UT Lawnghorn

Lulz. I read that and thought it was mostly bullshit. There was a lot of aggy-esque sunshine pumping in there. IT says just about all of our recruits are underrated pretty much every year. The article also makes it sound like Herman's first choice was to take 3 stars and coach them up while ignoring the fact that most of the 3 stars we have taken the last two years are due to missing out on higher rated guys the staff prioritized first. The staff did a great job mitigating their misses last year, and I like our class and tend to think most those guys are underrated except for Coburn and Carson. I'm not as high on this year's class so far. Sweat and Carter (assuming he's in) should be 3 stars. They're solid players but don't have very high ceilings from what I can see (and their offer list echoes that). Mpagi is underrated, and I expect his rating will rise with a strong senior year. Regarding your data on tOSU, I have no idea where you got your numbers, but they're way off and entirely misleading. Urb's 2 first full classes were 2013 and 2014. He took 6 DEs (including Hubbard who was listed at ATH but played DE) for an avg of 91.38. This included first-round pick Joey Bosa in 2013, who is a similar size and rating to the #1 target we just missed on in Leal. Weighing down that number were 2 3-stars Urb took in 2014. Both barely played and ended up transferring. For DT, he took 3 guys with an average of 91.45. For UT, you said we only took one DT but we've taken 2: Ojomo and Coburn. So for DE, it's 5 guys with an avg of 88.13 and 2 DTs with an avg of 91.76. tOSU's total DL average was: 91.40. UT's total DL avg over 2 years: 89.16. Further, only 2/7 of UT's commits were 4 stars. For tOSU, 7/9 were 4 stars and the only ones who actually contributed were 4 stars. All this also glosses over the fact that tOSU had 2 5 star DEs in their 2012 class and another DE who was #92 overall. Point being, Urban recruited significantly better on the DL his first two years, and the talent he's utilized to get to where he's at now with tOSU is much better than the talent Herman and Co. will have to utilize for the next few years. Your comp to tOSU doesn't hold up at all. I don't understand why people either completely deny bad news or get irrationally angry and upset when confronted with it, whether it's that Herman made some big mistakes in his initial hires with guys like Mehringer, Warehime, and Beck, or that DL recruiting has some issues and is lagging behind this staff's recruiting at pretty much every other position. The 2018 DL class was good, but it wasn't the staff's Plan A like IT is trying to say, and it's not sustainable to do it that way every year. 2019 is shaping up to be worse than 2018, unless we find 2 Ojomo's in this class or a big time recruitment takes a major turn. All these things can be overcome and no one's saying that we're doomed and Herman will be a definite failure, but they're also fair to point out. There is no doubt in my mind the offensive hires lost us at least two games last year (there were 3 games alone where our O couldn't' score than 10 in regulation), which is negatively affecting our 2019 recruiting and will negatively affect our 2020 recruiting, unless we turn it around this year, which I'm not super optimistic about since Beck is still the OC and all three offenders are still on staff, not to mention the opportunity cost of wasting 3 coaching spots on TE and WR when we could (and should) be using at least one of those spots to help out DL recruiting. Anyways, I like Herman and I'm hopeful he can be a good coach at UT, but he absolutely under performed on the field last year and there are things he needs to fix in the program. It shouldn't be that hard to hold both of those ideas in your head at the same time. Anyways, these conversations are probably gonna keep coming up ad nauseum while things are slow, my work is picking up, and I waste way too much got dam time on this site, so I'll be signing off for a while. Have a fun dead period y'all!

I'm surprised @Longhorn94 didn't neg this and then go back and neg every post you've ever made for giving him a heart attack because he thought for a second that Card decommitted when you bumped this.

Let's ask the inverse of CTJ's prior question. Who was in charge of recruiting slot receivers last year that's not in charge of recruiting slot receivers this year?

I wouldn't assume that. There's pretty much no national reporter with sources in Sacramento. They're all just blatantly guessing. For instance, Givony of Draft Express first reported the Kings weren't interested in Doncic. His basis was that they didn't go to scout Doncic. Turns out, he had bad info and he was dead wrong. He had to take back that part of the report, but kept his line that the Kings weren't interested and a lot of other national guys piggybacked on it. Well, fast forward to yesterday, and it 's been confirmed that not onyl did Vlade and Vivek watch Doncic play, but they also had dinner with him like two weeks ago and neither Givony nor any of the other national guys had a clue about it. https://www.sactownroyalty.com/2018/6/16/17470146/vivek-ranadive-and-vlade-divac-met-with-luka-doncic-in-spain-sacramento-kings-draft-rumors

There have been repeated misses at the position. People can try to explain each one away or say why each one happened, but eventually trends develop. See DL recruiting for the last two years. Second, Herman was literally trying to ship away Warehime and Mehringer over the offseason. It was unsuccessful, so they both got demoted. The writing is on the wall.

