Apparently our collective fan recruiting psyche has been bruised with how our class finished as there have been many panicked or very concerned comments about that finish and the huge focus on zero commits so far. Radiant's comment from another thread: "Beginning to think Claeys' brutal closing rate last Feb at NLI day a red flag and not an anomaly" inspired me to review the "finish". So should we be concerned about level of recruiting based upon the evidence so far? I don't think so. A couple of summary points first:
1. Too much focus on Claeys as the recruiter when we know that recruiting success is a function of the entire staff's abilities.
2. We know this staff can identify talent, one of the best in the country at finding talented players that have been essentially overlooked. Any criticisms in this area have been somewhat alleviated with the two new coaches replacing Limegrover and Zebrowski.
3. We as fans tend to overrate the timing of the commits and the positive and negative "momentum" or lack thereof. Instead of focusing on the finished product and how good the class is, our "feel" for the finish colors our judgment.
To be fair, I think you have to review the last couple months of the cycle, the battles we won and lost for recruits, and consider the Gophers circumstances (poor finish on the field, uncertainties in the coaching situation (head coach and then assistants not yet named). Here is how I break it down:
Big Gets (should win these battles some of the time):
1. Durr - fought to the end with V. Tech, and N. Carolina for a southern recruit
2. G. Wright- fought off an offer from TCU who had great back to back seasons
3. Calhoun- picked us over SEC Miss. St. as a southern recruit*
*both o-line recruits picked us with an uncertain situation with Limegrover gone
Other Late Recruiting Wins (should win these battles most of the time):
4. McCrary - with offer from Colorado St. (should win that most times)
5. M. Jackson - picked us over Iowa St. and S. Miss.
6. Green - tough to know who got in the picture late after Oregon situation, but still a good get a high rated qb
7. Devers - picked us over UCF as a Florida kid
8. D. Williams - had Tulane offer and others trying to get in late
Long Shots (major coup if we landed any of these under circumstances):
1. Cushenberry - late LSU offer sealed the loss, but we were in the mix with S. Carolina and Miss St.
2. Castillo - trying to pull him away from verbal of home state Missouri is a long shot, but we were close
3. Thomas - actually had won the battle over N.Carolina and S. Carolina and many other options, but literally last minute Auburn offer was a tough near miss.
Tough To Pull Southern Recruits North if they (or Mom) want to stay home:
4. Byrd- in the mix, but it was clear that he wanted to stay south and committed to W. Forest
5. Lindsey - sounded like a verbal, but mom convinced otherwise and committed to Memphis
Tough Losses:
6. Watts - the one late loss that really hurt as he wasn't necessarily a long shot and it wasn't a location issue. We should be able to win a reasonable portion of battles against Indiana and Pittsburgh
Wild Card:
7. Snelson - not sure even how to characterize this one.
So in summary (and Wren you better read this extremely long post), we actually won more of the fights in the last couple months and when you consider the long shots and the recruits that were likely never to leave the south . . . it's tough for me to believe it is any evidence of Claeys or his staff showing an inability to recruit. Maybe it would have been better if guys like Coughlin, Martin, Howard, Schlueter had waited to firm up until the end, so we would have felt better about how the class finished.
Edited- to take out Battle as we didn't "lose" him to another team
1. Too much focus on Claeys as the recruiter when we know that recruiting success is a function of the entire staff's abilities.
2. We know this staff can identify talent, one of the best in the country at finding talented players that have been essentially overlooked. Any criticisms in this area have been somewhat alleviated with the two new coaches replacing Limegrover and Zebrowski.
3. We as fans tend to overrate the timing of the commits and the positive and negative "momentum" or lack thereof. Instead of focusing on the finished product and how good the class is, our "feel" for the finish colors our judgment.
To be fair, I think you have to review the last couple months of the cycle, the battles we won and lost for recruits, and consider the Gophers circumstances (poor finish on the field, uncertainties in the coaching situation (head coach and then assistants not yet named). Here is how I break it down:
Big Gets (should win these battles some of the time):
1. Durr - fought to the end with V. Tech, and N. Carolina for a southern recruit
2. G. Wright- fought off an offer from TCU who had great back to back seasons
3. Calhoun- picked us over SEC Miss. St. as a southern recruit*
*both o-line recruits picked us with an uncertain situation with Limegrover gone
Other Late Recruiting Wins (should win these battles most of the time):
4. McCrary - with offer from Colorado St. (should win that most times)
5. M. Jackson - picked us over Iowa St. and S. Miss.
6. Green - tough to know who got in the picture late after Oregon situation, but still a good get a high rated qb
7. Devers - picked us over UCF as a Florida kid
8. D. Williams - had Tulane offer and others trying to get in late
Long Shots (major coup if we landed any of these under circumstances):
1. Cushenberry - late LSU offer sealed the loss, but we were in the mix with S. Carolina and Miss St.
2. Castillo - trying to pull him away from verbal of home state Missouri is a long shot, but we were close
3. Thomas - actually had won the battle over N.Carolina and S. Carolina and many other options, but literally last minute Auburn offer was a tough near miss.
Tough To Pull Southern Recruits North if they (or Mom) want to stay home:
4. Byrd- in the mix, but it was clear that he wanted to stay south and committed to W. Forest
5. Lindsey - sounded like a verbal, but mom convinced otherwise and committed to Memphis
Tough Losses:
6. Watts - the one late loss that really hurt as he wasn't necessarily a long shot and it wasn't a location issue. We should be able to win a reasonable portion of battles against Indiana and Pittsburgh
Wild Card:
7. Snelson - not sure even how to characterize this one.
So in summary (and Wren you better read this extremely long post), we actually won more of the fights in the last couple months and when you consider the long shots and the recruits that were likely never to leave the south . . . it's tough for me to believe it is any evidence of Claeys or his staff showing an inability to recruit. Maybe it would have been better if guys like Coughlin, Martin, Howard, Schlueter had waited to firm up until the end, so we would have felt better about how the class finished.
Edited- to take out Battle as we didn't "lose" him to another team
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