Can you rehash your prediction?
We are at 4 4 stars with Heath likely committing in the not so distant future & Dean & Selmon potentially getting bumps.
That gets us to 7 4 stars.
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Joe Mo can definitely recruit. He's got us heading in the right direction big time. It's nice to have this type of talent coming to Starkville.
Cooley is a 4 star talent and hasn't budged in the rankings. I'd say Dean and J. Brown are 4 stars as well.
Only the Top 5 in MS are 4 stars for 2020. Now I personally think that number will be closer to 9 or 10 when this cycle is done. But to compare, there were 16 4 stars from the 2019 class.
Only 4 of the Top 15 in 2020 are left uncommitted. Obviously we might still do some work there but there isn't much Top end talent left in the state.
These are the kind of years where we have to be able to go out of state and grab 4 stars. So far we've got Marks that's a 4 star. Can Moorhead go get more? That is how we win minimum 8-9 per year long term.
Mullen has the 2014 class that finished 38th. Three total 4 stars, all in state. We missed on the Top 5 in state and Mullen couldn't pull any highly rated players from out of state. If Moorhead can pull a Top 25 class from a weaker in state class this year that will be huge for us.
I guess it could be considered weaker compared to a year ago but this isnt a bad year by any stretch. Plenty of good football players in MS. Get out on fridays and watch them. A lot of them arent done justice by the experts
Last year was a hell of a class but this one aint bad. I dont think there will ever be a bad year in this state too much talent and too much passion for the sport.
IYOK, Ari, or other guys with insight, how is our standing with McKinnley Jackson and is Eli Acker really a possible flip? Thanks.
Jackson has shown us no return interest and Eli Acker is only going to flip if Matt Luke is fired and even then it's 50/50. Also, Jackson has plummeted down the recruiting rankings. He may be fortunate to stay a 4 star at the end of the day, although his potential is high enough that I suspect he will keep it.
We haven't recruited Jackson hard in months. I think there's only 2 SEC programs who would take his commitment right now (OM & Auburn).
Acker likes MSU a lot but like Jarius said I think it would take a coaching change to pull him. His family are big time OM supporters.
Jackson better be careful or he'll look up and find himself as a 3 star. He has had some very poor camp showings. He was ranked a 5 star just based on his size and potential, but everyone else has caught up to him now, and he is falling. He'll end up at OM and they'll claim that he's still a 5 star.
I think they're ultimately similar, but Joe and his staff work WAY harder at recruiting than Mullen's did, so we're rewarded with a player or two that Mullen wouldn't have gotten. Take Charles Cross for instance. Joe stayed on his ass, even when he committed to FSU, and got him. I don't think Mullen would've gotten Cross
If Moorhead finishes with Top 25 classes every year then no it's not the same as Mullen. Obviously there is a lot of talent that was here under Mullen, but Moorhead is about to work his guys in more this year.
Class ranks by Mullen according to 24/7
2009: 18
2010: 30
2011: 41
2012: 22
2013: 24
2014: 36
2015: 18
2016: 28
2017: 24
Mullen never strung together more than 2 consecutive years of classes inside the Top 25. Now he did have those 2 classes of 18. Those were solid classes. But 4 classes outside the Top 25 over 9 years is going to keep us from being consistently competitive and in the upper echelon.
Moorhead in his 1st two years has gone 27 and 24. If he gets in the Top 25 again, that would put us at 3 out of the last 4 classes inside the Top 25. Last time that happened was 2012-2015 and two years after (2014-2017) is one of the better stretches in program history. So if Moorhead can continue to stay in the Top 25 and push into the Top 20 a few times like Mullen did, he will end up with far more talent and could get us to the 8-10 win mark consistently with no drop off years.
To me that's how we build. Mullen was great. But we had 4 of his 9 seasons where we finished with 6 or fewer regular season wins. Moorhead is here to reverse that and consistency in recruiting will be what pushes us there. Moorhead has a much better chance to do that because him and his staff grind in recruiting daily.
Will we? We aren't beating auburn, aTm, Bama, and LSU with recruiting. We'll have to beat them with experience and coaching. We can't outcoach or out talent bama, so cancel them off the list. aTm has upgraded coaching and is in the process of upgrading talent. LSU is staying an elite recruiter, but they do have coaching question marks. Auburn is a great recruiting program, but terribly inconsistent.
I look at the recipe you laid out as OM's, but they topped out even higher than top 15. They had a dynamic offense with a good coach. They did beat Bama, but it still didn't get them a west title. The grind of the sec west takes supreme talent, great coaching, and luck to win the west over saban. I don't see it happening for us as long saban is there