Translation: Neither myself nor any other media member has a clue what the Kings will do, so I'll list all three of the guys they might pick in hopes of throwing out the right name a day before the draft.

Should be a good season. This CC is a lot better run from what I hear and they have the #5 player in the country, who UT is recruiting this year.

I doubt Anderson would commit (or stay committed) to Baylor if we were going after him full bore. Even if he did, I struggle to care even a little bit. There's so many good WR prospects this year and every year, and WR is so far down the list of things that have made our offense suck lately that it just doesn't matter. Unless a guy is someone who can completely change the dynamic of your offense by himself, improving OL and QB play will be exponentially more important to WR output in our offense than which outside WR we land in 2019.

I think you're on to something here. I've seen a lot of clients stress eat while they're waiting to hear the other side's offer.

It wasn’t directly from his father, but his father made sure he got a ton of training. Casey went to a ton of camps his whole life, had personal trainers, advanced HS coaches, etc. plus, his older brother was a D1 QB, so he was getting training from a very, very young age.

I honestly have no clue where you're getting any of your info but you should probably start looking elsewhere. Thompson threw a ton in HS. He was in very advanced spread attacks and averaged over 300 pass attempts per year for 3 years on varsity. He's not some raw passer who ran a ton in HS. His dad played QB at OU, Casey got all the QB training in the world. The fact that he had that much training and mechanics teaching and still isn't all that consistently accurate isn't great and it's part of the reason why his rating fell. He has not developed a ton as a QB since he was a sophomore. Now, he was at a very high level as a sophomore due to all that training, so he's not terrible, but painting him as this raw passer who has a ton of untapped development is completely inaccurate. Rising is actually the guy who's really raw and hasn't received a ton of great coaching/training until now. Casey's not far from being a good QB (and he's certainly far ahead of Jerrod as a QB) and if he can improve on his accuracy and ability to read defenses, then he can become a great college QB, but there's questions as to whether or not he can do that because he's had access to great teaching and training so far and those things haven't happened yet. Herman is a good QB developer, so I hope he can bring out some of the development needed in Casey's game but it's not a given at this point, and Beck has usually seen his QBs regress as passers over time, so I'd like to get a different OC in next year to help out Sam, Casey, and Cameron.

Hahaha holy shit. I have no recollection of ever saying this. Idk how you remembered that. Good stuff. Pretty sure at that point, I wasn't factoring in the JUCOs that really helped our roster or Zubia, Clemens, or Hamilton being nearly as good as they were this year, so hopefully I'm overlooking a lot of factors for next year at this time, too. I'm totally with you on the bullpen. Starter is what makes me nervous but still time to grab a JUCO or for a guy like Bocci to improve. Bocci will be really interesting. He's definitely a guy who could emerge next year. For batting, Pierce really seems to know how to coach up hitters, so hoepfully we can get some more David Hamilton-esque jumps and get a deep lineup with a lot of guys who can hit, like we faced against TTech, Arky, and UF. This is neither here nor there, but I'm confused why you think sabermetrics don't factor in individual and team defensive fielding? They absolutely do. I get that the general idea is sabermetrics say no bunting, but there are tons of ways sabermetrics value and factor in fielding to that equation.

Yeah, they'd probably have to give up Rozier and can. I doubt they'll re-sign him next year and have enough depth to overcome his loss. Boston could easily hop into the top 10 this year and probably should. Even though Sacramento is terrible, their lottery odds have been 10th, 5th, and 7th the last three years, so it's not as good of an asset as people make it out to be. Boston is better off adding a quality player now rather than waiting a year and it seems like Rozier plus the Kings pick would probably get it done. I think it really depends if a player they like falls far enough. I'm not sure exactly what number pick it would need to be for them to trade up, but you have to think starting around #4 or #5, teams would start to at least consider their offer.

Hopefully they can also continue their streak of having none of those teams finish above .500 in conference.

Yep. I'll definitely be going there more regularly. The son was the one who was running the counter when I was there yesterday. I talked to him a good amount before I left. Seems like a good dude. Yeah, that's where I'm at and I understand where they're coming from too. When I was talking to him yesterday, he mentioned how his dad and uncle buy a lot of the shitty stuff, so they can get to the good stuff and actually said they get the first pick in Austin on store pick barrels from most of their desired distillers. They definitely do mark up some of the more rare stuff they get, like W12 for $90 or Blantons for $79, but I don't hold it against them. They're the ones who buy all the shitty stuff to get to the good stuff, so there's no reason to sell it at MSRP, just so some guy can buy a whole case and triple his profits on the secondary market. As long as the market keeps allowing them to sell at those prices, they might as well. On that note, it does seem like some stuff like Blantons and W12 will experience a market correction in the near future, but maybe that's just me being hopeful.

