2008 Recruiting Wars

[Cajun Express]

_ You all have good points to make in this and I'm not sure in reality what exactly happens between coaches and recruits. There's so much we don't know. As fans, we see the results of the process, not the process. I can understand what IHateLaState is saying, that we should be competing against other respectable, D-1 programs for most of our commitments. You can't believe (not directed at anyone specific) that out of 24 recuits, most of these are the under-the-radar type. Some sure, but not most. You can't have those odds and expect to win. I believe for the program to grow and improve, at some point, your program should get recruits it really doesn't deserve. This is where the coaches make or break the program. This is where the recruit sees something in the coaches, not just the facilities, that make them want to play for them. I also don't think all of a sudden we are going to see 4 and 5 star athletes on our list. But, we should see several guys that are on the scope of other programs, dare I say some 3's and a sprinkling of 4's ( I know these ratings aren't that accurate, lets not divert the discussion that direction). This is a slow process, it takes winning to fully push this train at full speed and we aren't winning enough. That's another item, we need to win games consistently that we are suppose to win and then win some that we aren't. Just my 2 cents.

Geaux UL! _

I am in total agreement with you. If your coach cannot up star his share of players he will be forced to out coach those who do, and that makes for long odds. To those who are going to go ballistic about stars, they for the most part a measure of who is recruiting the young man. The stars are not something that a football analyst spent several hours pouring over an individual's performances to come up with. I bet the typical player under four stars is given about two to three minutes of evaluation.

[CajunT]

_ You are 100% correct. I am NOT down on Gauthier.. I am down on the quality of athletes that we seem to be chasing. And I stand by it until I see something different. Now don't start questioning my loyalty.. For the record.. AGAIN. Season tickets to Football, basketball, baseball and this year softball.. Other than softball we are talking at least 20 years of those Season Tickets. I am just engagin in conversation and voicing a concern as a Cajun Fan..

We alway seem to be satisfied with mediocre result around here. I voiced during the season my displeasure at being happy with 6-5 and middle of the road in the worst conference in Americal. I dont look at the videos that some of you seem to do. I don;t read any recuriting websites. I have my own method. I look at who the recruit chose us over. If all we are beating is SE La and Nichols then I have a problem. We cannot compete if that is the level of recruit we are getting. Soemone stated that it is early.. and I am hoping there are some bigger fish ready to hit the pan.. I sincerely hope so..
Someone sldo stated that all we can do is offer if we get turned down well we just move on.. Thats like saying well all we can do is tee it up.. If we lose we just move on.. NO.... dang-it we have to EXPECT to do better around here. If this coaching staff cant get better recruits we wont win. If we dont win they have to be gone...
Once again... Comeon Bustle... reach higher... and grab a few............ _

No one has questioned your loyalty my friend. What I'm trying to tell you is that this staff has not had a problem recruiting athletes on the offensive side of the football. Our problem has been on the defensive side of the football, and that is were the improvement is needed. But some of your comments lead me to believe that you unrealistic if you think we are going to go head to head with BCS programs for recruits. A list that contains 3-star or 4-star recruits and list your program as one of the schools of interest is nice to look at, but its not accurate. Athletes fill out questioners for Rivals and Scout, listing their programs of interest or those that have sent letters. We offered athletes that are committed to BCS programs, but you won't see them on the list. The site publishers never list smaller programs that offered their athletes, they don't want subscribers to see that. What matters is if the athlete will take an official visit to your program. Athletes are only allowed five official visits to programs. So who cares if SLU, McNeese St, or Nichols St are mentioned as offers. They are no different the UL in that they can offer any athlete, especially in state. Louisiana Tech signed two prosepects that were committed to SLU, both played last year. They offered another kid that was offered and visited McNeese St, he played this year.

I look at the schools we are recruiting against, and most of them are MAC, Sun Belt or CUSA programs. And that is exactly what we should be doing, because we are not better then those conferences' programs. If we get lucky with athletes like Odoms or Pholuar, thats great. But the majority of them will not have 22 Div1A offers, because our program is not viewed in the light.

Also, more then a few recruits parents google search UL fan boards and read the comments. It does recruiting no good to have fans knock an athlete that has just committed to your program. You might not see it as a big deal, but put yourself in their shoes for a second. I understand you have opinions and that you want to express them, and that's fine. Just put them in context. There is a bigger picture here and that is what I'm trying to convey to you.
I never questioned you status as a fan.

[MissingMandy]

_ I will apologize in advance if this angers you, and for the long post this is going to be, but I can see that you really do not appreciate how recruiting works these days, and more specifically, how it must work at UL, in order to have success.

UL is not in the SEC, UL is not in a BCS conference, so there is nothing that UL can do to compete with that. If a kid absolutely wants that, has the highlights, stats, height, weight, and speed that proves that he can play there, he is gone.

