Gophers ranked #61 by Scout? Sheesh!

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froggopher

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With 28 commits, I would have thought they would be ranked higher than that. Not even in the Top Fifty? Good God! Anyway, Go Gophers!!!!:cry:
 

Turns out, you can only play 11 on the field at one time.
I'd rather have 15 great recruits than 28 mediocre ones...
 

Pretty sure the rankings look more at quality of recruits as oppose to quantity of recruits. And while the quality question is always up for debate as it concerns recruiting services the general consensus seems to be that this class is pretty light on star power. There are a lot of players and they should definitely fill some holes in terms of depth but outside of Nelson there are not a lot of guys who would be viewed as a prize recruit in most other classes around the country.
 

No (4 star) recruits from Scout. ESPN rated Harbison and Hayes (4 star) recruits. All these stupid stars seem to matter when they rank the whole class.
 

Well, we're not in the top 50 with Rivals either. I think based on Tom Lemming's top 200 recruits ( Minnesota has 3 listed) we'll be a top 40 class when his ratings come out.
 


Tough recruiting class. How does this team expect to compete with no high end talent coming in? The answer: Great coaching. Not good coaching, but great coaching. There is very little room to miss on these recruits. Each one needs to live 100% up to their individual talent. No 4 star guys from Yahoo! and Scout is a bit discouraging. But we shall see.
 

I'd say the fact that after 2 3-win seasons we got some high 3* players on these recruiting sites is impressive.
 

zambam said:
I'd say the fact that after 2 3-win seasons we got some high 3* players on these recruiting sites is impressive.
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Exactly. What do people expect? I'd say a 61st ranked class isn't too shabby considering everything.
 

zambam said:
I'd say the fact that after 2 3-win seasons we got some high 3* players on these recruiting sites is impressive.
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I'm not really taking a position on the star argument, but this is making faulty excuses for a few reasons:

1) It's traditionally the case that a coach's best chance at recruiting is in his first year when there is still some buzz/optimism. You can sell guys that you were just hired and therefore will be there for a while and you're going to turn things around, blah blah blah. Take Timmy B's first class, for example.

2) Numerous studies have shown that, by itself, recent winning % isn't as important to recruits as location, size of fan base, ability of program to place players in the NFL, program prestige, and other factors. Now, none of those things particularly benefit Minnesota, but that's a systemic problem, not a one-year problem.

3) Even if you disregard the previous two points, 61 is still below Maryland (2-10), Colorado (3-10), Indiana (1-11), Ole Miss (2-10), Toledo (MAC school).

I don't think this is a huge deal overall, and it really depends on how much weight you put into the recruiting services, but people on here are far too willing to simply chalk it up to lack of wins and losses. There are plenty of programs that have been able to recruit well in spite of limited on-field success. Kill came in with a reputation for not being a great salesmen; this shouldn't be shocking to anyone.
 



Gopher Gold said:
Exactly. What do people expect? I'd say a 61st ranked class isn't too shabby considering everything.
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Yeah, I'm having a hard time getting worked up about the apparent lack of big names in this class. Selling kids on a program turnaround is difficult enough when you're not a first-year coach no one's heard of at a school coming off back-to-back dreadful seasons. I expect signs of progress in the W-L record next year. Maybe I'll get worried if the next class is equally underwhelming.
 

Gopherprof said:
I'm not really taking a position on the star argument, but this is making faulty excuses for a few reasons:

1) It's traditionally the case that a coach's best chance at recruiting is in his first year when there is still some buzz/optimism. You can sell guys that you were just hired and therefore will be there for a while and you're going to turn things around, blah blah blah. Take Timmy B's first class, for example.

2) Numerous studies have shown that, by itself, recent winning % isn't as important to recruits as location, size of fan base, ability of program to place players in the NFL, program prestige, and other factors. Now, none of those things particularly benefit Minnesota, but that's a systemic problem, not a one-year problem.

3) Even if you disregard the previous two points, 61 is still below Maryland (2-10), Colorado (3-10), Indiana (1-11), Ole Miss (2-10), Toledo (MAC school).

I don't think this is a huge deal overall, and it really depends on how much weight you put into the recruiting services, but people on here are far too willing to simply chalk it up to lack of wins and losses. There are plenty of programs that have been able to recruit well in spite of limited on-field success. Kill came in with a reputation for not being a great salesmen; this shouldn't be shocking to anyone.
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Those schools though are all in areas that in general, have more talent (not Colorado, but the others). My point about the wins and losses if we aren't a school most recruits will think of as a football school and not winning many games does not help us get more publicity.
 

zambam said:
Those schools though are all in areas that in general, have more talent (not Colorado, but the others). My point about the wins and losses if we aren't a school most recruits will think of as a football school and not winning many games does not help us get more publicity.
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Wait - are you saying Colorado does not have talent??
 

