in the right people like you said, being opportunistic, and player development. I think they have done a good job in the other aspects of roster building that I mentioned. I think people often use the term "recruiting" to define roster building as a whole, but in reality how well we are doing at recruiting is only a factor in our roster building efforts.

Benford's teams didn't win a non-conference road game in any of the last three seasons. In fact, they won one non-conference road game during his entire 5-year tenure and were consistently boat-raced. This was an impressive non-conference run in that we really made great strides and got better heading into conference play, which is exactly the point for us.

I really think QB is a different animal than other positions, too. So many QBs get offered on size alone (Greer, Means), but you can find undersized QBs who can play on the FBS level but don't have many or any other offers because of height (Kellen Moore, Rakeem Cato, Blake Bogenschutz, Matt Johnson, McKenzie Milton, Mason Fine, etc). For the same reason, it's also easier for an underrecruited guy to pan out in scat back/slot receiver roles. Chancellor, Harris, Mike Lawrence, Evan Johnson, etc. These guys are underrecruited because of size but as long as they make people miss it doesn't matter. On the line, tight ends, linebackers, outside receivers, 3-down backs, defensive backs, the more offers the player has, the better chance he has to be good, statistically speaking.

An update to this: A+ - (1) Reggie Williams A - (1) Keyvon Davis B+ - (1) Jaxon Gibbs B - (4) Austin Ogunmakin, Jason Bean, Deandre Torrey, Darrian McMillan C+ - (1) Jordan Hunt C - (7) Larry Nixon, Kason Martin, Dayton Leblanc, Keelan Crosby, Cole Brown, Josh Sa'afi, Jordan Redfearn 7/15 (46.7%) are "B" or higher I didn't count Carroll right now, since signs are pointing to him not being part of the class anymore. He would have us at 7/16 (43.8%). Still continuing the downward trend, but not as dramatically as before. I expect this number to continue to go up as we likely get more guys at the end who saw their offers dry up. I would imagine it will probably be around 50-55% with about 5 spots left. I really think anything below 65% is not very good recruiting. 65% having at least two other FBS offers doesn't seem that hard, but it has been. Any FBS offers at all. 13/20 should be very doable, and it still leaves room for underrecruited "system" guys and guys who the coaches see something in that other coaches don't. Certainly some great gets at the top, and plenty of "system" guys, but this class could use more foundation guys than just Williams, Davis, and Gibbs.

Programs is incorrect. He didn't lead Miami to probation or sanctions. The violations the NCAA found committed by Miami occurred during Dennis Erickson's tenure. Davis was forced to deal with the postseason ban and scholarship reduction shortly after accepting the job, but he didn't lead the program to those issues. At North Carolina, the issue was academic fraud and players receiving improper benefits related to them having illegal contact with agents. Not recruiting violations. Per the Wikipedia page on the NC football scandal, "the NCAA did not find anything extending to lack of institutional control, explaining that the university 'educated its tutors regarding academic improprieties and its coaches regarding outside athletically related income...self-discovered the academic fraud and took decisive action...cooperated fully, is not a repeat violator and...exhibited appropriate control over its athletics program.'" https://web3.ncaa.org/lsdbi/search/miCaseView/report?id=102358 Despite that, you can definitely say that his players cheating and having illegal agent contact ultimately falls on him because he was the head coach, and I wouldn't bother arguing with you on that. But there were no wrongdoings found directly linked to him, and there were no actual recruiting violations. So I don't agree that the comment of yours is justified by his history.

http://www.statesman.com/sports/college/due-new-tax-bill-texas-will-now-have-pay-over-million-for-jimbo-fisher/R42pBNtr4ZYQEArh5pzzGN/amp.html?__twitter_impression=true SIAP

Yeah, it's a press move and an alignment/backing move more than it is an indication of this being some saving grace for the people of this country. Still working my way through the TCJA, so not trying to say it's great or awful as of yet, but you saying the bonuses are independent of the bill is correct.

I think every independent except Notre Dame counts as G5

Wonder if people of this board would be so skeptical of us like they have been of UTSA and FIU if we were getting similar recruits as them.

In a weird twist of fate, my family and I ended up on the same flight as the women's team on our way up to Chicago for the holidays. Got to talk to Jalie Mitchell for a while. Great group with a great leader. Not their two best showings of the year, but they have a great shot of going 9-3 in non-conference this year. Definitely building something special.

Shoutout to @Mean_Green09 for being right about this one yesterday and calling Duffy playing against Georgetown. Got a good source

Then I guess so. He's in his 6th year out of high school so it makes sense he'd be done with a master's already. Still impressive. Not sure what grad transfer rules are for a second grad degree.

Since he has already started his grad program, I'm pretty sure he can't

Probably where it comes from. Just trying to get everyone on the same page before he starts his career here.

Not to call JayD out specifically, but I keep seeing Jordan Redfearn's name getting spelled incorrectly as Jordan Redfern on this board. Just for future reference, it is spelled Redfearn.

How much do you think making entertainment expenses fully non-deductible for businesses affect UNT sports? I'm sure it'll affect professional sports more, but I'm not sure how many businesses have season tickets at Apogee.

Down 1 with Smart just 2-9. Not a bad predicament. Gotta like our chances if we can get him going

They had us as North Texas State on their schedule

We didn't flip him. We offered after he decommitted. https://247sports.com/Player/LaDarius-Hamilton-69938/TimelineEvents I thought I remembered JayD reporting that Texas State was no longer recruiting him as we waited for his decision, too.

I certainly wouldn't want Robocop after me, either

JayD said this a few nights ago. Now that we have two of those three, I'm holding my breath until we see Carroll sign or JayD says he expects him to sign.

Right. Process of elimination points that way.