UL is not likely to get 4-5 star athletes that have 20 offers to top 25 teams, unless there is a family connection.

What if a kid does not have playing in the SEC/BCS as his top priority and is not a "made man" by the recruiting services?

Here are my top 10 other priorities, in random order:

1) Proximity to home or relatives
2) Education
3) Geographical Region
4) Nearest City
5) $ value of tuitition/scholarship
6) Extra Curricular Compensation
7) School Size
8) School Tradition
9) Coaches
10) Facilities

Your coaching staff cannot do much about items 1-8. If they can get kids to visit, 2, 3, and 4 will be pleasant surprises. The current status and ongoing upgrades to 10 is very positive, but meeting and getting to know 9, the coaching staff, is UL's "Ace in the Hole".

Why? Because of priority #11, the one I left off the list. Every player thinks in the back of their mind, "I want a shot at the NFL", and while they know the odds are slim, they are looking for a staff that can coach them up and help provide that shot if they do the work. UL actually has way above average coaches for the level of compensation they receive, solid guys with awesome personalities, and the strength and conditioning coach will be the scale tipper for priority #11, he will get them where they need to be, and they will know it upon meeting him.

Ever been on an Easter Egg hunt as a kid, where they had a GOLDEN EGG? Ever been the first one to find it? Kids are running past all sorts of eggs, staying in motion, scanning the horizon, when all of the sudden, one kid stops, turns, and inspects something closely, most of the other kids surge towards the area in frantic hopes of beating the kid to that GOLDEN EGG.

Recruiting is a lot like this. It is a delicate balance of not showing too much interest too early, and offering right when you either think you can get them to commit or just before everyone else notices them. Your coaches have stopped, turned, and are inspecting a player closely, and the result is that many other coaches will surge to the area and try to snatch the kid away. The UL coaching staff does a good job of this, and it is not easy to pull off.

This is where I break off into why I posted. You have it all wrong, most of the time you do not want the guys that have all of the offers, because you want them to commit before everyone else in the Easter Egg Hunt finds them. Why have the others not noticed, because there are plenty of easy to find eggs laying around in plain sight. The UL coaching staff does a very good job of finding the well hidden ones, the guys that have slipped through the cracks so far. They go after late bloomers, kids that backed up a superstar, kid's that were not featured because of the system their HS uses, kids that started playing football late, kids that transferred and had to earn a starting spot, in general, the well hidden eggs, the ones that are the hardest to find, the ones that will still be out there under that bush long after the hunt is over, if nobody takes the time to really try to find them.

As mentioned above, UL is typically not going to win the battle for the guys that everyone has found, everyone has offered, and everyone has ranked as a 4-5 star. UL needs to do the work, uncover the guys that are harder to find, and offer at the right time. When a kid commits early, it pretty much ends his offers, if he is truly committed, because he politley tells coaches that he is happy with and honoring his commitment to UL. Kid's that continue to rack up offers after commiting somewhere, are not telling coaches that, trust me on this, they are most likely showing interest in the other program, under the "keeping your options open" plan. So to say that a kid is a low level recruit because he has no offers, is meaningless, because he may be one of those hard to find eggs at the Easter Egg hunt, and UL had an eye on him all along, and got there before the crowd. _

Understand your analogy and I agree with some of it but won't go into much detail just wanted to say..... Wish it was an easy thing for both the schools and the athletes but it isn't. It is one of the most difficult things a YOUNG man has to go through and most are not even close to being ready to understanding what they are doing. It is a game. (recruiting) It doesn't come with a manual and it is so hard on the kids and their parents. It can be a pleasant situation one day and a cuts like a knife, horrible situation the next depending on the school and in the middle of all of it is a kid being pulled in a million directions. With all of the decisions you have to make I kept telling myself over and over the advise KP's high coach told us "that kids always end up where they are suppose to be". It sounds like you have faith in the UL coaches and you are right to feel that way.
Trust the coaches at UL, they are good at what they do. Been there and done that. It will work out. I truely believe that. Welcome to all the new recruits, glad you are at UL.

[rhineaux]

_ Here's a link to his videos.

Link:
http://footballrecruiting.rivals.com...uit&pkey=56214

And here's a link to the current commits, according to Rivals.

Link:
http://footballrecruiting.rivals.com...008&School=149

He seems to have pocket awareness, good touch and zip when needed. _

dude kinda looks like VY, in that he seems long and lanky, and runs with the ball out away from his body. he's got quite an arm though. He seemed to really put some heat on a couple of those balls, but I was probably more impressed with the touch that he had on some of those fade routes.

Anybody have any idea how this would effect the two QBs that red-shirted this year? If we have three pretty good guys on the team, all within a year of each other, somebody will get left out. Are they planning on moving some of these guys to other parts of the field?

