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What positions will make or break this class?

Duff Man

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For me, I am paying most attention to RB, OL, and LB.

RB because there are several top recruits at that position (notably Ballage and Enwere), OL because it could go a long way in telling how we do in-state, and LB because it is another position with good athletes that we have interest in (Dakota Allen, Jordan Perez, Tyler Cook).

QB is not on my list because I think the lack of can't miss prospects means the QB boards vary widely from team to team. I am pretty confident the coaches will find a QB that adds athleticism to the group regardless.

DB could also be on the list, but with it being a loaded year in both CA and TX, along with a coaching staff that puts emphasis on the position, we should continue to upgrade the talent back there without an incredible recruiting effort.
 
I guess I don't see us recruiting to fill immediate needs. We need more talent everywhere.

Unless we seriously outperform expectations, it will be difficult to get a highly rated class. So how will we judge this class? Down the road I guess.

Early results are promising:
Reid and Gillam were two guys who came here with the new staff, amongst widespread groans on the various boards. All they did this spring is show they could end up starting very soon in their CU careers.
 
I should be a little more clear here. My post is not about recruiting to fill immediate needs or even talking about "biggest" needs. It is about realizing that recruiting is both a science and an art. It was mostly in response to a Big Bang post in the Greg Gaines thread about him being MacIntyre's first big loss. Not picking on Big Bang in this instance either because everyone (including me) tends to get a little too worked up when certain recruits choose other schools.

Of course we need help everywhere, but we can help ourselves in some areas more than others. For example, if the 3rd running back on the board is much higher on your overall board than your 2nd wide receiver, you should target the 3rd running back instead of being consumed by strict numbers at positions. It generally goes hand in hand with the overall strength of that position in a given year. Obviously there is a limit to this line of thinking as well. The Hawkins 2007 offensive line class and Embree 2012 defensive line class are good examples of trying to do too much at one position group in a single class. We signed eight defensive linemen in that class. It was obviously a need, but at what price? That same class produced an incredible number of both elite and very good offensive line prospects out west, yet we mostly struck out. The signing day spin became it was not a big need, but that seems pretty silly now.

I always pay attention to who gets offered early by a staff. It is particularly useful with MacIntyre's staff since they have been very deliberate in offering players. Early offers can give you a good feel for how they view certain positions.

With running back, the new staff is offering some big guys. Kalen Ballage, Royce Freeman, and Vic Enwere. Not hard to see the coaches want at least one big back in this class and possibly two. So while it may not break the class if we miss out on any of the three, it certainly could help make a good class if we land one or two of those guys.

With offensive line, the coaches have offered four in-state offensive linemen (Dalton Risner, Sam Jones, Isaac Miller, and Isaiah Holland) and had Alec Ruth visit on Junior Day. All five have BCS offers, which is similar to the 2012 class where four in-state offensive linemen left the state. If the new coaching staff strikes out in much the same manner as Embree's staff did in 2012, it is going to be hard to say that the new coaches accomplished two important goals for this recruiting class: landing top choices and making headway with in-state recruiting.

With linebacker, there are ten reported offers out there, half of them in Texas. Plus you add in guys like Ballage/Enwere who may eventually end up at that position. It is pretty clear the new coaches want to add length (started with Markeis Reid) and to find that elusive traditional MLB prospect. If we land some of these early offers, it could be a good sign going forward for our efforts in Texas, as well as the added bonus of getting players who can play early (we do need to be finding some of these players in every class).

Contrast those three positions to quarterback for this class. It is becoming pretty clear that MacIntyre/Lindgren are looking to add an athletic quarterback for this class. They have been pretty stingy with offers, but have clearly targeted players like Darius Lee-Campbell, Cade Apsay, Manny Wilkins, and Marcus McMaryion. When Morgan Mahalak committed to Oregon, I posted it was hard to know where he fit on the quarterback recruiting board. He may have been at the top or he may have been placed squarely in a jumbled mix with several other players. If you look at his offers (particularly Oregon), it probably seems like a big loss, but it may not be if the coaches land one of the other players mentioned above. If the coaches offer Cade Apsay in early June and he accepts, do I really care whether we missed out on Mahalak or not? Not really.

Overall, just trying to add a little bit of nuance to the recruiting board instead of simply looking at star ratings, offers, etc.:wink2:
 
For me, getting commits from some of the best in-state guys who the coaches like might offer the positive, long-term effect the team needs to get the ball rolling. Of course, I'd prefer whatever highly rated kids we can get from anywhere, for the same basic reasons. Credibility with future prospects, so others don't laugh at their choosing CU, is probably more important than specific position needs in the upcoming class, in my eyes. Also, balancing the classes would be nice, since it seems like a long time since graduation has not left us with gaping holes to fill with inexperienced, unable, or outclassed players. Nice non-answer, eh?
 
Great post, Duff.

