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What it should look like

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Allabouttheu95 said:
Those Previous transition classes were beyond brutal looking back. WOW
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To some extent, Golden had the toughest road to travel. He had just two commitments left when he signed with Miami, and had less than two months to scramble to get any sort of class. I remember he flipped one four star (Grimble) and tried to get Brissett. But having to start with just two players is brutal.

This was one of the risks in a coaching regime change, and it is also why it is so good to see how CMC is attacking it.
 
DMoney said:
This class has eight players. Seven of them are blue chippers. The class average is .9165. That’s good for 7th in the nation. But it’s still only eight players.

Why is Mario is choosing quality over quantity? It’s simple- he knows what it should look like. This isn't about recreating Temple. This is about building a roster to compete with Bama. It will take time, but you need to have high standards. Even in a transition year.

There were four transition classes between Coker and Mario. They followed the same pattern- new coach comes in, rushes evaluations, signs some sleepers and we fall in love with the grainy film. I was the worst culprit. Over four classes, at least 24 kids fell into this "lottery ticket" category:

2007 (Shannon)

Daniel Adderley, Shawnbrey McNeal, Tyler Horn, Jared Campbell

2011 (Golden)

Darius Smith, Ricardo Williams, Gianni Paul, Olsen Pierre, Antonio Kinard, Thomas Finnie, Eddie Johnson, Corey King, Junior Alexis, Hunter Wells, Thurston Armbrister

2016 (Richt)

Tre Johnson, Tyreic Martin, Jeff James, Dayall Harris

2019 (Diaz)

Adam El-Gammal, Jakai Clark, Zion Nelson, Peyton Matocha

Only five of the 24 ended up as quality players: Zion, Pierre, Armbrister, Clark and Horn. The rest gave us next to nothing. That's a 20% hit rate.

Mario is taking a different approach. He doesn't want excess fat weighing down the roster. Instead, he's laser focused on blue chip players, and made numerous references to recruiting rankings during his press conference. The Portal (which his predecessors didn't have) allows him to sign blue chippers while filling the rest of the spots with developed veterans.

This class, while small, is loaded with blue-chip athleticism and body types. Chris Graves and Nyjalik Kelly are prototypical. Wesley Bissainthe is fluid and has stopping power as a tackler. Jacurri Brown is built like an oak with nuclear athleticism. Isaiah Horton and Jaden Harris opened eyes on their visits through sheer size. Khamauri Rogers and Markeith Williams have been stacking INTs and offers since they were high school freshmen. And there are many names yet to come.

Enjoy these next couple months. This program will continue to stack blue talent, either from high school or the Portal. We have money, along with a coach and an AD who know how to spend money. Clemson is sputtering. The time is right to build a sustainable monster that reloads every year. Wednesday was just the first step.
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I think with the changing of time meaning getting proven guys from the portal probably eliminates alot of this no need to take so many risky guys
 
Canefancarlos2 said:
I think with the changing of time meaning getting proven guys from the portal probably eliminates alot of this no need to take so many risky guys
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Could you imagine how many players would have left in the fall of 2011 if the transfer portal had existed? As it was, we suffered heavy attrition from the 2010 class.
 
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DMoney said:
I have no problem taking three stars if they are vetted. Greg Rousseau is a recent example.

The issue is taking sleepers without a thorough evaluation, including a live eyeball test. That’s how we’ve made mistakes in the past.
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Every class has a few 3*. Maybe a kid who did not camp, maybe new to football, I am all for a 3* if they are running 4.3 and 10.9's as a junior (ala Harris who we signed this year)
 
Excellent points but I have a hard time believing there weren’t more 3 Star guys he would have taken if they wanted in.
 
Ver said:
Something I never thought of until now is the low 3 star kid probably isn't that invested in football, doesn't go as hard and that weighs down the team competitiveness across the board
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This is terrible take don't mention it. Stars a lot of times come from offer list and attending camp circuit. More politic than performance.
 
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DMoney said:
When I saw his film, I remember thinking, “There has to be a reason nobody is on this kid. He’s unbelievable.”

Turns out there was a reason, unfortunately.
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If he could've got his **** together and stayed together would've had a nice long NFL career.
 
Problem2 said:
How refreshing that we won't have to have threads where people are rationalizing taking players that have no business being here

Our coach is a star *****, and that's a good thing
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But also should make us feel good when he takes a lower rated kid because he thinks he can play, not just a take because we need numbers.
 
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DMoney said:
I have no problem taking three stars if they are vetted. Greg Rousseau is a recent example.

The issue is taking sleepers without a thorough evaluation, including a live eyeball test. That’s how we’ve made mistakes in the past.
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To be fair, the portal has made this more of a possibility. You kind of had to fill the spots just to fill a roster. I am glad we are being smart and adapting our strategy to the current climate, but I am not sure coaches had much of a choice in the pre-portal world.
 
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DMoney said:
This class has eight players. Seven of them are blue chippers. The class average is .9165. That’s good for 7th in the nation. But it’s still only eight players.

Why is Mario is choosing quality over quantity? It’s simple- he knows what it should look like. This isn't about recreating Temple. This is about building a roster to compete with Bama. It will take time, but you need to have high standards. Even in a transition year.