[Cajun Express]

Anybody have any idea how this would effect the two QBs that red-shirted this year? If we have three pretty good guys on the team, all within a year of each other, somebody will get left out. Are they planning on moving some of these guys to other parts of the field? _

I think everybody is still in play. You come, you compete, you decide if your role then becomes starter, backup, another position, or possibly transfer. Competition is a good thing, I would not want a quarterback who is not willing to compete at this stage.

[rhineaux]

_ I think everybody is still in play. You come, you compete, you decide if your role then becomes starter, backup, another position, or possibly transfer. Competition is a good thing, I would not want a quarterback who is not willing to compete at this stage. _

No doubt. Just curious if its been talked about before. I know that BG seems to be a pretty good prospect, but so were Masson and McGuire. So, I was kinda thinking that a couple of them might have the potential to move to another position, otherwise, we're keeping several young QBs on scholarship when that scholarship coud maybe be used somewhere else.

I'm almost positive that Gautier will be red-shirted his first season, and will be a red-shirt freshman when Masson and McGuire are RS Sophs. Again, just curious if anyone with connections to the inside knows if this "problem" (if you will) has ever been discussed.

[Cajun Express]

_ No doubt. Just curious if its been talked about before. I know that BG seems to be a pretty good prospect, but so were Masson and McGuire. So, I was kinda thinking that a couple of them might have the potential to move to another position, otherwise, we're keeping several young QBs on scholarship when that scholarship coud maybe be used somewhere else.

I'm almost positive that Gautier will be red-shirted his first season, and will be a red-shirt freshman when Masson and McGuire are RS Sophs. Again, just curious if anyone with connections to the inside knows if this "problem" (if you will) has ever been discussed. _

I know where you are coming from. I just think at this point we cannot have too many fine young prospects fighting for the job. Somebody will be second and third. IOW I don't think anybody including the coaching staff knows for sure what the third guy will decide or who for that matter will be the starter. I think we still need a fourth competitor this or next recruiting class.

The good thing is that I like our guys. There is not one that I felt was recruited just to have a player at the position. It will be fun to watch them fight for that playing time.

[locoguano]

http://www.mapgameday.com/recruit/#

Go check out that map... It shows where each D1-A school gets its players... Look at any successful mid-major team... They get their talent from within a 100 mile radius of their schools... The reason this kid didn't have big out of state offers is because all of those other schools have a similar guy within their spheres of influence...

[DrumRoll]

_ http://www.mapgameday.com/recruit/#

Go check out that map... It shows where each D1-A school gets its players... Look at any successful mid-major team... They get their talent from within a 100 mile radius of their schools... The reason this kid didn't have big out of state offers is because all of those other schools have a similar guy within their spheres of influence... _

Awesome resource, thanks for posting the link.

What you say about Gauthier is true.

Something I wanted to point out though, in regards to the apparent ongoing debate about the quantity of local recruiting. Using your map, I looked up teams that I consider to be on the rise, teams that have come from relative obscurity to the top 25 in that last few years. They all appear to be doing 2 things in common, spending money on facilities, and recruiting outside the 100 mile zone. UL appears to be doing the same, I wonder if UL can make this list in the next 2 years?

These would be my examples:

Louisville* **
Rutgers* **
UConn* **
Boise State* **
Vanderbilt**
Troy* **
UCF* **
USF* **


*Significant investment in infrastructure
**Consistently recruits outside of 100 mile radius

[Just1More]

_ http://www.mapgameday.com/recruit/#

Go check out that map... It shows where each D1-A school gets its players... Look at any successful mid-major team... They get their talent from within a 100 mile radius of their schools... The reason this kid didn't have big out of state offers is because all of those other schools have a similar guy within their spheres of influence... _

I really like this link, but have found an equal number of exceptions to the 100 mile radius rule as confirmations (among successful mid majors). I do not think schools are necessarily succeeding because they target/succeed recruiting kids in the 100 mile radius. Some schools are getting kids from their area because they are having success. To me, it's like making an observation that the more "stars" on a player's helmet, the better he plays. No, he gets more stars on his helmet from playing better. To some extent, we may be looking at the result rather than the cause. And, I'm not sure if the original success lines up with this current recruiting map. Some schools may have had a great recruiting coord that dove into a talent pool in Texas, succeeded, and now is able to pick up equal or better talent, as a result, from the area. I see UL being required to do this. I only hope the staff has that ability.

I think you would have to look at the programs, including academic focus, proximity to BCS schools, density of the regional population, northern vs southern, east coast/west coast, and many other components before making a broad statement about recruiting practices.

I found more oddities in this recruit locator map than I expected. Even among BCS schools, some are massively recruiting within a region, despite nationwide popularity, whereas others are recruiting in a broad nationwide sweep. Again, however, I do like this site.