Deion Sanders "Coach Prime" Now At Colorado

[Dennis Taylor 18882]

2 hours ago, Helobious said:

That’s not a Mexican thing but it is an alpha male thing. 

Did one show you that?

[Dr Phil WIth Hair 273]

22 minutes ago, longhornmatt said:

I don't know what the fuck Deion is going to do at Colorado, but the wrapping enchiladas in a tortilla thing is genius and makes this thread life changing for me.

1000% this......

The first time I ate a beef enchilada with a flour tortilla wrapped around it my in-laws (both their parents came from Mexico) were horrified.  Then my father-in-law started doing it too.  He continued it until the week that he passed.  I will always have that memory.

[crash_davis 23115]

1 hour ago, Dr Phil WIth Hair said:

1000% this......

The first time I ate a beef enchilada with a flour tortilla wrapped around it my in-laws (both their parents came from Mexico) were horrified.  Then my father-in-law started doing it too.  He continued it until the week that he passed.  I will always have that memory.

You should remember that you killed your FIL with that shit.

[Wulaw Horn 19153]

3 hours ago, Pam Cummings said:

If you're eating queso that's worth a shit, doesn't it already have most of the things that salsa has? Leaving queso remnants in the salsa seems like a way bigger dick move.

That was the problem- the queso wasn’t worth a shit. And there was literally one small spoonful of salsa mixed in. I rarely do it- like 1 in 20 times when the queso is subpar. I’d never do it at a classy joint like Papasitos or chuys. 

[Royale with cheese 1467]

11 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

You should remember that you killed your FIL with that shit.

Colonel Mustard in the dining room with a tortilla.

[Hook1997 5404]

3 hours ago, GringoSalado said:

I believe your standard ratio is

 

to

You can’t go wrong with velveeta, spicy Jimmy deans, the hot rotel and some smoked jalapeños or sautéed fresh ones added in.  

[closetojumping 62891]

37 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

That was the problem- the queso wasn’t worth a shit. And there was literally one small spoonful of salsa mixed in. I rarely do it- like 1 in 20 times when the queso is subpar. I’d never do it at a classy joint like Papasitos or chuys. 

You dirty, filthy human. Nothing you did with that salsa and queso was reasonable, measured, or common. Pure nightmare fuel. Own it, sir. 

[Dr Phil WIth Hair 273]

51 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

You should remember that you killed your FIL with that shit.

I can't take the blame/credit for that.  I out-ate him 4:1 when it came to enchiladas.  But, then again, I plan on being sick when I die.....

[Wulaw Horn 19153]

12 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

You dirty, filthy human. Nothing you did with that salsa and queso was reasonable, measured, or common. Pure nightmare fuel. Own it, sir. 

Agree to disagree. 

[Wulaw Horn 19153]

17 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

You dirty, filthy human. Nothing you did with that salsa and queso was reasonable, measured, or common. Pure nightmare fuel. Own it, sir. 

As a borderline autist I can’t be expected to understand all your precious social cues. They essentially served us velveeta so I added the closest thing to rotel at hand. Problem solved. You’re welcome. 

Edited May 3, 2023 by Wulaw Horn

[Dr Phil WIth Hair 273]

40 minutes ago, Hook1997 said:

You can’t go wrong with velveeta, spicy Jimmy deans, the hot rotel and some smoked jalapeños or sautéed fresh ones added in.  

Hell, even some Velveeta and Wolf Brand Chili (no beans for God's sake) will work in a pinch.

[Not a cat 5721]

32 minutes ago, Wulaw Horn said:

As a borderline autist I can’t be expected to understand all your precious social cues. They essentially served us velveeta so I added the closest thing to rotel at hand. Problem solved. You’re welcome. 

Borderline?

[Wulaw Horn 19153]

4 minutes ago, Not a cat said:

Borderline?

Probably  my wife says adjacent. 

[mchookem 16414]

On 4/28/2023 at 11:26 AM, Modessit said:

Chris Simms?

 

too soon

[Texzilla58 4745]

1000% this......
The first time I ate a beef enchilada with a flour tortilla wrapped around it my in-laws (both their parents came from Mexico) were horrified.  Then my father-in-law started doing it too.  He continued it until the week that he passed.  I will always have that memory.

I learned this trick a million years ago working in a the line in a Mexican joint in Memphis. Going on a break you’d throw an enchilada into a tortilla. Or a tamale or two. Or a relleno. Best was a cheese ench with a tamale and some onions. Thanks for reminding me of this; you throwed a hankering on ne.

[Slacks 6880]

On 5/2/2023 at 12:01 PM, RGBIII said:

I’ve seen you mix your queso and salsa together so this is accurate for you

Wait. Is this a bad thing? 

I thought adding some salsa was an acceptable way to add flavor to bland ass restaurant queso... 

I'm always impressed by how particularly surly this place gets about the most random and seemingly meaningless things. 

I like it here. 

[BurntOrange&White 40049]

1 hour ago, Slacks said:

Wait. Is this a bad thing? 

I thought adding some salsa was an acceptable way to add flavor to bland ass restaurant queso... 

I'm always impressed by how particularly surly this place gets about the most random and seemingly meaningless things. 

I like it here. 

I think the line gets drawn when the color of the queso turns pink in hue.

