Here is a stat that will surprise some people

[Ethnicsands]

But even the NFL kids didn't play like that here. That is why I focus on development and scheme.

For example, we had five OL start games in the NFL this year. That's a huge number. But not a single one of those guys made All-ACC. If the NFL talents are underperforming, I suspect that is true across the board.

I think we agree that our coaching and schemes and development have been putrid, so I am not surprised by our ‘nfl kids’ not excelling in college. It’s not an inconsistency for me, because my view of the problem is ‘all of the above.’ We’re just emphasizing different problems. They’re all problems. It’s hard for a single OL to look good when the entire line and scheme are hot messes.

Clemson is not ignoring NFL prospects by choice. They are just getting the most out of what they have and covering up flaws with scheme. Now, with a track record of success, they are starting to sign the future NFL linemen.

This is where I caution you to pause. It’s not that they are ‘ignoring nfl prospects by choice.’ That wouldn’t make sense. But it’s pretty likely that the traits they are looking for in prospects are different, and they may well care a lot less than you imagine about physical ceiling for nfl purposes vs. traits they think are needed to be effective linemen at Clemson. That’s part of what I have been trying to say. Nfl ceiling may be a distraction. Helpful but insufficient.

First thing I do is fire Barry and let the new OC bring his own coach. Then, I develop a top-down OL recruiting strategy with several key principles:

1. Focus on the three uncoachable traits-- length, athleticism and toughness.

2. Communicate those physical traits to your low-level recruiting staff, and have them scour the country for guys with verified measurables and/or converts from other sports and positions. This needs to be an ongoing process due to late bloomers and converted guys.

3. Focus on South Florida and big cities. Stoutland's lines were heavy on local kids and big city recruits. Country kids are, by and large, a waste of resources. They don't like the culture. We need to be the expert on every big city's OL crop, including South Florida and Jacksonville.

I am on board with this. I’ll come back another time with more specifics. I’ve shared views on recruiting and OL recruiting in the past. Clean house. Change how we define what we are looking for, then how we find kids then how we assess / evaluate them.

 

[mirednmediocrity2]

Decent coaches would develop these players and have successful teams. We don't and won't for the foreseeable future. Kids we think are crap go to the NFL, get decent coaching and become solid pros. Not surprised at these numbers at all.

 

[Calvin]

This is only surprising to those who dont follow UM football, its called the art kehoe affect, the main did his job at a high level, i always thought it was the one mistake coach richt made, but than again, knowing coach richt, if he had a problem with coach kehoe back in the day for trying to transfer, coach richt wasnt gone let that go! Had coach richt kept coach kehoe, and with the high level of recruiting that coach richt brings, this o-line and the running game would've been hummin.

 

[SneakyFriendlyCrow]

The school and coaches are failing the players.

Suck my ballz manni diez

 

[Ethnicsands]

Decent coaches would develop these players and have successful teams. We don't and won't for the foreseeable future. Kids we think are crap go to the NFL, get decent coaching and become solid pros. Not surprised at these numbers at all.

People should to be careful about projecting their beliefs. That’s part of my point and has been for ages here. Yes as a general matter we’ve had bad everything, and that includes development. Okay, but what of it? People then say with confidence that a good coach would have turned whoever into whatever. But they don’t know that. Your comment is a great example. If potential were enough, Seantrel would be the top OL in the NFL. Flowers would be better in the NFL. This whole ‘NFL U’ thing has really poisoned the mind of too many around this program. I’d be happy not to hear about the NFL for a long while in connection with this program.

I suspect with new coaches that we will see line improvement with fewer pros going forward, because we’ll start evaluating kids differently, and focus more on what it takes to succeed at Miami, which is not the same thing as what it takes to project a kid to the NFL years down the road.

 

[Cane4L]

First thing I do is fire Barry and let the new OC bring his own coach. Then, I develop a top-down OL recruiting strategy with several key principles:

You think this happens D$? If so, why hasn’t it happened already? I’m running out of patience bro

 

[DMoney]

You think this happens D$? If so, why hasn’t it happened already? I’m running out of patience bro

I think so. Manny seems to be on the Taggart track. After the bowl.

 

[The Franchise]

I’ve been blaming everything on coaching the last few years. Or decade. But when you lose to FIU it’s time to consider that the players are also not good enough.

I know you’ve been saying this for a few years now, and as much as I hate to admit it....you’re right.

The FIU game actually supports D$’s theory more than any other game.

 

[Ethnicsands]

The FIU game actually supports D$’s theory more than any other game.

It also supports the theory of the poster you responded to. It supports all theories. Talent and coaching and all else. When you get stomped by FIU, you have to accept your problems are more multiple than Enos’s offense is.

 

[Robbymoto]

People should to be careful about projecting their beliefs. That’s part of my point and has been for ages here. Yes as a general matter we’ve had bad everything, and that includes development. Okay, but what of it? People then say with confidence that a good coach would have turned whoever into whatever. But they don’t know that. Your comment is a great example. If potential were enough, Seantrel would be the top OL in the NFL. Flowers would be better in the NFL. This whole ‘NFL U’ thing has really poisoned the mind of too many around this program. I’d be happy not to hear about the NFL for a long while in connection with this program.

I suspect with new coaches that we will see line improvement with fewer pros going forward, because we’ll start evaluating kids differently, and focus more on what it takes to succeed at Miami, which is not the same thing as what it takes to project a kid to the NFL years down the road.

Simple concept and we need to do this.

 

[Ethnicsands]

I count 17 OL drafted since ‘00. Maybe I missed one.

7 were between ‘00–‘05. (Mercier, McKinnie, Bibla, Gonzalez, Carey, C. Joseph C. Myers.) Butch recruits. Nuff said.

So we are talking about ten kids over 14 years. Not bad but not evidence of great lines each year, either. But let’s look more closely:

- Coker had 2 OL kids he recruited get drafted (Winston, Butler, both ‘06). (Jason Fox (’10) was recruited under Coker by Mario but signed by Shannon iirc.)

- Shannon/Stoutland had 6 (Franklin, BW, Linder, Seantrel, Feliciano, and Fox).

- Golden brought in Flowers and Isidora. The rest of his OL evals were bad. His highest rated kids were St. Louis, Darling and McDermott, and none were drafted. However, and maybe it’s relevant to the Clemson analogy, they were all contributors. We’d do okay recruiting more of them, the NFL aside. (No credit to Golden, who also brought in Bar Milo, Loftus, Jahair Jones et al.)

Richt got us Donaldson and Scaife, but also a bunch of bad evals from the looks of it, compounded by Searels and Richt’s offense.

Bottom line: if you exclude Stoutland’s kids, you’re talking about 4 kids over 10 years (deducting 4 Stoutland years and 6 Stoutland kids). And only 2 recruited since Shannon left town. If you think the ‘17 kids since ‘00’ means a lot, you may want to dig deeper.

 

[The Franchise]

It also supports the theory of the poster you responded to. It supports all theories. Talent and coaching and all else. When you get stomped by FIU, you have to accept your problems are more multiple than Enos’s offense is.

Not really. Losing to FIU means one thing: they were infinitely better prepared to play than we were. The talent gap is far too huge to read anything else into that loss unless you want to contort your argument into UM and FIU being closely matched from a talent perspective.

I get your overall point that we’re not as talented as some think we are, but that argument is irrelevant when discussing the FIU game.