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Embree > Hawkins?

Recruiting is a very inexact science. You could make a list of NFL guys who had a hard time getting anyone to pay attention to them coming out of HS and another list of 4* and 5* guys who were bust, including guys who signed with the Buffs on both list.

That said if you look in pure percentages higher ranked guys tend to turn out to be good players a higher percentage of the time. A bigger correlation would probably be found in looking at who offered a kid out of HS.

We all have high hopes for this years class. I honestly believe it is a step up from what we have been seeing over the past few years but we won't know for at least 2-3 years.

There are however some things that I can back my optimism up with. One is the success of players from last years class that Embree and Co. put together in a short time, this class seems to indicate that they can judge talent. Secondly is their record of recruiting pretty good players when Embree and EB were college assistants along with the record of guys like Kennedy and Tui. Hawks staff had never shown they could evaluate or recruit players who stepped up at the BCS AQ level. Third thing is simply the reported information on these kids that indicates that they are at least athletic enough and big enough to play at this level, Hawk brough in a lot guys who simply weren't. This is reflected in the fourth factor which is that virtually all of these guys have offers from other AQ level schools including some pretty successfull schools.


Will it all work out, I hope but don't know that. We all seemed pretty optimistic after year 2 of Hawkins as well and we saw how that turned out but I do think that this staff is different.
 
MtnBuff said:
Recruiting is a very inexact science. You could make a list of NFL guys who had a hard time getting anyone to pay attention to them coming out of HS and another list of 4* and 5* guys who were bust, including guys who signed with the Buffs on both list.

That said if you look in pure percentages higher ranked guys tend to turn out to be good players a higher percentage of the time. A bigger correlation would probably be found in looking at who offered a kid out of HS.

We all have high hopes for this years class. I honestly believe it is a step up from what we have been seeing over the past few years but we won't know for at least 2-3 years.

There are however some things that I can back my optimism up with. One is the success of players from last years class that Embree and Co. put together in a short time, this class seems to indicate that they can judge talent. Secondly is their record of recruiting pretty good players when Embree and EB were college assistants along with the record of guys like Kennedy and Tui. Hawks staff had never shown they could evaluate or recruit players who stepped up at the BCS AQ level. Third thing is simply the reported information on these kids that indicates that they are at least athletic enough and big enough to play at this level, Hawk brough in a lot guys who simply weren't. This is reflected in the fourth factor which is that virtually all of these guys have offers from other AQ level schools including some pretty successfull schools.


Will it all work out, I hope but don't know that. We all seemed pretty optimistic after year 2 of Hawkins as well and we saw how that turned out but I do think that this staff is different.
Click to expand...

recruiting is art, not science
 
Here is what I like about the recruiting this year as compared to the 2009 and 2010 years. CU is still in the running for several top players late in the game...in those past years CU was scrambling just to fill the class at this stage. How will it turn out we do not know but at least we appear to be making inroads. If the fates smile on CU and we land a couple of the more high profile players then I will say this staff has recruited above their record.
 
BlackNGold said:
Here is what I like about the recruiting this year as compared to the 2009 and 2010 years. CU is still in the running for several top players late in the game...in those past years CU was scrambling just to fill the class at this stage. How will it turn out we do not know but at least we appear to be making inroads. If the fates smile on CU and we land a couple of the more high profile players then I will say this staff has recruited above their record.
Click to expand...

To be fair, though, early in the Hawkins era we certainly come close on many blue chippers as well. My point is that just being there and coming close doesn't do anything. You either close or you don't, there's no moral victories to be found in recruiting. That said, I'm happy with what the staff has done thus far considering we're coming off a 3-10 season, but let's land a few of these guys and finish this class off the right way!
 
We have already recruited "above their record" !?? I don't think that cynicism is warranted.

The fact is there is considerable talent on our list of verbals. The majority of recruits are highly regarded 3*, and they are signing with CU instead of other teams with much better W-L records.

We are already on the cusp of a top 25 class (#29 according to one service). So it is a pretty trivial question to compare this group with Hawkin's efforts. (his most highly regarded class was inflated because of a single 5 star recruit, Scott)

If we do land the high profile recruits which are apparently leaning toward us, we will definitively break top 20. More importantly, we will be very competitive next year, and ready for our revenge against UCLA and Stanford. And we will have the foundation to fill out our team with more visible RB, OL, and WR recruits.
 
aeroxx said:
We are already on the cusp of a top 25 class (#29 according to one service). So it is a pretty trivial question to compare this group with Hawkin's efforts. (his most highly regarded class was inflated because of a single 5 star recruit, Scott)
Click to expand...

Well, at least your analysis is trivial. The 2008 class also had 7 four star recruits according to Rivals, including Katoa who had a 6.0 rating, Givens, Major, Mohler, and MTM with 5.9 ratings, and Deehan and Polk at 5.8. They contributed mightily to the rating of that class.
 
I accept the fact that those players were highly regarded. I honestly forgot that they were... which is really the point. Major still has the potential to become a major force. But the bottom line is how many of them became leaders in the conference? How many of them play in the nfl?

In light of this, it is not much of a stretch to say that the top 15 recruiting class didn't live up to its billling. We could argue lots of reasons why not.

The question was how does this recruiting class compare to Hawkins. We will see how these new freshman play next year. If we are anywhere near bowl contention, then the conclusion will be plain. (given the fact that we are playing freshman there is some control for differences in coaching and growth)

The question is still trivial because Hawkins had very little eye for talent and was a terrible coach. The new staff is building relationships with schools and actually preempting other pac 12 schools, which are then following our lead. The difference is night and day.
 
I believe Embree is making inroads that Hawkins never made. For instance, our recruiting in Texas is taking a huge upturn from where the Hawkins regime was. And I keep saying this; You have to get the "stars" to consider you first. Just getting them to listen after a 3 win season is excellent. What Embree HAS to do is show marked improvement on the field next year. If we can do that, I believe next years recruiting will take a step up. Embree needs something to sell. It is the old "chicken and egg" thing.
 
zbuff said:
Well, at least your analysis is trivial. The 2008 class also had 7 four star recruits according to Rivals, including Katoa who had a 6.0 rating, Givens, Major, Mohler, and MTM with 5.9 ratings, and Deehan and Polk at 5.8. They contributed mightily to the rating of that class.
Click to expand...

This is true for this particular class, Hawk got a bunch of highly rated kids including Scott who everyone wanted at the time. The rest of the highly rated guys we also had competition for but less than normal because almost all of them had significant issues. Givens was already known to be a bit of a character risk, he was also available only because of a late coaching change at Nebraska. Major was a solid kid but he wanted to stay in Colorado so I don't give Hawk a lot of credit on that one. Mohler was also a refugee from Nebraskas coaching change if I remember right, he was also a JC and a little undersized. MTM would have been a Trojan if he didn't already have the knee problems that shortened his career here. Deehan and Polk were legit without significant issues. Katoa was already being Katoa which chased off virtually everyone except us and Oklahoma.

It is still to be seen how this class ends up contributing on the field. Everything being equal I would much rather have a 4* with 12 AQ level offers to a 2* with 1 but as we have seen things aren't equal. If the 4* can't get and stay on the field he doesn't help you any and in fact is a negative because he is taking up time and energy as well as a scholly that could be spent on someone who helps you. Hawk built a highly rated recruiting class but did it by taking some big risk, many of which cost him in the long run. I may be completely wrong but I don't see a lot of those risk in this class that Embree is putting together. Instead I see a lot of foundational players, guys who may never be a star but who will be solid multi-year contributors to a winning program.
 
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