 

As someone mentioned earlier mixing chili(no beans) with queso is no longer queso IMO, that is rendered a "dip"

Edited May 4, 2023 by BurntOrange&White

[Not a cat 5721]

56 minutes ago, Slacks said:

Wait. Is this a bad thing? 

I thought adding some salsa was an acceptable way to add flavor to bland ass restaurant queso... 

I'm always impressed by how particularly surly this place gets about the most random and seemingly meaningless things. 

I like it here. 

According to the Chicago Manual of Style, an ellipsis should have spaces between each dot.  To do otherwise is an abomination to the language and you are now my sworn enemy.

[Texzilla58 4745]

Adding salsa to queso is something I’ve done since I was a kid. Dad did it. I do it. You never heard of a Bob Armstrong? When queso became a thing it was often at the family Christmas a crockpot of melted velveeta. It got a dump of hot sauce from the adjacent bowl. Same in restaurants.

Food fascism is a stupid thing. If I don’t have to eat it I don’t give a shit. Beans in your chili. Ketchup in your Chinese food. Well done steak. Well done steak with ketchup, queso, salsa, whipped cream. You be you. Occasionally we see brilliance like this in Steel Shank’s thread.

[closetojumping 62891]

Just now, Texzilla58 said:

Adding salsa to queso is something I’ve done since I was a kid. Dad did it. I do it. You never heard of a Bob Armstrong? When queso became a thing it was often at the family Christmas a crockpot of melted velveeta. It got a dump of hot sauce from the adjacent bowl. Same in restaurants.

Food fascism is a stupid thing. If I don’t have to eat it I don’t give a shit. Beans in your chili. Ketchup in your Chinese food. Well done steak. Well done steak with ketchup, queso, salsa, whipped cream. You be you. Occasionally we see brilliance like this in Steel Shank’s thread.

Here's the thing - you nimrods opining in favor of Wulaw's behavior have no fucking idea what he did and he's not laying it out correctly here. The dude turned queso into salsa soup. I've eaten texmex the entirety of my life and seen this specific nightmare once. Those at this lunch have all condemned what we witnessed, and it's not out of ignorance. The man must be stopped. The next time I meet Wulaw for a meal, it will be at a burger joint.

[PilotsError 2325]

JFC. 

[Pam Cummings 9685]

I would say that if enough salsa is added to the queso to change the temperature of the queso, that is too much. Just a dip, or adding a small amount, doesn't seem like a problem.

[Sawbonz 27622]

3 hours ago, Not a cat said:

According to the Chicago Manual of Style, an ellipsis should have spaces between each dot.  To do otherwise is an abomination to the language and you are now my sworn enemy.

MLA til I die

[GringoSalado 1652]

So it's not "dot dot dot" but "dot space dot space dot?"

 

Everything I once knew is wrong.

[Slacks 6880]

6 hours ago, Not a cat said:

According to the Chicago Manual of Style, an ellipsis should have spaces between each dot.  To do otherwise is an abomination to the language and you are now my sworn enemy.

[Slacks 6880]

I love this place... 

Click on thread title "Coach Prime..." 

Go to last page... 

Queso, Salsa, Ellipses... 

Dogs think we are easily distracted. 

[Earl Haffler 597]

If you add seltzer to queso, won't it make the queso runny?

[Francisco 2.0 32432]

Mexican food talk not going away.

 

In the meantime:

https://theathletic.com/4485364/2023/05/04/deion-sanders-colorado-transfer-portal-roster/

 

Quote

The text messages came flying in from all over the country on April 24, a chorus of coaches and recruiters seeking clarity.

What’s going on at Colorado?

First-year coach Deion Sanders and his staff were in the middle of a roster dump the likes of which college football had never seen in the modern recruiting era. Eighteen scholarship players entered the NCAA transfer portal in one day. Thirty by the end of the week.

 

Quote

Colorado’s efforts to dramatically flip its roster have generated national attention, but the people in college football watching the proceedings most closely are those whose day-to-day roles revolve around roster management.

“What we know is all eyes across all of college football are gonna be on Colorado,” one Big 12 director of player personnel said. “It will impact the future of college football markedly for the next generation, one way or another.”

 

Quote

The Athletic spoke with a dozen Power 5 head coaches and recruiting staff members about this unprecedented flip, the risks behind what Colorado is attempting and what it will take for this to succeed. Recruiting staffers spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

Several of them recently went through rebuilds and fully understand that Year 1 is the time to make these changes, especially for a team coming off a 1-11 season that was outscored 521-165. But as they watch this new strategy unfold, many wonder whether Colorado’s staff went too far in pushing out as many players as they did, clearing room for as many as 70 newcomers.

 

Spoiler

After all the cuts and exits last week, the Buffaloes were down to 60 scholarship players on board for their 2023 team. They needed to go add 25 more for their No. 1 ranked transfer class. It’s just one of the many aspects of this flip that experienced recruiters consider confounding.

“It’s a tremendous risk to replace all of those guys,” an ACC recruiting director said. “It’s an experiment that has never happened on this big of a scale.”

And it’s an experiment that pits Coach Prime against the college coaching establishment.

 

Colorado recently updated its 2023 football roster. All of the names of players who are departing via the portal have been deleted. The revised roster lists 76 players: 12 returning scholarship players, 21 incoming transfers, 17 new freshmen and 26 walk-ons. Not listed are 17 more transfers who have verbally committed.

