I am not surprised at Geno going after another top 10 talent like Patterson to go with Brady, but a class with 3-4 in 22 seems like overkill to me. His reaction seems to be bring it on, but I wonder how some of these recruiting discussions go. I know his standard line is nobody is guaranteed minutes or being a starter, but if a player asks for his realistic assessment, what can he tell them?
Can he tell a third of the roster they might get garbage minutes in a 40 point blowout? Maybe even if some were a top 30 if not top 10 recruit. If Evina returns that is what he is looking at for next year. Even that assessment generously assumes that with all this talent, Geno expands his rotation to 10 from 8, something he has rarely been willing to do. If he stuck with a 7-8 player rotation, roughly half the roster could get garbage minutes, with only Autumn and Piath not being a top 30 recruit or better
Without getting into the "T" word speculation, if we get Patterson to go with Brady we are at 14 when they come aboard, a similar numbers crunch with top talent even if nobody else was was added from the 22 class. When the roster is this loaded and deep I don't think there is any good reason to recruit beyond the top ten, unless that player is comfortable with the probability of never getting meaning-full minutes.
Many would disagree, but I hope Geno presses more, pushes the pace more, and by doing so justifies going much deeper in the rotation next year. I suspect the gap between our second unit and other team's reserves will be bigger than our edge over most team's starters. It will be big in both cases of course, but if that is true, pressing which wears out both teams starters means because of fatigue, more of the game becomes a battle of the benches which could easily increase the ultimate margin of victory, and give utility to more of the roster. Not expecting it to happen, but rooting for it.
