Can we hang onto our commits for eleven months?

[Palatine]

That's how the system is set up. There is no early signing period. The B10 and SEC don't want one. They want to wait until they see the Senior seasons of many players. If somebody blows up, they can swoop in.

IMHO, there should be a September signing period. That way coaches don't have to keep recruiting kids that have committed. It would give every school a level playing field. That's why the SEC and B10 will never be for it.

So, the question lingers. You can get Aaron Hernandez to commit but does he ever show up at your campus?

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

You're always looking at the glass half full.......

I do agree with having an early signing period though.

 

[CTMike]

We can. We will. Will it be 100%? No. But I love the early interest and the commits, even if they won't be official for a year.

 

[johnhuskies95]

Can palatine be any more pessimistic?

 

[UConnRock]

Pasqualoni and Company held onto all the Edsall commits in 2010 with the exception of Amos. UConn had more early commits in 2011 than any previous year, with several from Florida. All these guys stayed strong with UConn even through all the conference shuffling. There is nothing that makes me think that the two commits from Junior Day will be any different. Thomas seems about as solid an early commit as possible. Ogundeko may be looking around, but at this point I would rather have a soft commit than no commit at all. The time when you don't want a soft commit is just before LOI.

My guess is that the competition for Ogundeko will come from Penn St. and Syracuse, but I would rather be in UConn position as the committed school, than the school trying to get a kid to break a committment.

 

[Yonick]

Iowa is sharpening their recruiting for our early commits.

 

[jrazz12]

Why wouldn't they want to come play for the defending Big East champs and 2013 Orange Bowl victors?

 

[Palatine]

Can palatine be any more pessimistic?

I'm only asking the question and citing historic precedence. The answer could be yes.

What I don't understand is why coaches from the other conferences push for a September signing period. It would benefit them.

 

[businesslawyer]

Having nothing to do with P, the earlier you get verbals from recruits, and the more highly rated they are, the higher percentage of them you will lose. And that's true for fish who are a lot bigger than UConn. So the fact that the risk arises is both true and not a huge deal (and certainly doesn't prevent everyone from seeing that P and staff are off to a strong start this year).

I admire the work that Dan and others are doing on the recruiting end, and thank them for it, but please keep in mind that much of it is entertainment more than anything. The class can only really be judged on signing day, and even then can only be judged through the eyes of the limited correlation (and please note that there is a correlation, but one that is limited as opposed to overwhelming) between rankings and actual players' careers.

 

[sdhusky]

I admire the work that Dan and others are doing on the recruiting end, and thank them for it, but please keep in mind that much of it is entertainment more than anything.

Unlike college football that is life and death

 

[FAIRTIDES]

Can palatine be any more pessimistic?

Even the most optimistic of you have to admit that UConn athletics hasn't been good news central, recently. I'm almost afraid to sign-on to CT Newspapers/UConn sites. And, I have always been optimistic to a fault.

 

[FDNY99]

This will show what kind if closer P is and how good our Asst. Coaches are at building that relationship with these kids. Our ace in the hole is Strength and Conditioning cosch Jerry Martin and his staff combined with our facilities. With the numbers Kash and Kendall are putting up at the combine and the guys who we have in the NFL it is a good drawing point.

 

[Kgun7]

I'm only asking the question and citing historic precedence. The answer could be yes.

What I don't understand is why coaches from the other conferences push for a September signing period. It would benefit them.

Precedence is defined by Amos and Hernandez? We may have lost a few recruiting battles over the years ... but I can't remember losing too many commits.

Edsall's, and now P's, recruiting can be faulted for a lot of things, but it can't be faulted for a pattern of losing early commits.

 

[gioff23]

Well, we're talking about 2 kids only, neither of whom is ranked YET. I have no fear of losing players - we've lost under the radar types we recruited in the fall - and fully expect we will going forward. I love this staff's belief in themselves and the program going after top kids in key recruiting areas. PP said it when he joined, great players want to play with great players. So, let's start loading up on kids, and the earlier the better. And let's start acting like a big boy and play some O on the recruiting trail, instead of always playing D, and in the shadows. Bring it on!

The issue of an early signing period is a bit complicated. It is hard for me to endorse an early commitment when the odds are already stacked against the kids -- they are the only ones committing, the schools and certainly coaches are not.

 

[huskypantz]

Even the most optimistic of you have to admit that UConn athletics hasn't been good news central, recently. I'm almost afraid to sign-on to CT Newspapers/UConn sites. And, I have always been optimistic to a fault.

You do realize that we just came off a year where we had a BCS bowl game, Men's NC and women's FF, right? That comes around about as often as Haley's Comet.

 

[mets1090]

We will lose a couple of our soft verbals but we will also probably get surprise signing at signing day. It happens every year and I don't particularly care. I want the kids that want to be here. The kids that want to be elsewhere shouldn't sign with UConn.

 

[mets1090]

You do realize that we just came off a year where we had a BCS bowl game, Men's NC and women's FF, right? That comes around about as often as Haley's Comet.

