Official 2021 Gophers Football Recruiting Updates Thread: Links, Tweets, Videos etc

[MNVCGUY]

#15 Illinois recruit in Cameron James a 6"8 OT is visiting with his parents and has a MN Crystal Ball on 247
#13 Illinois recruit is also on campus this weekend. Jameson Geers a TE.

We already have 3 top 17 Illinois recruits committed in.

#3 QB Athan Kaliakmanis
#4 Ath Sam Jackson
#17 WR Dino Kaliakmanis

This staff seems very plugged into the Kansas, Missouri, Illinois region. We have landed a decent amount of players from those states over the past few seasons and 2021 seems to be shapign up the same way.

 

[short ornery norwegian]

FWIW on Erdmann at St. John's - watched the kid play a few games. He's got legitimate talent. Big, strong, good (not great) arm and can run a little bit. In the right system, I think he definitely could have played D1. Add the academics and intangibles, and he's the kind of guy who just might hook on with some pro team as a backup or developmental QB. Might be a good fit in Canada.

 

[Gophs24]

FWIW on Erdmann at St. John's - watched the kid play a few games. He's got legitimate talent. Big, strong, good (not great) arm and can run a little bit. In the right system, I think he definitely could have played D1. Add the academics and intangibles, and he's the kind of guy who just might hook on with some pro team as a backup or developmental QB. Might be a good fit in Canada.

as a Johnnie fan I may be bias on this. I have probably seen him play in 12 games live and then the playoff games that are streamed online. But yes Erdman was just that much better then the rest of the QB's in the league. He of course is surrounded by a lot of talent at the skill positions as well. But the guy is as good as they come when it comes to D3 QB's.
I would say he gets signed as an undrafted free agent to some team and may hang on as a practice squad player. But the skies the limit for him outside of football. just a really truly good dude.

anyway....sorry to get side tracked....back to 2021 recuiting

 

[Tommyboy]

Where are all the Minnesota

This staff seems very plugged into the Kansas, Missouri, Illinois region. We have landed a decent amount of players from those states over the past few seasons and 2021 seems to be shapign up the same way.

Illinois is the head coaches home turf. We have 5 million people in our state and all the recruits are from his home state. Two of them are twins that are a year different in age? The other wants to play QB and is 5'9"

 

[BeerFueledFF]

Where are all the Minnesota

Illinois is the head coaches home turf. We have 5 million people in our state and all the recruits are from his home state. Two of them are twins that are a year different in age? The other wants to play QB and is 5'9"

They aren't actually twins, they are just in the same grade.

Sam Jackson is an athlete who we want to play WR or maybe DB, and he personally believes he can be a QB. His HS tape is awesome, but AFAIK he does not have a P5 QB offer at this time.

 

[upnorthkid]

Where are all the Minnesota

Illinois is the head coaches home turf. We have 5 million people in our state and all the recruits are from his home state. Two of them are twins that are a year different in age? The other wants to play QB and is 5'9"

What?
Jackson is listed at 5-10 or 5-11 everywhere. The number of people in a state is irrelevant. He has a commit from a kid from MN. The Greens have roots here and are listed as potential commits. You gotta chill man. Give it a second. If there's MN kids who deserve offers, they'll get them. This isn't the 60s where tape isn't out there and word of mouth is all we have to go off

 

[Tommyboy]

I was at a Big 10 camp and watching Jackson, he wanted to be a QB. He was not over 5'9" last summer. Probably has grown. Really fast, but small. Looks like a very explosive guy, he would be exciting with the ball in open field. Does not look like a QB.

 

[Off-GridTNgopher]

I was at a Big 10 camp and watching Jackson, he wanted to be a QB. He was not over 5'9" last summer. Probably has grown. Really fast, but small. Looks like a very explosive guy, he would be exciting with the ball in open field. Does not look like a QB.

Shot in the dark here... Is this Tommy Olson?

