BillySee58

Marcus Smith probably has the best chance because of his size and athleticism at tight end.

Falcons for Akunne and Saints for Lemon. UDFA

6'6" 320 lb offensive lineman from Broken Arrow, OK. We have offered. Also holds offers from Texas Tech and Tulsa. Worth noting is that he has a lead recruiter from OU, so that's a legitimate potential offer as well. Even more worth noting is that he has a mullet. Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/athlete/2163344/rowdy-frederick http://247sports.com/Player/Rowdy-Frederick-68821 http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/recruiting/player-Rowdy-Frederick-164774

Again, I haven't seen anyone argue that Chico doesn't do the QB recruiting. All I said was that Coach Mccarney is the one that finalizes the offers. It was pretty obvious the entire recruiting cycle that we were not going to take a QB with Chumley slotted as our QB for the class, as it looks like it was agreed on. Riddle and a few others were slow played, but Coach Mac didn't want a high school QB last class, outside of Chumley.

I never said Riddle was a case of Mac evaluating QBs. I just said we heard directly from his father that Coach Mccarney was the one who had the final say in whether or not an offer would be extended. I understand Canales does the majority of recruiting and evaluating, but it is up to Coach Mac to extend and okay the offer. You said you agree, so what I'm saying is that it's obvious Coach Mac has only okay'd offers to tall QBs so far with the two exceptions I mentioned. That's what he wants. So that limits the QBs Canales can offer. That doesn't completely exclude Canales from blame, but it does make things more difficult. Like I've said, I think it's reasonably possible that we can get a better QB evaluator, developer, and OC than Canales. I just don't expect we'll suddenly start signing all-CUSA QBs and/or start being at the top of the conference in offense just by replacing him.

It's Mccarney's team. I understand what you're saying, and he does deserve credit and blame for the offense and the defense, and team as a whole. But as long as he's the coach it will be what he wants, from a broad perspective. What have we heard since Cosh was hired? How similar he is to Skladany. He's mixing in a little bit of odd fronts, but Coach Mccarney has brought in a guy who is going to keep running what he wants, with the individual plays and quirks thrown in being where the DC can vary a little from if it were Mccarney himself as the DC. As far as offense, there has been a tremendous change in philosophy from what Canales ran at USF, here with Dodge, and here as the interim to what our offense has looked like under Mccarney. It's his team. If we hired a new OC it wouldn't be a drastic change from what we have seen up to this point in the Mccarney era. We keep hearing, and saw a little, about how this offense is going to be more spread and more up-tempo this year. There were some rumblings about Canales last year being on the hot seat, so I think he knows that. If he's in danger of losing his job then he's going to want to run more of his offense, rather than lose his job running more of someone else's offense. And as far as QB recruiting, we've even seen a QB recruits' dad tell us explicitly on the board that Coach Mac had the final say in whether or not a QB is offered (but that was always pretty apparent). Canales had two 6'0" even QBs at USF, so I don't think he's the one who is so set on almost exclusively recruiting taller QBs. But it does limit him. That's just how I see it, at least.

Because Voss already used up his 4 years of playing and his redshirt.

Good post. One thing I disagree on is that offering kids who end up getting P5 offers doesn't prove anything to me. If a kid is talented enough to get P5 offers then it doesn't take a genius evaluator to realize that that kid is worthy of a CUSA offer. I agree that transfers can help, but I think you have to be selective about the transfers you offer. It really helps when you can get transfers like Aderius Epps to walkon. If we had needed to give him a scholarship that would've been one less scholarship last class, for a guy we don't know if he'll ever play meaningful snaps. Getting guys like Trice, who are legitimately in the two-deep at a P5 school have a high chance of being good pickups. I definitely agree on the unique circumstances. We shouldn't be overly picky with top talent, as far as their exact situation. Kevin Dillman is a good example there. Ultimately, like I always talk about, it comes down to winning recruiting battles. There are plenty of good players who don't have P5 offers, but most of them have 4,5, or more G5 and FCS offers. Guys like Zach Orr, Mason Y'Barbo, Derek Akunne, Aaron Bellazin, Chris Miles, Jeffery Wilson all had zero P5 offers, yet all had 4 or more offers. If you fill your class with kids with solid offer lists then you set yourself up well. Then you can take a chance on the occasional P5 transfer or unique circumstance and not rely on them working out.