Might as well call him FAIR... wait for it.... FAIRWEATHER.

Kidding aside, I almost made that same post

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

You do realize that we just came off a year where we had a BCS bowl game, Men's NC and women's FF, right? That comes around about as often as Haley's Comet.

I was thinking the same exact thing. And then harkened back to last week when someone started a thread asking if we're a spoiled fanbase. I thought of an appropriate answer and could only muster: Does Howdy-Doody have a wooden ass?

 

[Nostical]

That's funny cause I happened to mention Howdy-Doody at dinner with my grandkids and no-one knew who I was talking about. I guess if he doesn't tweet, he doesn't have relevance.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

That's funny cause I happened to mention Howdy-Doody at dinner with my grandkids and no-one knew who I was talking about. I guess if he doesn't tweet, he doesn't have relevance.

I would actually be shocked if Howdy-Doody didn't have a twitter account.

 

[Dann]

Well, we're talking about 2 kids only, neither of whom is ranked YET. I have no fear of losing players - we've lost under the radar types we recruited in the fall - and fully expect we will going forward. I love this staff's belief in themselves and the program going after top kids in key recruiting areas. PP said it when he joined, great players want to play with great players. So, let's start loading up on kids, and the earlier the better. And let's start acting like a big boy and play some O on the recruiting trail, instead of always playing D, and in the shadows. Bring it on!

The issue of an early signing period is a bit complicated. It is hard for me to endorse an early commitment when the odds are already stacked against the kids -- they are the only ones committing, the schools and certainly coaches are not.

both were given 3* by 247sports before they committed to uconn this weekend. people here need to start getting used to that site. they don't give us a great look becuase uconn fans aren't using it much. several fan bases have moved internet boards to ones at 247 recently and seem to be extremely happy about it. were one of the few on 247 that has no real home page with news or board. the capabilities are like here but u pay for good stuff etc. they are quickly becoming better than rivals as more people see whats up.

 

[Jimmy Serrano]

both were given 3* by 247sports before they committed to uconn this weekend. people here need to start getting used to that site. they don't give us a great look becuase uconn fans aren't using it much. several fan bases have moved internet boards to ones at 247 recently and seem to be extremely happy about it. were one of the few on 247 that has no real home page with news or board. the capabilities are like here but u pay for good stuff etc. they are quickly becoming better than rivals as more people see whats up.

Just took a look at their site for the first time. Our list of offers has a ton of kids with "cool interest". It's fairly depressing looking at it.

Dan - what distinguishes this site from the others? I have to be honest, when I look at Noel Thomas' profile and see that he's ranked #808 nationally, I'm not sure if I can take that seriously. I mean how does anyone, or any group of individuals, sit down and rank high school players to that great of length? It's not possible.

 

[FAIRTIDES]

You do realize that we just came off a year where we had a BCS bowl game, Men's NC and women's FF, right? That comes around about as often as Haley's Comet.

I realize that the UConn world was great a year ago. Then, in close order the Athletic Department got hit with NCAA penalties, the Burton/Hathaway mess, a less than elegant dismissal of the AD, the conference issues and the APR issue. That's a lot of bad publicity to overcome; especially when presented to kid by another school's silver tongued recruiter.

 

[Dann]

Just took a look at their site for the first time. Our list of offers has a ton of kids with "cool interest". It's fairly depressing looking at it.

Dan - what distinguishes this site from the others? I have to be honest, when I look at Noel Thomas' profile and see that he's ranked #808 nationally, I'm not sure if I can take that seriously. I mean how does anyone, or any group of individuals, sit down and rank high school players to that great of length? It's not possible.

they grade every kid in the system at some point and based off that gread he gets a # under different sections. noel got a 3* grade but behind the scenes he got a couple of #'s that make up that star count. he is listed as a ath there. #71 ath in the nation, thats just like rivals top 100 players at a psoition. the national overall number is just his ranking overall like espnu has a top 150. 247 gives the kids a # all the way down. if your top 1k, then your good.

cool interest thing- its a good tool, i like it. when a kid first gets offer and they are put on that site the school gets a cool interest. if the kid visit then its changed based on his reaction. most of the warm/warmers/cool on the site are nothing special right now but they were pretty good in dec/jan this past recruit season. they were dead on a lot of kids. thats the result of there indisder articles and stuff. they are behind on our offer list and commits and stuff but thats becuase alot of other fanbases use that site and we dont. that will change i think in time. from what i hear they are stealing ppl for rivals easily. they have alot of guys in the media and twitter now also.

 

[FAIRTIDES]

I realize that the UConn world was great a year ago. Then, in close order the Athletic Department got hit with NCAA penalties, the Burton/Hathaway mess, a less than elegant dismissal of the AD, the conference issues and the APR issue. That's a lot of bad publicity to overcome; especially when presented to kid by another school's silver tongued recruiter.

By the way, I'm still a huge fan. That's what makes the negative sh@# so hard to swallow.