 

[salzie]

Where are all the Minnesota

Illinois is the head coaches home turf. We have 5 million people in our state and all the recruits are from his home state. Two of them are twins that are a year different in age? The other wants to play QB and is 5'9"

We're recruiting MN kids. Are you suggesting we recruit exclusively MN kids? We'd be a dreadful B1G team if that were the case

The top 2 MN kids this class are not destined to end up MN

The third is also leaning towards Iowa

 

[salzie]

Shot in the dark here... Is this Tommy Olson?

I can't imagine it would be.

 

[tmvander]

I can't imagine it would be.

I don't know I can't imagine there are too many gopher fans with an avatar name yet alone a real name of Tom.

 

[MNVCGUY]

Where are all the Minnesota

Illinois is the head coaches home turf. We have 5 million people in our state and all the recruits are from his home state. Two of them are twins that are a year different in age? The other wants to play QB and is 5'9"

And these recruits you are so down on from Illinois would be rated higher then almost anyone in this state outside of the top 1-2 guys. You seem very fixated on where a recruit is from and seem to want to imply that the staff is not recruiting Minnesota kids.

The reality is the state of Minnesota does not churn out a lot of high end D1 football talent. That is not to say there are not talented players in Minnesota but there are simply not enough to build a football team around. If we were playing at the FCS like NDSU then we could definitely go hard after the in-state kids and be fine but the simple reality is that for as good as a team like NDSU is, they wouldn't hold up playing in the Big Ten. For a game or two they are fine but for a whole season the talent level just isn't high enough.

It doesn't matter where a kid is from. Coaches are going to go out and find the best players they can to fill the roster. The fact of the matter is that in a lot of cases those kids are not going to come from Minnesota because this state does not produce a lot of Big Ten level talent on a yearly basis.

 

[Tommyboy]

The talent is here, but the preparation and training is lacking on the most part. It is difficult to get kids to train like they have to for the next level. The FCS teams have competed well with the Big 10. Last time I remember NDSU beat Minnesota and Iowa, I would say that is competing. South Dakota, could have beat them this year. Nothing against our Gophers.

 

[BeerFueledFF]

We're recruiting MN kids. Are you suggesting we recruit exclusively MN kids? We'd be a dreadful B1G team if that were the case

The top 2 MN kids this class are not destined to end up MN

The third is also leaning towards Iowa

The third as of right now in 2021 is Eastern who is a Gopher commit.

I also wouldn't be shocked if we end up landing Alt who is #5 in 2021 as of right now.

 

[MNVCGUY]

The talent is here, but the preparation and training is lacking on the most part. It is difficult to get kids to train like they have to for the next level. The FCS teams have competed well with the Big 10. Last time I remember NDSU beat Minnesota and Iowa, I would say that is competing. South Dakota, could have beat them this year. Nothing against our Gophers.

Come on man....the top FCS teams can hang with Power 5 teams and on any given Saturday any FCS team might spring an upset. But for the most part the FCS programs get crushed when they play Power 5 teams and if they had to play a full schedule against Power 5 teams they would get destroyed.

The Gophers can't afford to recruit the guys that a place like NDSU does, those players would not make it in the Big Ten. There will always be the handful that could have and were overlooked but the vast majority of guys playing at the FCS level are there because that is where they are supposed to be talent wise.

 

[#2Gopher]

Wonder how many times where its not about over looking someone but rather someone has grown quite a bit and developed into a nice frame for football. I'm thinking Theilen for example.

 

[Jeshurun]

#15 Illinois recruit in Cameron James a 6"8 OT is visiting with his parents and has a MN Crystal Ball on 247
#13 Illinois recruit is also on campus this weekend. Jameson Geers a TE.

We already have 3 top 17 Illinois recruits committed in.

#3 QB Athan Kaliakmanis
#4 Ath Sam Jackson
#17 WR Dino Kaliakmanis

Illinois is Gopher Country

 

[Word]

Where are all the Minnesota

Illinois is the head coaches home turf. We have 5 million people in our state and all the recruits are from his home state. Two of them are twins that are a year different in age? The other wants to play QB and is 5'9"

Those are called Irish twins.

