Glass Joe

Only 1 of the top 17 ranked players in that class made it to their senior season. Bryce Anderson (#14 ranked). And the best remaining player in that class (Leveon Moss) will probably not be available in August for next season due to knee injury.

So it’s down to Nussmeier or Arch. And LSU just added Barrion Brown, and I doubt B.Brown and A.Anderson are interested in sharing targets with Singleton (and vice versa).

I took a cursory look at defensive stats yesterday (and some offensive) and the only one where Clemson was ahead of Texas was net turnover margin. They’ve been good at recovering fumbles (and not turning it over on offense). That said, other than some real dudes on the DL (Woods, Parker), and some good young WRs (Wesco, Williams, Moore) I don’t see much to worry about. Klubnik is a chain mover, not a big play guy, and we need to be more aware of his legs than his arm. This feels a bit like Arkansas (dual threat QB, decent WRs, but a much better DL).

First, this already is professional football sponsored by the nation’s largest universities. The only thing forcing these players to even play “college football” is the NFL draft rule that entrants must be age 21 or be 3 years post-high school. Second, I would encourage everyone to reconsider the value of high school recruiting at all. Since this is now a true monetary investment in talent, one must consider both the expected return and the RISK for each player (talent) you bring into your program. And how do you reduce or manage the risk of any investment? You don’t invest in things that are LESS LIKELY to produce your expected return. In recruiting terms, that means bringing PROVEN productive players (portal) into your program whenever possible, and not bringing in more speculative / risky players (high schoolers). I think you’ll soon see a huge bi-furcation in college football between the major P2 schools who largely source their talent from the Portal, and the lesser P4 and G5 schools who rely on high school recruiting for their talent. Effectively, you’ll have a minor league and a major league within college football. The Minor league takes high schools recruits and develops players for a year or two, and then the Major league teams grab these proven, developed-but-not-yet-finished players from the Minors through the Portal. The exception will be those truly elite high school players who can contribute to winning for a Major league program from day one out of high school. In other words, the true bluest chips. These elite high schoolers now have agents taking bids from colleges and will place their clients (recruits) with the best combination of immediate playing time and highest bid. It’s effectively now an auctioning process. Winning is secondary to the agent & recruit when the primary goal is to get to the NFL draft as quickly and as well-prepared as possible, while maximizing your NIL earnings along the way. I’m not sure that we aren’t already witnessing this change with Sark / Texas in this 2025 recruiting class and particularly so over the next few days and weeks. I think Sark is deep sea fishing for only the bluest chips out of high school who project to contribute at Texas immediately (Justus Terry, J.Hilson, J.Ffrench, et al). But once the Portal opens, I expect Sark and Texas to grab some huge impact players from other P4 and G5 programs to fill immediate impact needs on the depth chart for 2025 (this is effectively calling up proven college productive players from the Minors to the Majors). We will have de-facto separation between the truly elite P2 programs, and all other programs in college football. One is just a talent farm system (Minors) to the other (Majors) Their may be positional exceptions where in-house, longer term development makes sense to source from the high schools (OL, for example) since these players are often developed more so than true athletic freaks (with a few elite OTs being the exceptions). But, by and large, why not take an I.Bond into your WR line-up, A. Makuba into your secondary, J.Lole into your DL and not waste valuable resources on non-elite high schoolers who have a much higher washout rate?

We just kicked former 5-star WR Johntay Cook out of the program, so that’s a clue to Sark’s thinking. It may be as simple as Sark not seeing the value of lightly productive WR divas whose circle thinks much more highly of them than Sark does. High school stars are valueless the day a WR steps on campus.

Is the listed 185 lbs correct? If so, Skattebo is 215 lbs so it’ll be interesting to see if this kid can add enough weight to break P4 tackles in the hole the way Skattebo does (without losing the foot quickness that defines his game right now). Based on those highlights, if P4 level football doesn’t work out for the kid, he should give the 110M hurdles a try 😂. The kid has elite ups and downs without breaking stride.

Well, Texas is on the very short list of schools he has NOT yet attended, so….