Among those dozen scholarship players who played for Colorado in 2022, there’s not one quarterback, wide receiver, defensive lineman or cornerback. Anthony Hankerson is the only running back left. Trevor Woods is the lone returning safety.

“I can appreciate the aggression and the urgency to essentially bust things down to the studs and start over,” a Pac-12 director of player personnel (DPP) said. “My concern is the rapid hemorrhaging of personnel within specific position rooms. They have an unfathomably low amount of scholarship players in some rooms that demand high-volume personnel.

“I’d be less worried about culture and locker room dynamics right now in Year 1 than I would be about having enough players to line up and stay healthy.”

A total of 53 scholarship players have left the program since Sanders was hired in December. Only three other FBS programs have lost more than 30 in 2022-23: Ole Miss (32), Oregon (32) and Louisiana Monroe (31). Arizona State has pursued its own aggressive roster shake-up in Year 1 under coach Kenny Dillingham and will end up bringing in more than 50 new scholarship players. The Sun Devils have lost 29 to the portal to do so. College coaches and staffers recognize that losing 20-plus players in one offseason is becoming common. Losing 50-plus players is not common.

Colorado now has 67 scholarship players on board for 2023 after landing a commitment from Marshall transfer receiver EJ Horton on Thursday and adding Washington transfer edge rusher Sav’ell Smalls, a former five-star recruit, as well as transfer cornerback Omarion Cooper (Florida State) and receiver Tar’Varish Dawson Jr. (Auburn) earlier this week. To get back to the 85-man scholarship limit, the Buffaloes would need to add 18 more.

There are more than 900 uncommitted scholarship players still available in the transfer portal. More than 400 left Power 5 schools, with 256 of them entering during the spring transfer window. It won’t be hard to pick 19 who’d happily accept a Colorado scholarship offer. The tricky question: How good are those players?

“It is just absolutely unreasonable to think you can sign 25 players out of the spring transfer portal and make your team better,” the Big 12 DPP said, “unless the players they had were just that bad, which I don’t buy. In the end, is the sum of the 25 new guys going to be greater than the sum of the 25 old guys? Man, I don’t know.”

“It has to be a significant upgrade in order to want to trade guys out,” one recruiting coordinator with Pac-12 and SEC experience argued.

These recruiting staffers agreed the caliber of talent available in the spring window, which put more than 600 FBS scholarship players into the portal over a two-week period, wasn’t as strong as they’d hoped. But they weren’t surprised. The April window turned into a sort of spring cleaning period as many coaching staffs moved on from players who won’t contribute this fall. They weren’t as bold as Sanders, who cut 20 players after his spring game, but attrition was necessary for any team over the 85-man limit.

“The kids who enter in December, there are at least more options,” the Big 12 DPP argued. “They had a great year and want to move up. They’re unhappy with their NIL payment. They got a new head coach or their position coach left. There’s a lot of reasons you end up in the portal in December or January. Almost every spring portal entry is, you got beat out or your school is trying to get back down to 85 and you’re at the bottom of the totem pole.”

What that inevitably leads to, another Big 12 DPP said, is everybody chasing the same 15 to 20 great players on the post-spring market. Colorado has offered almost all of them. The Buffs did land Florida State’s Derrick McLendon II, one of the top pass rushers in the portal, following their spring game. “I think he’s a good player,” the same staffer said. “The ODU transfer (defensive lineman Chazz Wallace) should be a two-deep player. Those guys are all right. I just don’t know how they’re gonna find 25 more.”

Sanders could view this like the NFL and argue he only needs 53 players good enough to play on Saturdays. Can he get away with most of these post-spring additions becoming backups? How many players does a staff actually need to be successful in college football these days?

The first Big 12 staffer believes you need 50 who are good enough right now and 20 who will eventually be good enough. The second Big 12 staffer agreed, putting it closer to 55 or 60. “Take 85 minus the high schoolers,” he argued. “That’s basically what they’ve got to get to in order to be competitive.” Five-star cornerback Cormani McClain and several of their 17 freshman signees should help right away. But the second DPP’s approach would put the target number of playable roster members at 68 for the Buffaloes. They’re currently at 49.

All of this is fodder for negative recruiting from rivals as they battle for the best players in the portal. Colorado is considered the frontrunner for Houston transfer running back Alton McCaskill IV. The former AAC Rookie of the Year is coming back from a torn ACL and could be the Buffs’ featured back if he jumps on board.

“If you’re him, don’t you have to wonder who you are gonna be running behind?” one Power 5 coach asked. “Deion let the entire O-line go.”

 

There’s another obstacle to upgrading the roster via the portal in May: Colorado still must beat big-time schools for these top transfers.

The magnetism of Coach Prime goes a long way with players and their families. Some are entering the portal knowing they want to come to Colorado. Sanders and his staff have to fight off a lot of other coaches who are trying to change their mind.

“People can say what they want,” one Power 5 director of football operations said, “but with NIL, for him to get legit dudes, he’s got to have real money.”

This left recruiting staffers wondering, in the final days of the spring window, whether Colorado had lined up silent commitments from players who had yet to transfer. “We already know what we got coming in,” Sanders said during an appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” last week. “Y’all just don’t know what we got coming.” Coaches get suspicious when they hear bragging like that, though none have publicly accused Sanders or his assistants of tampering. Now that the April 30 transfer deadline for underclassmen has passed, we’ll soon find out who’s on the way.