 

[mjfelton15]

Come on man....the top FCS teams can hang with Power 5 teams and on any given Saturday any FCS team might spring an upset. But for the most part the FCS programs get crushed when they play Power 5 teams and if they had to play a full schedule against Power 5 teams they would get destroyed.

The Gophers can't afford to recruit the guys that a place like NDSU does, those players would not make it in the Big Ten. There will always be the handful that could have and were overlooked but the vast majority of guys playing at the FCS level are there because that is where they are supposed to be talent wise.

Yeah there was a time I remember seeing a lot of our recruits being guys where we were the only P5 offer, the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc. In those years we were not a good Gopher team.

 

[MNVCGUY]

Yeah there was a time I remember seeing a lot of our recruits being guys where we were the only P5 offer, the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc. In those years we were not a good Gopher team.

Kill actually had a decent amount of success with recruits that didn't have better options. It was the running gag around here that most of our guys had Western Michigan offers. Kind of funny to think that now since in many of those cases we were going up against Fleck for recruits. At least I am pretty sure it was Western, definitely one of the directional Michigan schools.

Regardless though, it seemed fairly rare when we would beat out another Big Ten or Power 5 school for a recruit. Now it feels like pretty much every player we sign has a fairly impressive offer list and nearly all of them are being pursued by other Big Ten teams.

 

[noamfromm]

Kill actually had a decent amount of success with recruits that didn't have better options. It was the running gag around here that most of our guys had Western Michigan offers. Kind of funny to think that now since in many of those cases we were going up against Fleck for recruits. At least I am pretty sure it was Western, definitely one of the directional Michigan schools.

Regardless though, it seemed fairly rare when we would beat out another Big Ten or Power 5 school for a recruit. Now it feels like pretty much every player we sign has a fairly impressive offer list and nearly all of them are being pursued by other Big Ten teams.

I remember it starting with Bill Cubit as the HC at Western, but then the bit continued with Fleck at the helm

 

[dpodoll68]

Yeah there was a time I remember seeing a lot of our recruits being guys where we were the only P5 offer, the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc. In those years we were not a good Gopher team.

I'm curious when this was? It certainly wasn't under Brewster (who on paper is the best recruiter among Gophers head coaches in the internet era), and outside of the first year under Kill we were at worst a bowl team every year under Kill and Claeys. It sounds made up to me.

 

[MNVCGUY]

I'm curious when this was? It certainly wasn't under Brewster (who on paper is the best recruiter among Gophers head coaches in the internet era), and outside of the first year under Kill we were at worst a bowl team every year under Kill and Claeys. It sounds made up to me.

He is wrong about the FCS part, but under Kill a lot of our recruits had very few Power 5 offers outside of ours. Most of the time we were clearly their best or at least most high profile option. Mason had a similar philosophy and rarely beat out other Big Ten and Power 5 programs for recruits.

In general, the offer lists for our recruits under Fleck have been far more impressive then what we were used to seeing under previous staffs.

 

[BeerFueledFF]

I'm curious when this was? It certainly wasn't under Brewster (who on paper is the best recruiter among Gophers head coaches in the internet era), and outside of the first year under Kill we were at worst a bowl team every year under Kill and Claeys. It sounds made up to me.

Some of the Kill years definitely had quite a few players who fit this description where it's mostly Mac/FCS type offers:

Winston DeLattiboudere Recruit Interests

247sports.com

(Rutgers had only just joined the Big Ten right before signing day)


These players are all from the 2015 class, and all in between the first and third quartiles of the class. There are numerous others who had just one other P5 offer, usually an Indiana or Illinois type program.

 

[dpodoll68]

Some of the Kill years definitely had quite a few players who fit this description where it's mostly Mac/FCS type offers:

Winston DeLattiboudere Recruit Interests

247sports.com

(Rutgers wasn't P5 at the time)


These players are all from the 2015 class, and all in between the first and third quartiles of the class. There are numerous others who had just one other P5 offer, usually an Indiana or Illinois type program.

