Please stop with this bullcrap (and that's not a personal comment, it's a reflection of the argument itself).
Mario hit the transfer portal **** hard. I don't even understand the half-analysis that goes into that kind of statement. "Hitting the portal hard" doesn't guarantee that kids pick you, the kids have a decision to make too (and without nearly the length of time to make visits and a decision that high school kids have).
Outside of getting his two best transfers from the school he just left behind, Slingblade Billy didn't do a great job in the portal. Nor did Mike Norvell, though he got a couple of guys early when Miami and Florida were both in the "hiring a new staff" phase.
As for "hiring an OC that players across the country would SALIVATE to come play for", I fail to see the relevance in the short-term. Outside of Portal kids, the new OC hire would not have impacted our CURRENT roster very much at all. And if you are concerned about recruits "SALIVATING", I would point out that we have the #6 recruiting class right now, so I'm not sure how much "better" things would be IN CURRENT RECRUITING if we had not hired Gattis (and I am not even advocating for or supporting Gattis, just wondering who else should have been hired that meets these criteria).
Sure, there may be some long-term impacts, but I really don't think that our on-field talent would be much different for this year. In fact, the benefit of hiring a "big-name" OC (that might not be a perfect fit for UM) is that his reputation precedes him. Hiring some unknown, but up-and-coming, OC might be a better fit, but it doesn't guarantee recruits right off the bat.
And don't even get me started on how myself and others were SHOUTED DOWN when we mentioned that Dorsey had a standing offer from Mario for the OC position. Maybe recruits might "SALIVATE" over Dorsey now, but a couple of months ago our own fans were saying that Dorsey was unqualified.
