For three or four of the last several years, I have stated the same thing about our recruiting classes: "While we have a good class, it is not as good as it could and should have been. When questions came up about what our problem I have been virtually alone in stating that it has been recruiting. I have noted several times about how we have historically been the poster child for keeping our kids at home, and that for all of the good things our HC has done for us, it has all been offset by seemingly gradually losing that legacy.
I've said several times that we will never get to where we want to be if we, the state's flagship school, averaging the seventh most D-1 in state blue chip recruits nationwide and first per capita, become the second best recruiters in our own state.
I have pointed out the who's and what's of my opinion of the recruiting mistakes I was talking about. I caught the devil from several on this board for such opinions, but in most of these cases I was talking about kids we knew, or should have known, were going to be outstanding players with all conference or even all american potential, and in many cases it came to pass. I have named names in previous posts, but it consisted not only of in-state kids we didn't ever offer to OOS kids who wanted to be tigers that we either didn't think we wanted, or slow played for too long.
I have also wondered aloud why it seems we have to incur injuries to find find that we had kids to come in off the bench who were better players than those they replaced, as we did with several of our OL men a few seasons ago.
The good news is, or at least most of us have placed our hopes in, a new group of coaches with good reputations for being better recruiters in and out of state. It would seem that they have proven themselves in this respect throughout their coaching careers.
There have been several comments on here since the Bama game about how much bigger, stronger, and more aggressive their D line was than ours. And while the poster who said that, "one year does not a program make" is obviously correct, there are several top notch kids in this current recruiting class in DL positions who we are actively recruiting, who are as big and mean as those Bama guys we saw last night, and capable within a year or two of giving us that kind of DL. One great kid makes the ones around him even better, get several great ones make each other even better and you are there.
Now we must wait and see if Coach O and the other new coaches are good enough recruiters to go out and get us those DLmen. to add to couple we already have with good potential.
I've said several times that we will never get to where we want to be if we, the state's flagship school, averaging the seventh most D-1 in state blue chip recruits nationwide and first per capita, become the second best recruiters in our own state.
I have pointed out the who's and what's of my opinion of the recruiting mistakes I was talking about. I caught the devil from several on this board for such opinions, but in most of these cases I was talking about kids we knew, or should have known, were going to be outstanding players with all conference or even all american potential, and in many cases it came to pass. I have named names in previous posts, but it consisted not only of in-state kids we didn't ever offer to OOS kids who wanted to be tigers that we either didn't think we wanted, or slow played for too long.
I have also wondered aloud why it seems we have to incur injuries to find find that we had kids to come in off the bench who were better players than those they replaced, as we did with several of our OL men a few seasons ago.
The good news is, or at least most of us have placed our hopes in, a new group of coaches with good reputations for being better recruiters in and out of state. It would seem that they have proven themselves in this respect throughout their coaching careers.
There have been several comments on here since the Bama game about how much bigger, stronger, and more aggressive their D line was than ours. And while the poster who said that, "one year does not a program make" is obviously correct, there are several top notch kids in this current recruiting class in DL positions who we are actively recruiting, who are as big and mean as those Bama guys we saw last night, and capable within a year or two of giving us that kind of DL. One great kid makes the ones around him even better, get several great ones make each other even better and you are there.
Now we must wait and see if Coach O and the other new coaches are good enough recruiters to go out and get us those DLmen. to add to couple we already have with good potential.