1. He said "a lot" had offers where "the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc.." Aside from Johannesson, every player you listed had at least one FBS offer in addition to Minnesota. MAC doesn't apply to his statement - those are FBS schools.

2. Rutgers has never not been in the Power 5/Power 6, so I'm not sure what you're talking about there. Moreover, Rutgers was in the Big Ten in 2015 so, again - not sure what you're talking about.

3. Aside from saying that "a lot" had "the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc.," he said that those Gopher teams were "not good." Since this is the class of 2015, every year these players would've been on the roster (potentially 2015-2019) was a bowl team except the 2017 squad.

 

[BeerFueledFF]

1. He said "a lot" had offers where "the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc.." Aside from Johannesson, every player you listed had at least one FBS offer in addition to Minnesota.

2. Rutgers has never not been in the Power 5/Power 6, so I'm not sure what you're talking about there. Moreover, Rutgers was in the Big Ten in 2015 so, again - not sure what you're talking about.

3. Aside from saying that "a lot" had "the rest were the FCS Dakotas, Northern Iowa, etc.," he said that those Gopher teams were "not good." Since this is the class of 2015, every year these players would've been on the roster (potentially 2015-2019) was a bowl team except the 2017 squad.

Instead of saying "not good", he probably should have gone with "not talented". They played well, and were well coached, but you saw the massive talent disparities between those Gopher teams and the actual top tier teams of the Big Ten at the time.

Looks like I was a year off in when I thought Rutgers joined the Big Ten, it was Jan. 1st 2014, not 2015.

 

[dpodoll68]

Instead of saying "not good", he probably should have gone with "not talented". They played well, and were well coached, but you saw the massive talent disparities between those Gopher teams and the actual top tier teams of the Big Ten at the time.

I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. Once we really got settled into the Kill/Claeys era and were playing with a team comprised mostly/all of their recruits, we played almost everyone close. The only bad loss I can remember was when we got our doors blown off at Northwestern in 2015.

And that doesn't really address his central thesis - that we were offering "a lot" of guys who only had FCS offers. It's simply not true and is a made-up "fact" to push an agenda.

 

[dpodoll68]

Here's a factoid to chew on - people want to pretend that Claeys was the worst recruiter in the history of college football, but the one class he signed had a comprehensive 247 ranking of 46. Meanwhile, Fleck's 4 classes have an average comprehensive 247 ranking of 44.5 - and that will only get worse as the 2020 class continues to drop between now and when the classes are complete. If you take away the transitional 2017 class, it's still at 39.6.

 

[BeerFueledFF]

Here's a factoid to chew on - people want to pretend that Claeys was the worst recruiter in the history of college football, but the one class he signed had a comprehensive 247 ranking of 46. Meanwhile, Fleck's 4 classes have an average comprehensive 247 ranking of 44.5 - and that will only get worse as the 2020 class continues to drop between now and when the classes are complete. If you take away the transitional 2017 class, it's still at 39.6.

The 2016 class was special, and Coughlin also had a big hand in that. IIRC, the 2017 class was shaping up to be a disaster that Fleck scrambled to fix as much as he could. There is a reason Fleck's non-transitional classes have all been better than any of Claey's or Kill's classes.

 

[MinnGopher]

Here's a factoid to chew on - people want to pretend that Claeys was the worst recruiter in the history of college football, but the one class he signed had a comprehensive 247 ranking of 46. Meanwhile, Fleck's 4 classes have an average comprehensive 247 ranking of 44.5 - and that will only get worse as the 2020 class continues to drop between now and when the classes are complete. If you take away the transitional 2017 class, it's still at 39.6.

While everything you said was factual, I'm not sure that is the greatest representation although I am glad that you mentioned it would be 39.6 without the 2017 class.

Wasn't Claeys second go at a full class in 2017 pretty rough rankings wise? I think it was more of a long term question, he did solid in that one year. For the record I don't think he would have been a stellar recruiter long run but what is really interesting is how he was able to corral so many in state kids and how many were difference makers down the line in that class. I can't think of any other in state classes that had much success at the U.