Although there’s intense skepticism inside the college coaching world about what Sanders is attempting in Boulder, it’s worth noting the Pro Football Hall of Famer was also greeted with doubt and eye-rolls when he entered the business of college coaching three years ago. He went 27-6 at Jackson State with a 23-3 run over his last two seasons, at a place that hadn’t had a winning season since 2013. He stunned the recruiting world by prying the Class of 2022’s No. 1 prospect, Travis Hunter, away from Sanders’ alma mater Florida State and bringing him to an FCS program. In January, he did it again by flipping McClain from Miami to Colorado.

Sanders is executing this overhaul at a time when transfer rules are changing. The NCAA has made it much tougher for underclassmen to gain immediate eligibility on their second transfer. In recent years, it was easy to get a waiver by citing no participation opportunity (NPO) at your previous school. That won’t work anymore. Obtaining that eligibility waiver now requires documented issues of mental health, assault, discrimination or disability. Undergraduate transfers joining Colorado have two options if they need to transfer again: Get their degree first or sit out a year in residence.

There’s a potentially greater issue coming soon. The NCAA is concerned enough about the graduation rate of transfers that they want to hold schools accountable. Starting this year, the undergraduate transfers Sanders signs will have their financial aid guaranteed for their full five-year period of eligibility and count against Colorado’s 85-man scholarship limit until they graduate or go pro.

There are ways to get around that if the player transfers again or is medically disqualified, but recruiting staffers recognize they must be careful when taking transfers who aren’t close to graduating.

“If we take an undergrad transfer, we now view it like you’re stuck with this guy for the rest of their career,” the first Big 12 DPP said. “The rules are written in a way to encourage you being stuck with them. If they take 25 transfers and 15 of them stink, there’s really no way to get rid of those guys.”

Added one ACC general manager, “It’s gonna be interesting for these schools taking so many transfers. It could be really bad down the line if you miss on guys.”

Four transfers who joined the Buffaloes this spring have already left the program: tight end Seydou Traore, offensive lineman Yousef Mugharbil, defensive lineman Taylor Upshaw and cornerback Tayvion Beasley. Upshaw is the only graduate transfer of the four. The rest already used their one-time transfer exception and will be lucky if they’re able to get eligible to play this season.

“If you’re trying to bring in a bunch of these guys essentially all at once, how can you vet all these things out?” one SEC staffer wondered. “You’re hoping to go 50 percent on the ones that work out.”

 

Lincoln Riley was in this position a year ago. He brought in 20 transfers to help pull off a faster flip of USC. How did he balance the need for better talent against the risk that the wrong newcomers might hurt the program culture he’s trying to establish? And how do you actually get good intel on these transfers?

“The biggest thing with the portal is just the time crunch,” Riley said. “It just happens typically really, really, really fast, and there’s no going out to see ’em, especially this time of year. Unless they’re on your campus, there’s no face-to-face contact.”

When he can fly these transfers out to Los Angeles for an official visit, Riley believes it’s valuable to pair them with player hosts who “know what we’re about” and can help him size up whether that transfer would be a good fit. The messaging is important to him, too. He and his coaches are honest with a transfer about the day-to-day experience and expectations in their program. If they feel uneasy about the visit or the fit, they’re willing to move on from the player.

“Has that cost us some guys that we liked their on-field evaluation? Absolutely,” Riley said. “But we can live with that. We’re making that the priority.”

At Ole Miss, Lane Kiffin wants to extend offers to transfers as quickly as possible, but he has a rule with his staff: He doesn’t want to watch the film until someone on his staff has talked with someone at the player’s school. He’s not moving forward without honest feedback on their background and why they’re in the portal. “How big is this kid?” is another common question, especially when calling Group of 5 or FCS coaches.

“You don’t call just one source,” one SEC recruiting coordinator said. “We did have a kid that the first source we called who … said he was the worst kid ever. We called four more coaches there who were like, ‘No, that coach is crazy, he’s a great kid.’”

Added one Big 12 scouting director, “With portal kids, you’ll get the truth on the kid’s character. It’s just whether you choose to address it or overlook it.”

Colorado has budding superstars in quarterback Shedeur Sanders and Hunter, a talented receiver/cornerback, to build the program around, but this staff still must figure out a way to minimize its misses. The head coach promised from Day 1 he’d shake up the roster he inherited. Sanders says he had to clean out the “old furniture” in his beautiful new home to make way for the new décor. He’s trying to expedite a rebuilding process that used to take several years. There’s a vision behind all of these roster transactions.

“When we release the list of guys that we already got coming in,” Sanders said last week, “then everybody is going to say, ‘OK, now I see what he’s doing.’”

So far, recruiting staffers at other Power 5 schools aren’t seeing it.

“It’s unprecedented enough that, like, you could tell me this is gonna lead to them buying the best 25 players in the portal and I guess I’d believe it,” the first Big 12 DPP said. “You could tell me they got rid of the exact amount of guys that they already have silent commitments from prior tampering and I’d believe it. You could tell me that every 10 minutes they’re making a new decision and they’re gonna end up playing next season with 61 scholarship players and I’d believe it. Like, I’ve got no f—ing clue.”

