I think there is going to be a lot of coaching turnover in the SEC that is going to make things interesting this recruiting and portal cycle for us in a good way.
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JJ Bush to Missouri. We literally can?t buy a 4 star this year.
It's not cause we can't. It's because we don't want to. We don't want to overspend on HS players. It sucks but it's the truth. We're going to be portal heavy again this offseason and need most of our Rev Share for that. Also, Bush will decommit at least one more time. This is his 3rd commitment.
Apparently, Lebby is having recruiting adjustments. I wonder what are the adjustments?
Free article available on Genespage. Lebby personally broke the news to two of our recruits to look elsewhere. What's sad about this is that our national ranking only dropped from #43 to #44. This class could easily drop into the 50s if we keep all of these players. The ranking and worse than that, offer sheets of many these commits is very concerning.
Sign of the times. Roster turnover is huge. Until there are binding multi-year contracts - why spend money on a guy's freshman year and then have him bolt to LSU? Just get the developed guys to plug and play. Focus on cheap / free prospects in high school recruiting. About the only thing worth a damn to get is guys who play day 1 / stud QB.
I think it's very likely. Even if the NCAA doesn't grandfather the current players in I imagine that there would be a ton of lawsuits like Diego Pavia's and so I suspect the NCAA will go ahead and just bite the bullet and grandfather everyone in.
At the same time, there does need to be some kind of standard. Right now, you could go to JUCO and technically play football for 7 years if things go through as expected.
And if that happens I would imagine in the future we would start using JUCO's like minor league affiliates essentially and send guys like the ones we just processed there first to see if they develop and then add them. Almost no reason for a player that is a developmental guy to not do it because doing so doesn't cost you eligibility and if you don't pan out to be a SEC player USM is still an option. So, really nothing to lose except time.
Also, I would sincerely hope that MSU is making these decisions because they have a very good grasp of what is about to happen and I believe we do.
It's interesting in our situation because we are in a state that historically produces a ton of talent so everyone knows that there is talent in Mississippi. So, the higher end guys (I don't know that I can really call very many of them developed) end up going out of state a lot of times because unfortunately the Alabama, LSU, Georgia, etc. helmets are sexier than Mississippi State for now. And I think a lot of those players know that if they get recruited over, MSU is still an option. So, it's hard for MSU to get the higher end guys at this time- at least on the front end.
I think we need to still recruit them and get an many high end players as we can BUT at the same time I think to make sure our numbers don't get too out of whack we need to take some- probably more than most- developmental guys to try to fill depth and see if we hit on any of them. The reality is the portal goes both ways and the ones that don't develop we can always process out ourselves and then just replace them with someone from the portal.
I think that's the best way to have some balance there.
And then the players that are REALLY raw but athletic- send them to JUCO for a couple of years and see what happens and how the develop and use that as another avenue to add talent.
I think this is how we are going to have to manage this era in general.
have an excellent year at some point with a team of 24 to 26 year olds
yea, without ever leaving the country
We have dropped from 44 to 46 nationally. We now have 22 commitments as three more decommitted or were told to look elsewhere. They were a safety from Georgia ranked #162 in the state with an 85 rating, an offensive tackle from Tennessee ranked #37 in the state with an 86 ranking, and a linebacker from Florida ranked #166 in the state with an 86 ranking. I expect to see more of this if the NCAA grants 5 years to play 5.
Update: Have dropped to #48 with about 10 other programs that will pass us as they have a higher rating per player and many spots to fill. Yes, we need to work the portal very hard, but at this point 47 programs are ahead of us with much better HS prospects than us and still seem to think HS recruiting is important. We must win at least two SEC games and go bowling to flip some players and process some of these commits! There are only so many players that want to help rebuild a program vs. play for a winner, no matter how much $ that you throw at them. JMO.
No need to worry about recruiting rankings. Just get the players you need from the portal. So far Lebby has shown he does a great job with getting the type of players needed for the team to be successful. I trust Lebby.
We are not going to pay a lot for HS players right now. We just aren't, especially the guys who aren't ready. We are going to be portal heavy again this year.
So what's up with these 22 commits? Are they all cheap gets? How many are impact players early? How many are hopefully diamonds in the rough that we can develop in a couple of years? If these guys are the majority of what we end up with, is this our future Scout team? I think that there are a lot of sour grapes on this site because we are #48 nationally right now, so we are just going to be a portal program. The SEC teams we play seem to want and have plenty of 4 and even a few 5 star HS commits. Last year's portal class went 0-8 in the SEC and looked bad doing it. The jury is still out on this year's portal class at 0-2 in SEC play. The majority of our portal players couldn't start at other SEC programs, are from lower level programs or big program subs. We need the right mix of the best HS and portal players we can get. But, let's just flip the team again next year at 7-5, 6-6, 5-7 or Heaven forbid, 4-8 with 0-8 in the SEC again. JMO, fire away.
Note: If we go 7-5 or even 6-6, I agree that we should spend what it takes to keep our best players that helped get us there and use the portal to fill our needs for 2026 season. Still think we need the best HS players we can get that can contribute in year one and maybe be a starter in year 2 or 3.
It's about building depth and having bodies to practice. Out of that 22 there's probably 6-8 that can contribute in the next 2 years. I'm just being honest. There's just not many HS players out there that can contribute Day 1. I mean take a look at our class last year. 3 of our top 5 recruits haven't sniffed the field and Kamario plays sparingly. Lockhart is finally getting some run.