Originally posted by Deeeefense:
Originally posted by C1180:
You are of course right that there will likely be attrition but I keep hoping that the attrition will be small. Attrition was a major factor in the abject failure of Joker at UK. Heck it seems they lost almost half of most of their recruited classes to attrition. There is another option if they really wanted to push the issue. There is a few fifth year players that has contributed little to the team that they could pull their SS but I detest this option unless they are slackers.
You're right - I don't look for any early departures to be significant. Some guys that won't see the field will head for the exist as they have been over-recruited. You're also right about the previous staff - it was a revolving door of players which is why we were "forever young". Which brings us another point. Retention is just as important as recruiting. A lot of fans are unhappy over this current class not being what they thought it should be but ignore the fact that Stoops is doing a phenomenal job of retaining the talent we are stacking up. Much better than some teams ranked above us.
C1180 brings up a very relevant fact, which I have brought up often. In fact one of Joker's classes did have 50% attrition before they were seniors IIRC. And the problem was compounded by the fact that most of that was from higher rated recruits.
Brooks 09 class was a very good class for him, from 19 two stars in 07 to 12 in 08 to getting TWO 5.9 four stars (both JCs) and another 5.8 in 09 (can't remember a four star in 07 and Boyd disappointing in 08). The two 5.9s did well but were JCs gone in two years, the 5.8 nothing (maybe not the players fault in a lot of the failures, who knows for sure) but 5.7 Newton and 5.7 Crawford ended up disappointing and of the SIX 5.6s Huzzie, Kendrick, Russell, S Simpson, J Walker were disappointing to me, ONE of the six very good, Warford. What if the other five with the same rating had turned out as well as he did, woweey. AND the SEC athlete of the year from that class (primarily because of baseball), winner over the All American football beasts from Bama, Florida, LSU, etc AND the basketball stars from teams like UK, was a 5.4 (primarily because he almost died) that was a 6' 4" 220# WR that was the fastest receiver on the team. Did little, starred in baseball and dropped football for baseball, what ever happened to Adams, I thought he would make it in baseball.
I was encouraged by Joker trying to solve our MAIN problem, lack of talent, by firing most of the VERY good coaches that wouldn't recruit, and adding three 5.7s to our ONE that he got committed early AND a four star, all at the last minute, that was very encouraging. Until NONE of the four, Smith, Patterson, Priester, and Joiner did ZIP, in fact none of them lasted very long, they only tied up a scholarship for a couple of years.
As Deeeefense points out, retention (and development) is VERY important, and so far Stoops has lost ONE player, K Thomas that had a bad influence from his brother that was a Joker recruit from the 13 class.
From the 14 class he has lost ONE commit that really blew up and had offers from all the SEC teams plus the NC, from the 13 class, and he has lost ONE excellent prospect that had off the field issues that may be able to come back, hard to say now.
Yes, he has lost several commits in the 15 class, but that seemed to be an epidemic, and was partly understandable because of our poor finish AND because they spotted some excellent talent and got them committed before the Big Dogs heard about them (encouraging to me), and lost them when better programs (for now) offered.
An amazing turnaround not just in recruiting but in retention, this year we will see the coaching start to kick in IMO.
And if the coaching doesn't improve one bit a lot of fans on here are liable to think they are much better because of the improved talent, experience, and depth they have available. Funny how that works.
This post was edited on 2/8 2:06 PM by jauk11