I don't see it. Watson is more of an APB than an every down back, and he's coming off an ACL tear. There's no guarantee that he's completely right this year. I also think we'll use him some as a receiver. Regardless, I think the staff will have more of a time share going that will keep any one player from hitting 1,000 yards, or 1,200 all purpose yards as long as most of our RBs are healthy, and I don't really care as long as the offense's total yards improve a lot from last year. I could see teams negative recruiting us with Evans if we use a timeshare again at RB, but it's not a big deal as long as we can sell a competent-to-good offense.

Lulz. That doesn't explain what he did in his transition year. Literally no coach has ever been able to pull that type of thing off. And UGA has never even come close to signing a class like the one they signed in 2018 ever before. But go ahead and continue to double down on ignorance and get upset when people mention a legitimate factor when UGA enters a recruitment.

Yep. We're in a good spot for Evans, but I'll wait to see how he responds to schools like Bama and UGA putting the hard sell on before I expect him to be in the class. Some guys want to stay in-state regardless of recruiting tactics, though. It's entirely possible Evans is one of those. It's part of why UT is such a desirable coaching destination. Us having success on offense this year would help, and especially getting a guy like Young over 1,000 yards would be big. We can't role out an offense even remotely resembling last year's and expect to sign guys like Evans.

Normally I'd agree, but UGA is on a completely other level. Saying UGA is paying isn't like the aggy copout they give every time they miss on a prospect. UGA is legitimately cheating their asses off and pacing the field in that regard. Sure, UGA can sell winning and a very strong tradition of RBs in the last decade, but their cheating changes the game. Go look at the class UGA put together in Smart's transition year (he pulled in 3 5 stars, 2 of which signed after he got there. That's unheard of for a transition class. Even Saban signed mostly 3 stars during his transition class at Bama) and the recruits they had committed before they played a game in 2017, coming off a very mediocre 8-5 season. Selling winning is not what's been getting them all these 5 stars and elite recruits. If UGA identifies Cain as their #1 RB target, it could be trouble for us, but I'm skeptical they'll do that as I think Cain is currently overrated and is a good, not great, prospect. I'm not saying we shoudl throw in the towel by any means, but if UGA were to go hard after Cain as their #1 RB, it would constitute a drastic change in his recruitment.

I have a hard time seeing Kingham and Shugart not leave. They're the only ones I think would significantly impact the team next year. Do you think either of them will be back?

Totally agree on the first part. We have to find ways to advance runners and drive in runs in situations where a hit isn't even required. It was astonishing how bad we were at this at times this year. Regarding the JUCO stuff, we took a good amount of JUCO's last year and 3 of them were starters for us all year. Another will be a big time bullpen arm next year. I don't think it's that "Texas" as an institution is against it. Augie just didn't regularly utilize it. Pierce has shown at Tulane and Texas that he will. We may not take a ton this year due to numbers, but Texas/Pierce are open to it and will utilize it if they think it will improve the team. I'm also not sure it's fair to say there is no room to step back in Year 3 just because he massively overachieved in Year 2. We won the Big 12 and went to Omaha. Our team could improve its talent level and still not achieve those results. A less successful season next year is definitely the most likely outcome, and I won't necessarily view that as a failure depending on what the team looks like and how they develop.

If I could give all my rep to @Neonmoon, I would. I remembered he had said that Deb’s had RY 10 yr on the shelf a couple weeks ago. Meant to go, but got busy with work and forgot, plus I don’t go up that way much otherwise. I was meeting a friend at the domain and ahead of schedule, so I stopped by tonight. They had RY 10 yr, EH Taylor SiB, and a 1792 Full Proof store pick all in stock. Bought one of each. I think the RY 10 yr is my favorite, at least for my first joint taste test, but they’re all great. Mood after a liberal tasting of each:

What are the red flags with Stripling and Mowry? I know Stripling has some attitude issues but I’ve never heard anything about Mowry. Leal was definitely an aggy lean when Sumlin was there. I remember him tweeting as a sophomore about how great the SEC was and stuff about aggy repping Texas in the SEC. all that talked died down when it became obvious Sumlin was getting canned and he showed interest in texas, so I thought he was over it but clearly not. I think it’s true that Leal was much more of an aggy lean than we thought but also that the staff didn’t do a good job capitalizing after Sumlin was gone prior but before Leal got to visit Jimbo and co. Not IMO, just the latest to be offered. I like Higgins, Anderson, and Ellis more.

I don't remember overvaluing the loss of bats or even really commenting on it. ha But the main loss is Kingham and Shugart. I mean who do we have to replace that? Bocci and Fields, or hoping for a freshman? I think the progression with a lot of returning bats will mostly just go towards filling the void Kody leaves. It seems to me like you're undervaluing the losses, but maybe Pierce will bring in some JUCOs or something. Either way, it's probably too premature to give any meaningful projection, so I'll let it go at this point. The second half of this season (excluding htis weekend. lulz) was one of the most enjoyable stretches of UT sports in a long freaking time. This team was a joy to follow, and I'm looking forward to next year.