There’s certainly a sense of envy among some staffers who took on tough rebuilds in the past with low scholarship numbers, 25-man signing limits, no portal database and none of the beneficial rules Sanders is taking advantage of this spring. Still, even if it’s allowed today, they see more cost than benefit with such an extreme roster purge.

“I’m not gonna knock him,” the second Big 12 DPP said. “It’s his first time doing it. He swears up and down he’s got a plan. I just don’t see any way that makes a whole bunch of sense.”

But not everyone in the business is rooting against Sanders.

“I want him to do well because I think it will be good for college football, and from what I understand, he genuinely does care about kids,” the Power 5 coach said. “Maybe he is onto something. Then again, I’m not sure it would be good for college football. Because if Deion is onto something, it’ll be bad for other kids on other rosters because then a lot of other people will try and copy it: Let’s purge the entire roster and start over.

“I don’t know, but it certainly is entertaining.”

 

[closetojumping 62891]

2 hours ago, Francisco 2.0 said:

Mexican food talk not going away.

 

In the meantime:

https://theathletic.com/4485364/2023/05/04/deion-sanders-colorado-transfer-portal-roster/

 

 

 

 

  Hide contents

After all the cuts and exits last week, the Buffaloes were down to 60 scholarship players on board for their 2023 team. They needed to go add 25 more for their No. 1 ranked transfer class. It’s just one of the many aspects of this flip that experienced recruiters consider confounding.

“It’s a tremendous risk to replace all of those guys,” an ACC recruiting director said. “It’s an experiment that has never happened on this big of a scale.”

And it’s an experiment that pits Coach Prime against the college coaching establishment.

 

Colorado recently updated its 2023 football roster. All of the names of players who are departing via the portal have been deleted. The revised roster lists 76 players: 12 returning scholarship players, 21 incoming transfers, 17 new freshmen and 26 walk-ons. Not listed are 17 more transfers who have verbally committed.

Among those dozen scholarship players who played for Colorado in 2022, there’s not one quarterback, wide receiver, defensive lineman or cornerback. Anthony Hankerson is the only running back left. Trevor Woods is the lone returning safety.

“I can appreciate the aggression and the urgency to essentially bust things down to the studs and start over,” a Pac-12 director of player personnel (DPP) said. “My concern is the rapid hemorrhaging of personnel within specific position rooms. They have an unfathomably low amount of scholarship players in some rooms that demand high-volume personnel.

“I’d be less worried about culture and locker room dynamics right now in Year 1 than I would be about having enough players to line up and stay healthy.”

A total of 53 scholarship players have left the program since Sanders was hired in December. Only three other FBS programs have lost more than 30 in 2022-23: Ole Miss (32), Oregon (32) and Louisiana Monroe (31). Arizona State has pursued its own aggressive roster shake-up in Year 1 under coach Kenny Dillingham and will end up bringing in more than 50 new scholarship players. The Sun Devils have lost 29 to the portal to do so. College coaches and staffers recognize that losing 20-plus players in one offseason is becoming common. Losing 50-plus players is not common.

Colorado now has 67 scholarship players on board for 2023 after landing a commitment from Marshall transfer receiver EJ Horton on Thursday and adding Washington transfer edge rusher Sav’ell Smalls, a former five-star recruit, as well as transfer cornerback Omarion Cooper (Florida State) and receiver Tar’Varish Dawson Jr. (Auburn) earlier this week. To get back to the 85-man scholarship limit, the Buffaloes would need to add 18 more.

There are more than 900 uncommitted scholarship players still available in the transfer portal. More than 400 left Power 5 schools, with 256 of them entering during the spring transfer window. It won’t be hard to pick 19 who’d happily accept a Colorado scholarship offer. The tricky question: How good are those players?

“It is just absolutely unreasonable to think you can sign 25 players out of the spring transfer portal and make your team better,” the Big 12 DPP said, “unless the players they had were just that bad, which I don’t buy. In the end, is the sum of the 25 new guys going to be greater than the sum of the 25 old guys? Man, I don’t know.”

“It has to be a significant upgrade in order to want to trade guys out,” one recruiting coordinator with Pac-12 and SEC experience argued.

These recruiting staffers agreed the caliber of talent available in the spring window, which put more than 600 FBS scholarship players into the portal over a two-week period, wasn’t as strong as they’d hoped. But they weren’t surprised. The April window turned into a sort of spring cleaning period as many coaching staffs moved on from players who won’t contribute this fall. They weren’t as bold as Sanders, who cut 20 players after his spring game, but attrition was necessary for any team over the 85-man limit.

“The kids who enter in December, there are at least more options,” the Big 12 DPP argued. “They had a great year and want to move up. They’re unhappy with their NIL payment. They got a new head coach or their position coach left. There’s a lot of reasons you end up in the portal in December or January. Almost every spring portal entry is, you got beat out or your school is trying to get back down to 85 and you’re at the bottom of the totem pole.”

What that inevitably leads to, another Big 12 DPP said, is everybody chasing the same 15 to 20 great players on the post-spring market. Colorado has offered almost all of them. The Buffs did land Florida State’s Derrick McLendon II, one of the top pass rushers in the portal, following their spring game. “I think he’s a good player,” the same staffer said. “The ODU transfer (defensive lineman Chazz Wallace) should be a two-deep player. Those guys are all right. I just don’t know how they’re gonna find 25 more.”

