keylime_5;1483888; said:
Well this is gonna be a smaller class, and it's just plain bad luck when the two guys who are probably the two best prospects in Ohio this year (Hicks and Turner) might not be in our class because Hicks is from the south and might go to childhood favorite Texas, and Turner might have some off-field issues that get his schollie pulled allegedly. That and the fact that this isn't the most loaded Ohio crop we've had in the past few years could hurt us. But on the brightside we could pull a national top 10 player in Joyner, we have a good shot at Hicks, Turner's schollie is still good and he could turn things around and be a part of this class, and our chances at James and Ware are pretty good as well I'd think. I definitely agree the potential is there for this to be a down year, but losing guys like Brunetti, Welch, Hendrix maybe, and Gholston who we probably didn't have much stake in in the first place (aside from Hendrix) isn't enough just yet to make that the case. If Tressel can pull in Joyner, Hicks, and if we can keep Turner then this will be another very good class. Flipside it could be another 2007 if we don't get any of those 3.
I agree, just cause for concern. These guys may not end up being a big deal but they very well could be imo because, as I said, many might have been the option B (Brunetti, Gholston) or option A's (Welch, Montana, Hendrix). Many times the difference between option A and option B is slight...but once we get into option C and D, then I think you start seeing the falloff. Agreed on the in state recruiting, it just may be partially bad luck. If we miss Hicks, probably not our fault. Same with Turner. However, I think James and Ware should be feasible and both would be huge pickups. I personally think the top notch talent is as good as it's been in awhile top 5 (Hicks, Turner, Norwell, James, Ware) but the depth may not be there, though I think you have some decent talent in the 6-15 range (Donnal, Baldwin, Williams, Welch, Hendrix, etc.).
Cinfali;1483923; said:
I agree that this class has been a head-scratcher so far. I am not that worried, more like bored about the lack of news, but I would like to list some things that are a little weird for me :
- I know that Tressel has a soft-sell approach but other than Fiedorowicz and perhaps Hicks, we do not get any "Ohio State is recruiting me hard' type of updates from recruits.
It seems like we have offered some guys and did not follow through. A guy like Khairi Fortt, we would have a decent shot and stopped recruiting him. Early offers like Corey Brown, Seantrel Henderson etc. Will those guys even visit our campus?
-Who we did not offer. Guys like Leifheit, Prater, Cooper, Gardner, etc. I think these guys (not sure about Prater) claimed they grew up rooting for Buckeyes and they have pretty good offer sheets. Perhaps coaches do not think they fit our system and I can understand that but I would be pretty [censored]ed off if we offer late in the process when we have no chance.
That brings me to Gholston. I know that this is probably far-fetched and a more likely explanation for his late offer is the Turner situation but that offer seemed like a courtesy offer to me like the one we sent to Norman last year. Everybody knew we had no shot that late in the game like Norman last year, so why the offer? It is almost like we are trying to legitimize MSU's recruiting. It is perhaps an enemy of my enemy thing, like Woody Hayes did with Notre Dame.
One last observation, it seems that only two recruits (right now) in midwest/Big 10 territory excluding Ohio we might land is Rod Smith and Chad Hagan. Perhaps Luke Graham if we offer? Still, that is pretty underwhelming for me.
Great post. I don't understand even offering Gholston when his recruitment was pretty much over. However, I don't think we had a shot with Fortt personally. Henderson and Brown...both guys we have a legit shot at that I hope we aggressively pursue. If we pull off even one, great pickup. Seems we are throwing out some token offers like Luc, Robey, Fort, etc. this year while guys like Leifheit, Prater, etc. are without offers.
jwinslow;1483924; said:
While there might be a number of misses like 2007, OSU is going to have to whiff on Joyner, Smith, Hicks, Ware, Anderson and a few others to make the classes comparable. I really don't see them missing that many.
We got it from Montana.
Agreed to an extent...'07 was such a meltdown because of silent verbals or expected verbals (Brent, Martin, Wright, Barksdale, OT from NJ, etc.). I think we might have just as many misses on first or second round offers, but we just may know we are going to miss them in advance, rather than an AA game meltdown (which I prefer). We aren't whiffing on Anderson, Smith, or Bryant but I could see us whiffing on Joyner, Hicks, Ware, James, Hendrix, Henderson (not sure if that's considered a whiff), etc.