We had our best recruiting class in the Rivals era, coming off a ONE WIN SEASON. How can people forget this? The losing is not (by itself) an excuse to bring in a class ranked at/near the bottom of the Big Ten.
 



EG#9 said:
We had our best recruiting class in the Rivals era, coming off a ONE WIN SEASON. How can people forget this? The losing is not (by itself) an excuse to bring in a class ranked at/near the bottom of the Big Ten.
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Can't disagree with ^that^
 


EG#9 said:
We had our best recruiting class in the Rivals era, coming off a ONE WIN SEASON. How can people forget this? The losing is not (by itself) an excuse to bring in a class ranked at/near the bottom of the Big Ten.
Click to expand...

And where did that class get us?
 

EG#9 said:
We had our best recruiting class in the Rivals era, coming off a ONE WIN SEASON. How can people forget this? The losing is not (by itself) an excuse to bring in a class ranked at/near the bottom of the Big Ten.
Click to expand...

Like many, I was very excited about what Brewster did with recruiting the first year or two. The problem was many of those guys didn't stay long or never got into school to begin with. That's part of the reason we're in this mess right now.

I may be wrong, but I think Kill could have recruited a few more "high star" guys if he really wanted, but his strategy seems to be to get a bunch of guys who a) fit the system and b) aren't academic risks. If he takes a lot of chances and many don't pan out, then we're right back in this mess where we're so thin at certain positions.

Do recruiting rankings generally matter? Sure, but I bet retention plays a big part in success as well. We'll just have to see if this strategy works.
 

EG#9 said:
We had our best recruiting class in the Rivals era, coming off a ONE WIN SEASON. How can people forget this? The losing is not (by itself) an excuse to bring in a class ranked at/near the bottom of the Big Ten.
Click to expand...

I know I can't forget how they played.
 


A lot of Brewster's highly rated class never made it to the field.

I'm excited about the players Kill has recruited. I think it makes for an optimistic future. We have almost all the best high school players from Minnesota. That has not happened very often.

I think the out of state players we have targeted are "finds" through connections from a staff who have built relationships with out of state coaches, in addition, by staying together over time and being genuine.

We also have a goal of 10 walk-ons. We seem on our way to be in the neighborhood of achieving that. and they are impressive candidates. When was the effort put in to do that in the last 40 years?

We won't know but I'm all in at the moment. ha
I like our class and our plan.
 

GoldenRose said:
And where did that class get us?
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The point wasn't that you can only win with highly ranked recruiting classes or that they are a surefire way to win games. What was being pointed out is that it is possible to sign highly rated players coming off a poor season.
 

O the 2008 class.... Proof that recruiting rankings do not mean a thing. That was possibly the highest ranked class we have ever had, yet it is also the class that is the root cause of most of our problems right. I.e lack of depth, especially with upperclassmen, academics (which thankfully looked to have cleared up), and drop outs. I laugh at the stupidity of people who say that we should try to model our recruiting style after that season. The only reason we were highly ranked was because we took a bunch of academically high risk players that other schools did not want to gamble on. Most of them ended up flaming out and we ended up in the situation we are in right now because of it. WE DO NOT NEED 5 STAR PLAYERS TO WIN GAMES... Please people get that through your heads. Accept, and even embrace the three stars, let Kill work his magic and good things will happen.
 


gophergeek said:
O the 2008 class.... Proof that recruiting rankings do not mean a thing. That was possibly the highest ranked class we have ever had, yet it is also the class that is the root cause of most of our problems right. I.e lack of depth, especially with upperclassmen, academics (which thankfully looked to have cleared up), and drop outs. I laugh at the stupidity of people who say that we should try to model our recruiting style after that season. The only reason we were highly ranked was because we took a bunch of academically high risk players that other schools did not want to gamble on. Most of them ended up flaming out and we ended up in the situation we are in right now because of it. WE DO NOT NEED 5 STAR PLAYERS TO WIN GAMES... Please people get that through your heads. Accept, and even embrace the three stars, let Kill work his magic and good things will happen.
Click to expand...

While we lost a lot of players to attrition from that class, it isn't that class that was the problem. It was the classes before and immediately following that class.

First off, the class before the 08 class was dreadful, so the 08 class had to be essentially split in 1/2 (RS and Non-RS). That's fine if you continue recruiting, but Brew's subsequent classes were awful.

The 2008 Class:
11 players who were or/are multiple year starters (non-JuCo)
3 impact JuCo

In comparison:
The 2009 class:
10/20 guys are still on the roster
Hageman and Ed Olson have been about the only real impact guys
Garin/KGM/Jacques/M.Carter have been the other players giving depth
Wills is the only JuCo that did anything
This class gave us 8 guys who contributed.
 


gophergeek said:
O the 2008 class.... Proof that recruiting rankings do not mean a thing. That was possibly the highest ranked class we have ever had, yet it is also the class that is the root cause of most of our problems right. I.e lack of depth, especially with upperclassmen, academics (which thankfully looked to have cleared up), and drop outs. I laugh at the stupidity of people who say that we should try to model our recruiting style after that season. The only reason we were highly ranked was because we took a bunch of academically high risk players that other schools did not want to gamble on. Most of them ended up flaming out and we ended up in the situation we are in right now because of it. WE DO NOT NEED 5 STAR PLAYERS TO WIN GAMES... Please people get that through your heads. Accept, and even embrace the three stars, let Kill work his magic and good things will happen.
Click to expand...