Sanders could view this like the NFL and argue he only needs 53 players good enough to play on Saturdays. Can he get away with most of these post-spring additions becoming backups? How many players does a staff actually need to be successful in college football these days?

The first Big 12 staffer believes you need 50 who are good enough right now and 20 who will eventually be good enough. The second Big 12 staffer agreed, putting it closer to 55 or 60. “Take 85 minus the high schoolers,” he argued. “That’s basically what they’ve got to get to in order to be competitive.” Five-star cornerback Cormani McClain and several of their 17 freshman signees should help right away. But the second DPP’s approach would put the target number of playable roster members at 68 for the Buffaloes. They’re currently at 49.

All of this is fodder for negative recruiting from rivals as they battle for the best players in the portal. Colorado is considered the frontrunner for Houston transfer running back Alton McCaskill IV. The former AAC Rookie of the Year is coming back from a torn ACL and could be the Buffs’ featured back if he jumps on board.

“If you’re him, don’t you have to wonder who you are gonna be running behind?” one Power 5 coach asked. “Deion let the entire O-line go.”

 

There’s another obstacle to upgrading the roster via the portal in May: Colorado still must beat big-time schools for these top transfers.

The magnetism of Coach Prime goes a long way with players and their families. Some are entering the portal knowing they want to come to Colorado. Sanders and his staff have to fight off a lot of other coaches who are trying to change their mind.

“People can say what they want,” one Power 5 director of football operations said, “but with NIL, for him to get legit dudes, he’s got to have real money.”

This left recruiting staffers wondering, in the final days of the spring window, whether Colorado had lined up silent commitments from players who had yet to transfer. “We already know what we got coming in,” Sanders said during an appearance on “The Pat McAfee Show” last week. “Y’all just don’t know what we got coming.” Coaches get suspicious when they hear bragging like that, though none have publicly accused Sanders or his assistants of tampering. Now that the April 30 transfer deadline for underclassmen has passed, we’ll soon find out who’s on the way.

Although there’s intense skepticism inside the college coaching world about what Sanders is attempting in Boulder, it’s worth noting the Pro Football Hall of Famer was also greeted with doubt and eye-rolls when he entered the business of college coaching three years ago. He went 27-6 at Jackson State with a 23-3 run over his last two seasons, at a place that hadn’t had a winning season since 2013. He stunned the recruiting world by prying the Class of 2022’s No. 1 prospect, Travis Hunter, away from Sanders’ alma mater Florida State and bringing him to an FCS program. In January, he did it again by flipping McClain from Miami to Colorado.

Sanders is executing this overhaul at a time when transfer rules are changing. The NCAA has made it much tougher for underclassmen to gain immediate eligibility on their second transfer. In recent years, it was easy to get a waiver by citing no participation opportunity (NPO) at your previous school. That won’t work anymore. Obtaining that eligibility waiver now requires documented issues of mental health, assault, discrimination or disability. Undergraduate transfers joining Colorado have two options if they need to transfer again: Get their degree first or sit out a year in residence.

There’s a potentially greater issue coming soon. The NCAA is concerned enough about the graduation rate of transfers that they want to hold schools accountable. Starting this year, the undergraduate transfers Sanders signs will have their financial aid guaranteed for their full five-year period of eligibility and count against Colorado’s 85-man scholarship limit until they graduate or go pro.

There are ways to get around that if the player transfers again or is medically disqualified, but recruiting staffers recognize they must be careful when taking transfers who aren’t close to graduating.

“If we take an undergrad transfer, we now view it like you’re stuck with this guy for the rest of their career,” the first Big 12 DPP said. “The rules are written in a way to encourage you being stuck with them. If they take 25 transfers and 15 of them stink, there’s really no way to get rid of those guys.”

Added one ACC general manager, “It’s gonna be interesting for these schools taking so many transfers. It could be really bad down the line if you miss on guys.”

Four transfers who joined the Buffaloes this spring have already left the program: tight end Seydou Traore, offensive lineman Yousef Mugharbil, defensive lineman Taylor Upshaw and cornerback Tayvion Beasley. Upshaw is the only graduate transfer of the four. The rest already used their one-time transfer exception and will be lucky if they’re able to get eligible to play this season.

“If you’re trying to bring in a bunch of these guys essentially all at once, how can you vet all these things out?” one SEC staffer wondered. “You’re hoping to go 50 percent on the ones that work out.”

 

Lincoln Riley was in this position a year ago. He brought in 20 transfers to help pull off a faster flip of USC. How did he balance the need for better talent against the risk that the wrong newcomers might hurt the program culture he’s trying to establish? And how do you actually get good intel on these transfers?

“The biggest thing with the portal is just the time crunch,” Riley said. “It just happens typically really, really, really fast, and there’s no going out to see ’em, especially this time of year. Unless they’re on your campus, there’s no face-to-face contact.”

When he can fly these transfers out to Los Angeles for an official visit, Riley believes it’s valuable to pair them with player hosts who “know what we’re about” and can help him size up whether that transfer would be a good fit. The messaging is important to him, too. He and his coaches are honest with a transfer about the day-to-day experience and expectations in their program. If they feel uneasy about the visit or the fit, they’re willing to move on from the player.