Maybe we should ask the only other ranked opponent to play in Kyle Field’s “electric atmosphere” how that worked out….Notre Dame.

Aggy has to beat both Texas and UGA in successive weeks in order to make the playoffs. They can’t make it as an at-large, only as the SEC Championship game winner. This aggy team has lost its last two SEC conference games to So Carolina and Auburn. So, good luck with that.

Nah, his mother decided he’s going to play for Bo at LSU.

Hilson is also a Rosenhaus NIL client, correct?

This is the new late cycle go-to move by the NIL agents representing highly ranked recruits. Threaten to make a late cycle visit to a school with NIL coffers, and force the current school to pay-up to prevent the violence from happening. We paid Ffrench and Myron Charles not to visit Florida this weekend, and LSU just did likewise with Phillips and Zion.

JJ Kelly and Limas Sweed holla!

“Truth” - Jaden Rashada

I don’t think that is what the Committee is saying at all. I think the Committee is saying the 1-loss Big Ten teams are more deserving of a playoff spot than the 2-loss SEC teams. And as long as the Big Ten has four teams that all finish at 11–1 or 12-0, than those four teams are getting into the Playoffs.

Again, look at Penn State. They have 1-loss (to OSU) and they are still ranked #4 and ahead of all the 2-loss SEC teams. Indiana’s resume will be exactly the same as Penn State’s after they lose to Ohio State this Saturday. Why would a 1-loss Indiana with the exact same record and loss as Penn State fall behind all the 2-loss SEC schools. And do you really think the Committee (a TV-based organization) is going to allow 5 SEC teams in and only 3 Big Ten teams, especially by purging a 1-loss Indiana? I sure don’t.

You could apply to same logic to Penn State as well. One loss @ home to Ohio State, and zero wins against any ranked opponents while not even playing Oregon or Indiana. That said, the Committee has Penn State sitting at #4 (ahead of many 2-loss SEC teams) and Indiana at #5. That suggests to me that even if Indiana loses to Ohio State, they will still be in line for an at-large spot with only one loss and being from a P2 conference.

D.Moore never came back in after the 3rd down pop pass (for a 3 yard loss) in the first quarter. I do believe he was injured on the play. At halftime, he came out early to work with the Texas trainer to test if he could go in the second half, but they decided “no”. He was stretching both his hamstring and neck, so I assume it was one of those things injured.

All Drew Rosenhaus clients.

Maybe the DK Moore nugget makes a bit more sense now?

Maybe we can get his mother to do another thought-provoking interview with DK and post it on ON3 network to clear things up. 😂

While I agree with what you’re saying (it’s the crew, not necessarily Mar personally), the pattern I’ve always noticed with Mar’s crew is they throw way too many flags early in the game (which irritates all parties very early in the game), and therefore the bad vibes get more pronounced as the game goes on. Then, the boiling point is achieved. Last night, BYU’s Sitaki through a career-best tantrum at Mar for the way the first half ended. But, by games end, the Utah AD was publicly questioning his school’s membership in the Big 12. Let that sink in. And all of it lands at the feet officiating crew leader - Kevin Mar. Yet again. At some point, you have to question whether Mar & crew bring a uniquely incompetent approach to officiating a football game, or it’s something more nefarious (a crew following the wishes of their conference leadership)? Either way, it can’t be a recurring coincidence that it’s always the same crew. Every.Single.Time. Assuming it’s not the more nefarious cause, Yormark has to seriously consider not allowing Mar and crew to call another game for the Big 12. It’s gotten to the tipping point of compromising the integrity of the game, and that is a line the Big 12 can’t afford to cross (lest their TV partners abandon them). Mar & crew have single-handily inflicted incalculable brand damage to Big 12 football. Again.

Maybe this is why Brett Yormark dispatches the Kevin Mar ref crew to the most critical Big 12 games down the stretch. Kevin Mar is an insurance policy against the Big 12 getting left out of CFB Playoffs and the paycheck that goes with it.

Never allow Kevin Mar to referee a college football game at any level.