Orange Carpet Weekend

I'm not going to pee my pants over recruiting rankings in June. If one thinks we're screwed because "Butch," fair point. Let's not manufacture drama, though.

 

Yeah, I hate to be the guy defending him, but there were some guys taken yesterday that are absolutely going to be good and rise in the rankings.

 

So are Fant, Bumphus and Jackson. I understand Fant because of the injury last year, but not the other two, aside from Bumphus just playing in the backwoods

 

Should be happy either way.

 

Getting Gray, Fant, Bumphus, Taylor, and Jackson from the midstate is big.

There are also the occasions where a 3 star really is higher on the board than some 4 stars, which I believe is the case with the RB.

Lawson has huge upside and of all the commits seems most likely for a bump.

Of course, there will be some trimming.

 

Govols nailed it, if Bielema likes him he's probably good

 

Definitely.

 

This is it right here. If we win like we should (make the SECCG game and put ourselves in the playoff discussion), we'll have no problem signing a great class. It really is that simple.

Lose to UF, A&M, Uga, and Bama and his recruiting ability has officially sunk.

 

Tre Smith, Justin Foster, DeAngelo Gibbs, Ty Chandler, Cam Akers, the Gaddy twins, Tee Higgins and Jordan Williams are all guys Tennessee has a legit shot with.

Tennessee needs to win the East to get a lot of them, though. Gibbs and Williams will be Vols barring a catastrophic season

 

Hopefully a lot of these guys get recruited over. That's all I can say.

 

I don't think I'm manufacturing anything. Recruiting has had a huge dropoff. Yesterday was proof. Most of those guys don't have committable offers this time any of the last three years. Something is clearly worse on the recruiting front.

 

Thanks Sab...

 

Butch has consistently done that for 3 years. He's taken some head scratchers in the summer that aren't a part of the class on signing day.

 

This. There are plenty of positives from Saturday.

The instate commits are all highly recruited. Don't forget Gray added 6 days earlier. Taylor gives us two top recruits for '18.

We've also climbed into the top 10. I know the numbers, but we can still sell a top 10 class with limited spots now.

 

First, I don't follow recruiting closely enough to know my ass from a hole in the ground, and second, I have no reason to doubt your assessment, whatsoever - and really hope that you're right and I'm wrong.

But, even if true....the optimism of a bunch of 3 stars (and that's all this ultimately is, isn't it?) seems to be founded on the followih beliefs that,

1. Butch has not only been so efficient / lucky / possesses such a keen eye for talent as to be first in uncovering and gaining the commitment of these genuine "diamonds in the rough", and

2. That he has done so, even when most others have failed to similarly see and/or seemed to have this far completely missed them, including both the recruiting services and so many other and comparable schools who we'll be competing against both on the recruiting trail and the field, such as the likes of UF, UGA, etc., and

3. That it's an optimum strategy for Butch to be spending any significant time looking for / gaining the commitments of these alleged 3-star-studs-in-the-making, while the other and comparable schools are likely investing the same time / attention on fostering relationships with those other and (much?) more highly-rated recruits who generally have earned both a more well and widely consensus as to their higher and (far?) more certain ceiling/floor than the lesser known / lower rated recruits that Butch seems to be content in pursuing, instead.

I'm not willing to make that bet. I don't begrudge anyone who is, but I am not, because it seems like folly. Maybe even tomfoolery, threatening full-blown shenanigans. It also sounds eerily familiar to the "high character" apologia of Dooley's many failed classes, so maybe I'm just being gun-shy, and am allowing my decades-long negativism to color my view.

But if anyone thinks that Butch Jones (read that again: Butch. Jones.) is capable of being competitive - either at all, or with any consistency - with BAMA, UGA, UF, et al, etc., by turning 3-stars into gaggles of 5-stars, well, good luck with that. Hopefully, everyone knows better, even if they don't like or cannot admit it, even to themsleves.

Frankly, this seems like our bragging about being the best fisherman in a smaller and less-crowded pond with few (if any) trophy fish, and ignoring the fact that there are a good many and important reasons why so many others skip it for larger waters....typically, it's because the potential for modest returns aren't worth the sizable and finite investment of time / energy / resources.

This isn't "at" you, E, at all, but just to the general subject, itself. No harm intended.

 

Let me try the fishing analogy:

The day has just started. He's got some nice looking fish in the boat but he's not sure about their weight so he's keeping in the live well for now. It's only 4 AM so he's got several more hours of fishing before he has to figure out which ones to keep towards the daily limit. And he actually knows where to get on top of some very large fish, so he's quite certain some of these fish are going to be put back already. To quit fishing now simply because he isn't pulling Jayvol-loads of walleye in the first few minutes would be overreacting.

 

But Paawwlll we don't want no walleye we want largemouths and channel cats.

 

Your analogy completely shatters at the point where you expect me to have any understanding as to what it feels like or entails to catch a fish, to place it in a live-well, or to have any reasonable hope of possibly catching other fish.

Know your audience, IP. Has Trump taught you nothing?

 

My understanding is that you are the anti-Jonah.

 

Just got another 3* DT.

The offer list is pretty ridiculous (in a good way), though.