“Has that cost us some guys that we liked their on-field evaluation? Absolutely,” Riley said. “But we can live with that. We’re making that the priority.”

At Ole Miss, Lane Kiffin wants to extend offers to transfers as quickly as possible, but he has a rule with his staff: He doesn’t want to watch the film until someone on his staff has talked with someone at the player’s school. He’s not moving forward without honest feedback on their background and why they’re in the portal. “How big is this kid?” is another common question, especially when calling Group of 5 or FCS coaches.

“You don’t call just one source,” one SEC recruiting coordinator said. “We did have a kid that the first source we called who … said he was the worst kid ever. We called four more coaches there who were like, ‘No, that coach is crazy, he’s a great kid.’”

Added one Big 12 scouting director, “With portal kids, you’ll get the truth on the kid’s character. It’s just whether you choose to address it or overlook it.”

Colorado has budding superstars in quarterback Shedeur Sanders and Hunter, a talented receiver/cornerback, to build the program around, but this staff still must figure out a way to minimize its misses. The head coach promised from Day 1 he’d shake up the roster he inherited. Sanders says he had to clean out the “old furniture” in his beautiful new home to make way for the new décor. He’s trying to expedite a rebuilding process that used to take several years. There’s a vision behind all of these roster transactions.

“When we release the list of guys that we already got coming in,” Sanders said last week, “then everybody is going to say, ‘OK, now I see what he’s doing.’”

So far, recruiting staffers at other Power 5 schools aren’t seeing it.

“It’s unprecedented enough that, like, you could tell me this is gonna lead to them buying the best 25 players in the portal and I guess I’d believe it,” the first Big 12 DPP said. “You could tell me they got rid of the exact amount of guys that they already have silent commitments from prior tampering and I’d believe it. You could tell me that every 10 minutes they’re making a new decision and they’re gonna end up playing next season with 61 scholarship players and I’d believe it. Like, I’ve got no f—ing clue.”

There’s certainly a sense of envy among some staffers who took on tough rebuilds in the past with low scholarship numbers, 25-man signing limits, no portal database and none of the beneficial rules Sanders is taking advantage of this spring. Still, even if it’s allowed today, they see more cost than benefit with such an extreme roster purge.

“I’m not gonna knock him,” the second Big 12 DPP said. “It’s his first time doing it. He swears up and down he’s got a plan. I just don’t see any way that makes a whole bunch of sense.”

But not everyone in the business is rooting against Sanders.

“I want him to do well because I think it will be good for college football, and from what I understand, he genuinely does care about kids,” the Power 5 coach said. “Maybe he is onto something. Then again, I’m not sure it would be good for college football. Because if Deion is onto something, it’ll be bad for other kids on other rosters because then a lot of other people will try and copy it: Let’s purge the entire roster and start over.

“I don’t know, but it certainly is entertaining.”

 

Shadeur Sanders is now a "budding superstar", eh? This shit is going to be fun to watch. Sanders is a dime a dozen type of QB in P5. All of this hype and Deion is now counting double digit walk-ons as part of his roster count and they'll still need to add like 25-30 more players to his a legit 85 man limit. Most of the guys from the portal are bready back-ups, malcontents, and mediocrities. I expected to see a lot more traction over the last two weeks.

Also, Sanders' bullshit about a bunch of transfers sitting on their announcements is laughable. There's no reason for players in the portal to sit on their commitments. There aren't 20+ grad transfers hiding out, waiting to walk across the stage before declaring for CU. Colorado fans are staring down the barrel of 3-9 and spending the fall and winter rationalizing that this was intended, it's so much better than 1-11, and bowl games and CFP runs are just around the corner. When the roster is blown to the ground next offseason with guys that answered the siren song, how many new guys do people expect to be willing to become the next round of fodder for Prime Time? 

[Not a cat 5721]

I think announcing to the world that your son is the starting QB before he even sees a practice does wonders for your QB depth.

I keep seeing that he really cares about the kids, but I think he seems to just care about the talented ones.  I get it, college football is a ruthless business and you better win, but it'd be nice if he would just shut up about how it's all for the kids.  It's like the bible beater that always tells you how religious he is, right until he rips you off.

[Dennis Taylor 18882]

34 minutes ago, Not a cat said:

I think announcing to the world that your son is the starting QB before he even sees a practice does wonders for your QB depth.

I keep seeing that he really cares about the kids, but I think he seems to just care about the talented ones.  I get it, college football is a ruthless business and you better win, but it'd be nice if he would just shut up about how it's all for the kids.  It's like the bible beater that always tells you how religious he is, right until he rips you off.

It's exactly like that because Sanders already does that

[DFW Horn 6256]

1 hour ago, Not a cat said:

I think announcing to the world that your son is the starting QB before he even sees a practice does wonders for your QB depth.

I keep seeing that he really cares about the kids, but I think he seems to just care about the talented ones.  I get it, college football is a ruthless business and you better win, but it'd be nice if he would just shut up about how it's all for the kids.  It's like the bible beater that always tells you how religious he is, right until he rips you off.

Well, in fairness to Prime, he only ran off 4 QBs by anointing his son.

Hope he's found 5 competent blockers for him.

