If freshman aren’t getting playing time, are Miami coaches being truthful when they say they’ve upgraded their position group/team on signing day? And should Miami just aim on signing fewer HS freshman and adding more Transfers due to the inability to actually develop players?
In the past 5 years not a single true freshman QB has taken snaps in a P5 game (In a troubled season LSU managed to play 3 QB’s—2 are freshman). In fact, it seems like freshman are not playing much at all compared to many of their P5 counterparts. Miami freshman with significant snaps: OL? Donaldson, Scaife, Clark, Nelson. WR? Thomas, Harley. RB? Dallas, Knighton, Chaney. DB? Bandy. DE? Garvin. … Nelson, Clark weren’t top 10 recruits for the class and Dallas switched positions due to emergency.
I read once where Nick Saban said that a recruit should be able to contribute by the sixth game. If we use that six game scenario… Has Miami truly upgraded the team? Because it appears that if a kid does not get snaps his freshman year he likely won’t get very many or be very impactful over his career.
We can look at the improved record, 3rd down improvement and the advanced metrics, but this team really didn’t feel like an improved team — outside of TRANSFERS (King, Williams, Bolden, Phillips, Roche, Borregales, Hedley).
I’m all for giving kids time, but with the exception of Harley, I can’t think of a single player who has significantly improved in the Miami coaching/S&C ecosystem (Hyperbole: Pope, the new favorite whipping boy has improved). Wouldn’t it just make more sense to take the Bill Snyder transfer model to it’s extreme and use signing day as supplemental?