6'1" 230 lb inside linebacker from Oologah, OK. We have offered. He holds 12 offers from schools like Ohio, Wyoming, service academies, and FCS schools among others. No P5 offers yet. Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/athlete/1684430/jimmy-mckinney http://247sports.com/Player/Jimmy-McKinney-80167 http://recruiting.scout.com/player/8391695n-jimmy-mckinney http://sports.yahoo.com/minnesota/football/recruiting/player-Jimmy-McKinney-171217

6'0" 180 lb safety from Duncanville high school in Duncanville, TX. We have offered this morning, along with Fresno State. Also holds offers from Kansas, Texas State, and Hawaii. Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/athlete/3866432/jaron-bryant http://247sports.com/Player/Jaron-Bryant-79613 https://rivals.yahoo.com/footballrecruiting/football/recruiting/player-Jaron-Bryant-175146 http://recruiting.scout.com/player/8402896n-jaron-bryant http://espn.go.com/college-sports/football/recruiting/player/_/id/209777/jaron-bryant

That might explain why he's not our starting QB, but not why he couldn't be in our top 3 QBs at this point. In 2013 Dajon Williams was pushing and almost won the job against Derek Thompson as a true freshman who had just arrived on campus that summer/fall, and was our number 2 heading into the Idaho game. Mcnulty was our number 2 as a true freshman, and even if there is some degree of conspiracy with that, you don't have a true freshman as your backup and start him when your starter was hurt (Tulsa 2011) if you don't trust him. Means is still young but considering how supbar his high school stats were, until he starts actually moving up the depth chart you have to have more young options than just him.

Yeah, good point. It's spring and a lot of kids still have not taken their ACTs or SATs yet at this point in their junior years, so they probably do have to wait until they can really start ramping up their recruiting. Bailiff is a good coach and recruiter. I remember on their boards their fans were really going off on him after we beat them on Halloween in 2013. I wish they would get rid of him, because he's had way more success than anyone else has had there in recent years.

I don't think Canales would be that difficult a coordinator to get an upgrade over. But I still don't think getting a new OC would really change much. Whether or not Chico was calling the individual plays as an interim, it was clearly his offense. Which is much, much different from what we do now in Mccarney's offense. Even if Mccarney doesn't call each individual play, it's his team and the offense that he wants to run. I don't think it would change much with a new OC. As for QB developing and recruiting, every offer at QB is finalized by Mccarney. Like I've said before, he has offered two high school QBs under 6'3", and they've been JT Barrett (Ohio State signee/national prospect) and Andrew Mcnulty (son of a close friend). The thing with tall QBs is that if they're good then they'll have extensive offer lists. This staff has struggled to win recruiting battles against the schools you need to to be successful. And that becomes even harder when you're trying to convince a QB to come here, where some games we hardly throw the ball, over schools that run spread offenses. This recruiting cycle will be interesting to watch. We've offered one QB so far in Easton Underwood from Jackson, TN (listed at 6'3" in his hudl), but his offer from us has been listed for months and I doubt we'll recruit him that hard. Outside of him, we have offered zero QBs either in the class of 2015 or 2016. Does our QB-recruiting strategy change? Do we even go after a QB this cycle? I just think any change with how our offense has been performing and the QB position starts with Mccarney, regardless of the OC.

I think UTSA expects it will be a slow cycle after signing 31 this past class. But still, I was surprised. I think Rice was even more surprising. I think it's too be expected with UTEP. They usually go about the recruiting process very slowly, knowing how hard it is to get kids to choose to go to El Paso over other options. They only had 1 commitment throughout the season last year heading into recruiting season. Their strategy is to just wait until recruiting season and see who is available then, and see who they have a legitimate shot at. Thanks for the appreciation.

Also of note, Easton Underwood is still the only 2016 QB who lists a North Texas offer. What you have to show out of your last two classes at the QB position is a QB in Connor Means who has shown some potential but still has not been good enough to crack the top 3 in a subpar QB race two straight springs, and Caleb Chumley who will almost assuredly be a tight end at some point. We desperately need a good QB this class, so it's strange to see no offers have gone out at that position yet.