[tx 3 putt 77564]

LuLz @ 57 transfers 

curious to see where they land. They didn’t exactly burn it up last year 

[Dennis Taylor 18882]

3 hours ago, tx 3 putt said:

LuLz @ 57 transfers 

curious to see where they land. They didn’t exactly burn it up last year 

It's Colorado we're talking about so some of them probably did quite a bit of that

[Bill Lumbergh 7187]

21 hours ago, Texzilla58 said:

Food fascism is a stupid thing. If I don’t have to eat it I don’t give a shit...Well done steak...You be you.

I generally appreciate the spirit of your post, but let's not get out of hand.

[Texzilla58 4745]

Learned something from Bourdain in his first book. If I have folks coming over for steaks the ones I know like well done don’t get the Costco prime steaks; they will get what I can finagle from the butcher as out of date, less hood, etc.

[closetojumping 62891]

21 minutes ago, Texzilla58 said:

Learned something from Bourdain in his first book. If I have folks coming over for steaks the ones I know like well done don’t get the Costco prime steaks; they will get what I can finagle from the butcher as out of date, less hood, etc.

You had to read a book to figure that out? Look, if you have friends that like well done steak, it's time to find new friends. Inviting them over for dinner and then feeding their depravity is not helping the situation.

[TrashMaster G 17635]

On 5/2/2023 at 8:51 PM, Dr Phil WIth Hair said:

Hell, even some Velveeta and Wolf Brand Chili (no beans for God's sake) will work in a pinch.

[oSuJeff97 3435]

17 hours ago, closetojumping said:

Shadeur Sanders is now a "budding superstar", eh? This shit is going to be fun to watch. Sanders is a dime a dozen type of QB in P5. All of this hype and Deion is now counting double digit walk-ons as part of his roster count and they'll still need to add like 25-30 more players to his a legit 85 man limit. Most of the guys from the portal are bready back-ups, malcontents, and mediocrities. I expected to see a lot more traction over the last two weeks.

Also, Sanders' bullshit about a bunch of transfers sitting on their announcements is laughable. There's no reason for players in the portal to sit on their commitments. There aren't 20+ grad transfers hiding out, waiting to walk across the stage before declaring for CU. Colorado fans are staring down the barrel of 3-9 and spending the fall and winter rationalizing that this was intended, it's so much better than 1-11, and bowl games and CFP runs are just around the corner. When the roster is blown to the ground next offseason with guys that answered the siren song, how many new guys do people expect to be willing to become the next round of fodder for Prime Time? 

Fucking all of this.

The idea that there are 20-25 players in the portal at this point that are materially better than the players he ran off is laughably hilarious.

And even if he can find 20-25 halfway decent players, the fact that he did this AFTER spring ball and they will only have a handful of weeks in the fall to integrate all of these new players into something approaching a coherent team is also hilarious.

They may very well go 1-11 again and then what? Purge the roster again and start over? What a fucking moron.

[crash_davis 23115]

3 hours ago, Texzilla58 said:

Learned something from Bourdain in his first book. If I have folks coming over for steaks the ones I know like well done don’t get the Costco prime steaks; they will get what I can finagle from the butcher as out of date, less hood, etc.

I bet those same motherfuckers request beans in their chili. 

[hookemATL 11931]

24 minutes ago, crash_davis said:

I bet those same motherfuckers request beans in their chili. 

[tx 3 putt 77564]

On 5/2/2023 at 8:51 PM, Dr Phil WIth Hair said:

Hell, even some Velveeta and Wolf Brand Chili (no beans for God's sake) will work in a pinch.

I’m having horrible flashbacks from the queso thread 

[DFW Horn 6256]

5 hours ago, oSuJeff97 said:

...And even if he can find 20-25 halfway decent players, the fact that he did this AFTER spring ball and they will only have a handful of weeks in the fall to integrate all of these new players into something approaching a coherent team is also hilarious.

They may very well go 1-11 again and then what? Purge the roster again and start over? What a fucking moron.

I had a couple of guys tell me it was perfectly fine to cut guys after they'd gone through CU spring practices. Like Deion couldn't have evaluated their film beforehand. He deserves another 1-11 shit sandwich, IMO. He's earned it.

[Brothahorn 10087]

You had to read a book to figure that out? Look, if you have friends that like well done steak, it's time to find new friends. Inviting them over for dinner and then feeding their depravity is not helping the situation.

What about medium well?

[Deej 76972]

On 5/2/2023 at 6:13 PM, Dennis Taylor said:

Did one show you that?

A-Rod is not an alpha male. 

[msucolt45 4082]

I just want to see Prime lead out “Ralphie” on the first home game!

Hook’em!!!

[CooterBrown 18034]

Did they ever find the money to pay Sanders? It’d be hilarious if he quits the first week his check bounces.

[Chewbacca 7787]

I had a couple of guys tell me it was perfectly fine to cut guys after they'd gone through CU spring practices. Like Deion couldn't have evaluated their film beforehand. He deserves another 1-11 shit sandwich, IMO. He's earned it.

How could he evaluate anyone before spring practice? He got there after the season was over.

[Sawbonz 27622]

One of y’all needs to make us a list of the P5 coaches who are in the job “for the kids”

[msucolt45 4082]

I just want to see Prime lead out “Ralphie” on the first home game!

Hook’em!!!

I’ll keep saying this until the season starts or Prime gets enough “money players” to fill out the CU roster. This Fall is going to be entertaining on many fronts.

Hook’em!!!