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For decades, coaches have had a huge upper hand in the recruiting process. They knew how the system worked. For the most part, the recruits and their parents had no idea. Sure, a few of the best players could dictate terms and string along the coaches, but this lopsided information dynamic allowed coaches to dictate the terms of the process to the vast majority of recruits. Recently, services such as Rivals, Scout, and 247Sports have pulled back the curtain on the recruiting process and allowed players and their parents to become educated. Still, coaches controlled one vital piece of information—whether their scholarship offer actually was an offer. Now, coaches have to put their cards on the table six weeks earlier. Some of them hate that. Most programs hand out more than 100 scholarship offers but aren’t allowed to sign more than 25 players a year. Obviously, they need to offer more than 25 players because not everyone they offer will sign. But do they need to offer 231? That’s how many players claim offers from Minnesota in the class of 2018, according to the 247Sports database. Do they need to offer 265? According to rivals.com, that’s how many class of ’18 players claim offers from Ole Miss, whose coach thinks allowing players to sign six weeks earlier is reckless. Even if we correct for the possibility that some of the players are claiming offers they don’t have—let’s estimate that number liberally at 50—it’s still an astounding number of offers. Before this recruiting cycle, coaches could watch the dominos fall through December and January and either cut loose committed players or ask them to take a grayshirt, which would require them to delay enrollment until the spring of the following year. Michigan’s Jim Harbaugh made headlines in January of ’16 for pruning his recruiting class of committed players. Alabama’s Nick Saban has made headlines in multiple years for having the grayshirt conversation with players close to National Signing Day. (Grayshirting as a practice is fine; the problem is when coaches spring the conversation on a player just before National Signing Day when the player has fewer options.) read more: https://www.si.com/college-football/2017/06/05/early-signing-period-recruiting-coaches?utm_campaign=campusrush&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&xid=socialflow_twitter_sicr