I agree with most everything you say, except for the bolded. There was a bunch of talent in that class, so I think it was rated fairly well. Too many of them never made it to school (Vincent Hill) didn't stay very long (Tim Dandridge, Sam Maresh, Kevin Whaley, Brodrick Smith, Tramaine Brock) or haven't been able to stay healthy (Xzavion Brandon, Brandon Green).
 

I guess one more time for the idiots here is the 2008 class: http://rivals.yahoo.com/minnesota/football/recruiting/commitments/2008

It includes 2 players currently on NFL practice squads in Cedric McKinley and Traye Simmons and another player who has bounced around several practice squads in Simoni Lawrence. It includes one current NFL player in Tramaine Brock. All 4 of these guys started on "bowl" teams for Minnesota. The same types of bowls (and the same type of record) as we've had for years at Minnesota. That class also included a number of other starting players including MarQueis Gray who has been the MVP of the past two Iowa games and one of the best athletes we've had on campus. Anybody complain about Da'Jon McKnight at WR? How about Troy Stoudermire as KR/DB? Eric Lair was a good player at TE until last years system change and Brandon Kirksey has been a solid 4 year DT. Sam Maresh might not have worked out on the field due to illness, but if you remember back to when he committed it was a huge deal because the Gophers had not been landing the top Minnesota kids for years. There was some bad luck with injuries/illness and transfers, but if we put 4 recruiting classes together that had the type of offers/ratings that this class had, we'd likely be in great shape.

It's certainly valid to say that the 2008 class has not lived up to being a top 20 in the nation class, but I can't find a better class that has committed to Minnesota in terms of talent. It's entirely possible that 6 or 7 of those kids could end up playing in an NFL game.

The ability of the 2008 class was not what I posted about initially (it's just comical how some of you have no idea what you are talking about), but the fact that we outrecruited name schools for highly regarded recruits coming off a one win season. Losing, by itself, is not a valid excuse for recruiting against Western Michigan instead of other BCS schools. This class could turn out great, and I hope it does, but if you told me would have a class with the offers/ratings of 2008 instead, I'd hope everyone would be smart enough to jump on it.
 

Good write up EG.

For some strange reason, the 2008 class is seen as the reason for Brew's ultimate failure. If every one of our classes was as good as the 2008 class, we'd be sitting pretty...
Rallis - 3 yr starter next year
Cooper - 3 yr starter next year
Gray - 3 year starter next year
Stoud - 3/4 year starter next year
McKnight - 3 year starter (will probably be on an NFL roster next season)
Brock - NFL
Simmons - NFL practice squad
C. McKinley - NFL practice squad
Kirksey - 2 year starter
Lawrence - NFL practice squad
Tinsley - 2 year starter and our best defensive player last season (chance at playing somewhere at the next level)
D.L. Wilhite - 2/3 year starter

I'm kind of just repeating what EG said and what I said earlier, but if we got that kind of talent from every class, we'd be good.
 

Adding on

Bob_Loblaw said:
Good write up EG.

For some strange reason, the 2008 class is seen as the reason for Brew's ultimate failure. If every one of our classes was as good as the 2008 class, we'd be sitting pretty...
Rallis - 3 yr starter next year
Cooper - 3 yr starter next year
Gray - 3 year starter next year
Stoud - 3/4 year starter next year
McKnight - 3 year starter (will probably be on an NFL roster next season)
Brock - NFL
Simmons - NFL practice squad
C. McKinley - NFL practice squad
Kirksey - 2 year starter
Lawrence - NFL practice squad
Tinsley - 2 year starter and our best defensive player last season (chance at playing somewhere at the next level)
D.L. Wilhite - 2/3 year starter

I'm kind of just repeating what EG said and what I said earlier, but if we got that kind of talent from every class, we'd be good.
Click to expand...

If we continued to have a class like 08, some of these guys would have been potential backups to better incoming talent. Remember, it is possible with 2 similar ranked classes to have some new guys out perform upperclassmen.
 

At some point bringing in some star talent is very important especially if you have a great coach. Brewster was a good recruiter but he was not a good coach and his rotating of Coordinators didnt help. Glen Mason was great at getting the most out of lower ranked recruits but he couldnt get over the top because he struggled to bring in top tier athletes to coach up.

At some point you have to have a little bit of both you need top level athletes and you need to coach them up.
 

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