BillySee58

He played a full season before getting hurt last year

Yup. But I was thinking they still need a 2nd level JUCO linebacker. For the jack position they have now this guy, Ozougwu, and Thornton after this year. Any idea if they're still looking for a 2nd like linebacker? Congrats to Vada!

If we're tied or worse with an FCS team after 3 quarters then it's very likely he is a big part of why we don't have a comfortable lead.

Congrats to him and your family!

Thanks. Even if they step up, we only have 3 second level linebackers who have eligibility after this year (Fulp, Garner, Ejiya). And Garner and Ejiya will be seniors when these guys get to campus so definitely a need for JUCO linebackers

Michael Sewell Jr So does this mean Nixon (and Hunt) will both be playing outside linebacker on the second level as opposed to at the LOS?

Another thread derailed, and I would argue that it is not because of people complaining about lack of offer lists, but because of people feeling the need to justify it. If you like the tape, you like the tape. If you like the pickup, you like the pickup. If you trust Littrell, then trust Littrell. Congrats to Keelan!

From the sounds of it, it seems like Nixon may be playing the jack position that Wheeler is playing. All Vito asked/specified was inside or outside linebacker, which may not be specific when one of our outside linebackers is more like a hybrid DE/LB. At 5'11" I doubt this kid would be on the edge, so I don't think Nixon took his spot. And we need more second-level linebackers. Not many on our roster who have eligibility after this year. Maybe our offer to him expired, but we still need more linebackers for our future roster.

I'm interested to see if we see him at the 4 some this year, with all of the guard depth we have. Something like Woolridge, Duffy, Smart, Lawson, and Arikawe/Simmons/Tikhonenko. To me, the ideal type of player Lawson could become would be like a CUSA version of former Dallas Maverick all-star and Wake Forest great Josh Howard. Here is a comparison of their freshmen stats: Josh Howard: 9.2 points/game, 4.7 rebounds/game, 49.2% 2-point fg, 0.3/1.2 threes per game (28.6%), 58.3% free-throw percentage, 24.9 minutes/game AJ Lawson: 11.4 points/game, 4.4 rebounds/game, 48.9% 2-point fg, 0.5/2.0 threes per game (27.1%), 59.6% free-throw percentage, 23.1 minutes/game So clearly numbers are pretty comparable. Lawson actually averaged more rebounds than Howard per 40 minutes as a freshman. Shooting numbers are very comparable. Howard followed this up by having very good, yet similar sophomore and junior years followed by an ACC POTY in his senior season. His line from his senior year, in which he was predominately playing the 4: 19.5 points/game, 8.3 rebounds/game, 52.8% 2-point fg, 1.7/4.6 threes per game (37.3%), 83.3% free-throw percentage, 32.3 minutes/game Lawson will never be the defensive force Howard was, but I think he can have a similar offensive impact as Howard at the three and the four, defend both the three and the four, and rebound well enough to have the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. He averaged 5.5 rebounds/game over the last 11 games including two double-digit rebound games in that span. I don't think he'll ever be a true two-guard, but I think his skill set as a 3/small-ball 4 could really be something he excels at.

I don't think I've ever seen us lose a recruiting battle to UTEP since I started following UNT recruiting back in 2012. Temporarily we did with Demikal Harrison in 2015 but he flipped to us shortly after. It really is much like recruiting against an FCS. But poor UTEP has beaten us three straight times and out scored us by a combined 49 points.

Do I blame them? No. Do I give any credibility to their ratings? Definitely not. It's mostly a scam. Kids think they're paying for a rating that will help their recruitment, but they aren't.

I've never seen them rate someone below three stars

Offers are done going out for the most part across the country. Offers for seniors will go out sparingly over the fall for late bloomer types, then will pick back up in December and January but that's a more select crowd as well.

These are class of 2019 offers

Given his size, likely a jack linebacker like Josh Wheeler. Maybe a 5-tech but he's probably better suited to play jack. Also, these are the kind of kids we should feast on. 6 other FBS offers, all from schools that we absolutely should be beating out in recruiting battles for local kids.

Not really. It's not a thread about a specific recruit, and it's about us having players ranked in a list that doesn't have much precedence, so we're evaluating the significance of the rankings using other reference points. If this were done in Daizion Carroll's thread, then yeah, I'd agree.

I did some research into this. Every year there are approximately 350 FBS signees from the state of Texas. If you divide this number by 22 positions, you get about 16 FBS signees at each position. So you factor in the fact that there are two guard spots and you get an approximation of about 32 FBS guard signees from Texas each year. https://n.rivals.com/news/where-the-fbs-signees-come-from-1 A little further research showed me that about 21 of the 247 top 450 recruits in Texas were guards. I did 100 more than the 350 I mentioned because a lot of the first 350 either didn't sign or went FCS and I was going for roughly a representative sample of FBS signees. Those 21 were not all FBS signees either. http://247sports.com/Season/2017-Football/CompositeRecruitRankings?State=TX So we're looking at about 30 or so FBS signees each year from Texas at the guard position. Not trying to say having guys between 31 and 40 means they aren't FBS quality, but I would say based on that little research that's likely going to be a range every year featuring borderline FBS players. Impressive in what sense? I'm not being a smart aleck or arguing with you. Genuinely asking the question. The fact these guys didn't have any FBS offers means that you or I could've garnered their commitments. No disrespect to the players or their potentials, but we got these guys uncontested. The thing you keep missing with the offer list narrative is that it's not about predicting the success of each individual player. But: 1. In larger samples (i.e. Signing classes) you're playing against the percentages the more of these players that you sign and 2. If you can't win recruiting battles you are relegating yourself to players no one else wants. Even if you like some of those kids and they #FitTheSystem, you are putting yourself in a position where you are at the mercy of who other schools want and are not choosing between recruits, but getting the ones no one else wants by default. That's a very unlikely spot to win games out of and the concern for that is legitimate, whether you choose to be concerned by it or not.

What's weird to me is that UTSA somehow got 4.4 players named to this team

Put me on the record as saying this team gets 20 wins this season. Especially if we get a similar OOC schedule to the ones we have been getting. FIU and FAU twice each, Rice twice who lost its 3 best players to transfer and coach, and UTEP who had a losing record and proved that this conference is not in great shape by going 3-10 out of conference then 12-6 in it. WKU should be much improved, as well as UAB but overall it's just a weak conference. I think we'll see just how bad Benford was by watching this team and seeing how navigable this conference schedule should be for us.

Those jerseys put the sin in Sinbad. Personally, I liked his movie "Shazaam" better, I think

He also was committed to UCLA in between his Texas commitment and signing with Kansas State.

They do count against the 25.

Recruits have had access to google for almost 20 years. The point is, at the beginning of their recruitment what they know of college football is Alabama, LSU, Ohio State, USC, and the other big-time programs and players they have seen on national television over the past 5 years or so. At the point where we start recruiting them, we can really dictate what their image of UNT is. Sure they can look at our past records on google, but what happened under previous staffs when they were in elementary school or before is not nearly as important to the vast majority of recruits as what is going to happen when they are in college. It is up to coaches as recruiters to sell the recruits on their program and iteration of UNT football. If the vast majority of recruits we go after are more concerned with how bad our program was before they were even paying attention, and that turns them off from our program then that's on our coaches for not being able to successfully sell the current program to them.

Commits to SMU

Did they? I remember him being a 2 on Rivals when he committed. Who else has Rivals dropped a ranking for that you're referencing?