It's been a pretty slow start to this recruiting cycle. I looked across the conference to see how many offers each CUSA team has given out, according to 247. These numbers are not exact, but are pretty close. We have some offers out that 247 has not yet recorded but other sites have, but 247 is still the most accurate for listed offers. Same for other schools. So here are the number of offers given out by each staff so far. UNT: 35 Charlotte: 85 Florida Atlantic: 109 Florida International: 51 Louisiana Tech: 89 Marshall: 101 MTSU: 46 Old Dominion: 130 Rice: 21 Southern Miss: 123 UTSA: 5 UTEP: 5 Western Kentucky: 64

You could argue he needs to be more of both. He didn't have as good a year when we were forced to lean on him, rather than allow him to lean on all-CUSA guys around him. Can he be an all-CUSA guy in his own right? That would be huge for this secondary breaking in 3 new starters. Depends what you mean by "beat" a double team. If your idea of beating a double team is getting past two 300+ lb D1 offensive linemen into the backfield then no, and yes that takes a Booger caliber DT. Actually beating a double team just requires the DT not allowing the o-linemen to combo up to the linebacker in time. Do we have someone who can do that? Maybe. We'll see, but the linebackers will have to be a lot better and quicker at reading the play than they were last year.

So we currently have 16 scholarship seniors on this roster, and here's a breakdown of how this senior class has been assembled. Signed out of high school: 8 - Redshirt seniors (2011 class): 6 (A Orr, C Polk, M Thompson, M Smith, A Jimmerson, A Mcnulty) - True seniors (2012 class): 2 (C Harris, J Marshall) Transfers: 4 - JUCO transfers: 3 (C Loving, A Smith, M Dash) - FBS transfer: 1 (A Wallace) Former walkons: 4 - Transfers: 3 (K Buyers*, B Bean*, M Banogu) - Walkon out of high school: 1 (J Lynn) *transferred here as a walkon but from FBS school where they were on scholarship Now here's the offense/defense breakdown. Offense: 8 Andrew Mcnulty, Antoinne Jimmerson, Carlos Harris, Jarod Lynn, Marcus Smith, Chris Loving, Micah Thompson, Michael Banogu Defense: 8 Chad Polk, Austin Orr, Blake Bean, Anthony Wallace, AJ Smith, Kenny Buyers, Jamal Marshall, Matthew Dash Projected senior starters: 8-9 (Lynn is the first fullback but we usually list 3 receivers in our starting lineup) Projected seniors in two-deep: 15 Returning full-time senior starters: 6 (Mcnulty, Jimmerson, M Smith, Harris, Polk, Buyers) Returning multi-year senior starters: 2 (Harris, Buyers) That's my breakdown. What are everyone's thoughts on this year's senior class? If we're going to turn things around it's going to have to start with these guys.

This isn't the NBA. Most mid-major teams, in CUSA and across the country, start 3-guard lineups. Kids who are 6'6" or taller and legitimately have the shooting skills, ball handling skills, and agility to play on the perimeter then they'll usually have plenty of major conference offers. If your three is 6'5" he's not going to get exposed for lack of size in this league. Maybe Mo won't be the first-team all-CUSA small forward, but thats just because he's not a first-team all-CUSA player. He's just about what you'd expect in a starting three in this conference, from a size and skill perspective but maybe better shooting than average.

6'5" 295 lb offensive lineman from Hollis, Oklahoma. Plays left guard for his high school. We have offered. Also holds offers from Ohio, Army, and Wyoming. This is the third high school lineman out of Oklahoma who we have offered. Highlights: http://www.hudl.com/athlete/2163997/jace-webb http://northtexas.scout.com/player/8504854n-jace-webb

The exact number is irrelevant. Point is, the new staff at SMU is doing a great job making an impression with high school coaches and players in the area. I would honestly be surprised if we ever win a head-to-head recruiting battle against them as long as our current head coaching situations remain the same.

Yeah, should just be 1 spot left if all with eligibility return.