There were four transition classes between Coker and Mario. They followed the same pattern- new coach comes in, rushes evaluations, signs some sleepers and we fall in love with the grainy film. I was the worst culprit. Over four classes, at least 24 kids fell into this "lottery ticket" category:

2007 (Shannon)

Daniel Adderley, Shawnbrey McNeal, Tyler Horn, Jared Campbell

2011 (Golden)

Darius Smith, Ricardo Williams, Gianni Paul, Olsen Pierre, Antonio Kinard, Thomas Finnie, Eddie Johnson, Corey King, Junior Alexis, Hunter Wells, Thurston Armbrister

2016 (Richt)

Tre Johnson, Tyreic Martin, Jeff James, Dayall Harris

2019 (Diaz)

Adam El-Gammal, Jakai Clark, Zion Nelson, Peyton Matocha

Only five of the 24 ended up as quality players: Zion, Pierre, Armbrister, Clark and Horn. The rest gave us next to nothing. That's a 20% hit rate.

Mario is taking a different approach. He doesn't want excess fat weighing down the roster. Instead, he's laser focused on blue chip players, and made numerous references to recruiting rankings during his press conference. The Portal (which his predecessors didn't have) allows him to sign blue chippers while filling the rest of the spots with developed veterans.

This class, while small, is loaded with blue-chip athleticism and body types. Chris Graves and Nyjalik Kelly are prototypical. Wesley Bissainthe is fluid and has stopping power as a tackler. Jacurri Brown is built like an oak with nuclear athleticism. Isaiah Horton and Jaden Harris opened eyes on their visits through sheer size. Khamauri Rogers and Markeith Williams have been stacking INTs and offers since they were high school freshmen. And there are many names yet to come.

Enjoy these next couple months. This program will continue to stack blue talent, either from high school or the Portal. We have money, along with a coach and an AD who know how to spend money. Clemson is sputtering. The time is right to build a sustainable monster that reloads every year. Wednesday was just the first step.
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One correction. Gionni Paul actually was pretty good in a bad system. He transfers to Utah and was first-team All Pac-12. But point well taken. Golden was the worse culprit. The attrition in each of his classes was in the 33% to 50% range within 3 years.
 
Tough class to extrapolate to future classes, but if we’re pulling out insights, the key ones should likely be that (a) Mario and crew have cachet and (b) those dudes sincerely love and understand the importance of the trenches. You can tell by the offers and priority levels of their time.

And, those are huge differentiators for our situation (where we're always gonna have access to some skill positions anyway).
 
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I watched the ESPN (yea, I know) ESD wrap up show yesterday afternoon. Tom Luginbill said basically that Mario was the recruiting director. Couldn’t argue with that. With Mario’s rep as a recruiting monster, we can be confident that he’ll be relentless on the trail because he understands recruiting is the lifeblood of the program.

It’s going to be really interesting to see how Mario attacks the rest of this cycle and who he adds both from HS and the portal.
 
DMoney said:
This class has eight players. Seven of them are blue chippers. The class average is .9165. That’s good for 7th in the nation. But it’s still only eight players.

Why is Mario is choosing quality over quantity? It’s simple- he knows what it should look like. This isn't about recreating Temple. This is about building a roster to compete with Bama. It will take time, but you need to have high standards. Even in a transition year.

There were four transition classes between Coker and Mario. They followed the same pattern- new coach comes in, rushes evaluations, signs some sleepers and we fall in love with the grainy film. I was the worst culprit. Over four classes, at least 24 kids fell into this "lottery ticket" category:

2007 (Shannon)

Daniel Adderley, Shawnbrey McNeal, Tyler Horn, Jared Campbell

2011 (Golden)

Darius Smith, Ricardo Williams, Gianni Paul, Olsen Pierre, Antonio Kinard, Thomas Finnie, Eddie Johnson, Corey King, Junior Alexis, Hunter Wells, Thurston Armbrister

2016 (Richt)

Tre Johnson, Tyreic Martin, Jeff James, Dayall Harris

2019 (Diaz)

Adam El-Gammal, Jakai Clark, Zion Nelson, Peyton Matocha

Only five of the 24 ended up as quality players: Zion, Pierre, Armbrister, Clark and Horn. The rest gave us next to nothing. That's a 20% hit rate.

Mario is taking a different approach. He doesn't want excess fat weighing down the roster. Instead, he's laser focused on blue chip players, and made numerous references to recruiting rankings during his press conference. The Portal (which his predecessors didn't have) allows him to sign blue chippers while filling the rest of the spots with developed veterans.

This class, while small, is loaded with blue-chip athleticism and body types. Chris Graves and Nyjalik Kelly are prototypical. Wesley Bissainthe is fluid and has stopping power as a tackler. Jacurri Brown is built like an oak with nuclear athleticism. Isaiah Horton and Jaden Harris opened eyes on their visits through sheer size. Khamauri Rogers and Markeith Williams have been stacking INTs and offers since they were high school freshmen. And there are many names yet to come.

Enjoy these next couple months. This program will continue to stack blue talent, either from high school or the Portal. We have money, along with a coach and an AD who know how to spend money. Clemson is sputtering. The time is right to build a sustainable monster that reloads every year. Wednesday was just the first step.
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D$ i just have to say you are and are always spot on. I enjoy reading your posts. I dont get much insight here in Alabama so Thank You my friend for the information.
 
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