One thing I question is the in-state offensive lineman stance. Obviously the state produces more quality in-state lineman than any other position. I question though, if we land similar level players, or players that fit better to scheme (or whatever you want to call it) out out of state, does it really make a difference? At this point CU is just trying to be relevant in the whole landscape of college football. I understand the importance of landing in-state recruits, but if we miss out on those four you mention and recruit the same talent level (say in Texas/California), does it really hurt us in the long run? CU starts winning and I truly believe the 1-5 rated in-state recruits start committing. We've seen it before.

Either way, this is the kind of posts that are great on Allbuffs. Good discussion
 
I do think it matters, pate. Not saying we consistently need to land every single in-state OL we offer, but we need to start landing some. Getting completely shut out in-state probably does not bode well for efforts out of state anyway.
 
Great post, Duff.

One thing I question is the in-state offensive lineman stance. Obviously the state produces more quality in-state lineman than any other position. I question though, if we land similar level players, or players that fit better to scheme (or whatever you want to call it) out out of state, does it really make a difference? At this point CU is just trying to be relevant in the whole landscape of college football. I understand the importance of landing in-state recruits, but if we miss out on those four you mention and recruit the same talent level (say in Texas/California), does it really hurt us in the long run? CU starts winning and I truly believe the 1-5 rated in-state recruits start committing. We've seen it before.

Either way, this is the kind of posts that are great on Allbuffs. Good discussion

I don't find it very likely that we'd fill our 2014 OL class entirely with out of state recruits ranked higher than the top 6-7 in Colorado. Are national recruits with similar rankings (meaning multiple large school offers) going to be high on leaving their home state for a program with our recent history of futility? What we can sell to the local recruits is that it's close to home, family can see their games, and maybe they have best friends/girlfriends from high school who will be attending CU or somewhere nearby for their college years. In recent years if we struck out on local OL prospects we filled the majority of that need (really at every position) with out of state players who chose CU because it was one of the few power conference teams that extended them an offer. Therefore if we end up with non-Colorado offensive lineman in this class I will wager that we settled for a plan B rather than got something better, that is until I see if this staff can develop an unheralded recruit better than the last few staffs have.
 
I don't find it very likely that we'd fill our 2014 OL class entirely with out of state recruits ranked higher than the top 6-7 in Colorado. Are national recruits with similar rankings (meaning multiple large school offers) going to be high on leaving their home state for a program with our recent history of futility? What we can sell to the local recruits is that it's close to home, family can see their games, and maybe they have best friends/girlfriends from high school who will be attending CU or somewhere nearby for their college years. In recent years if we struck out on local OL prospects we filled the majority of that need (really at every position) with out of state players who chose CU because it was one of the few power conference teams that extended them an offer. Therefore if we end up with non-Colorado offensive lineman in this class I will wager that we settled for a plan B rather than got something better, that is until I see if this staff can develop an unheralded recruit better than the last few staffs have.
That is something we will find out with the new staff. Would you say we struck out on in-state lineman last year? It was a need and we signed one in-stater (alot of that was due to our staff). I like this staffs approach to recruiting but I believe it will take longer to convince in-state recruits about CU rebuilding than out of state. JMO
 
Duff - great post above, especially since I didn't understand the OP.

It's good discussion material. I happen to think Colorado kids view CU more dismally than Cali and AZ kids do.
I actually see AZ kids wanting to attend CO schools and CO kids wanting to attend AZ schools, often for the same reason: Improved climate!

From what I can tell, none of the Colorado kids view CU as a dream school. They are looking for something else at the BCS level. That's always true when you are a JR. Going away is so cool. As you become a SR, reality sometimes sets in. Local girlfriends probably end up swaying more kids than not.

So we need more local girlfriends. Solved.

Seriously, the O-Line is in serious need of some recruits. It's been thin lately. There looks to be 4-6 BCS level kids here this year. We need 2 at min.
 
The state of Colorado is never going to produce enough top recruits that we can compete without going into talent pools like California and Texas. At the same time if we are going to have a consistently strong program we have to put ourselves in a position were we are getting a significant number of the best players from in state.

We will never get all of them. The state has to many kids who's families came here with ties to other states or coaches with strong ties to other places or kids who simply want to go "someplace else" to go to college. That said when the program has been good it has had a strong core of local kids added to the out of state kids.

Part of the reason for this importance is proximity, the local kids should be easier to recruit since they can come visit and hang around becoming familiar and comfortable with the school and they get to stay close to their families and friends. The other is that unless we become really good again we will almost always be a second choice or lower for the kids in other states who will be waiting for offers from their home state schools or higher profile (winning) schools in other states.

At this point we are so low talentwise that we should put quality ahead of position in priority but we do also have to field a team so we can't ingnore certain positions because they are harder to recruit. We also have to consider certain kids just to re-open doors into certain schools and areas that prior coaching staffs have managed to close on us through indifference, arrogance, or worse.
 
If Jack Harris plays himself into draftable status, that would be nice. Not a big stretch either. We actually can sell OL on guys getting into the NFL.

More personally, as a Colorado kid myself, I love seeing local guys make it big.
 
Based on who HCMM has been offering, it looks to me that the priority for this class is to add a few LBs that can fly around. I think LB play is the foundation of the new defense.
 
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