D. C. Bear said:
ShooterTX said:
I have a close relationship with a former UT player. He is very active in the program, as an alumni, and was very close with Mack & Strong. He was baffled by the decision to pass on Baker Mayfield. But he was almost angry (this guy never gets angry), at the decision to pass on Charlie. The Brewers have a tradition of playing QB at UT and beyond. The family all agree that Charlie may be the most talented of all the Brewer QBs... and yet he was totally ignored by UT. According to my friend, Charlie always wanted to play in the Big XII. He was really disappointed to be snubbed by the entire conference. Once he was given a shot by Rhule... he jumped at it!
For all of the cheap shots about Rhule being from "Jersey" and such... he was the only guy in the Big XII to see the talent in Brewer. To be fair, it was McGuire & Bell who brought Charlie to his attention, but it was Rhule who gave Charlie the offer.
Rhule himself admitted that he shamelessly begged Lovett to come to Baylor. Rhule had been recruiting him for Temple, and he knew the kind of talent that Lovett could bring to any team.
Jalen Hurd was a bolt of lightening out of the clear blue sky! No one saw that one coming, including the coaching staff. I think Hurd believed in the staff, and saw the opportunity to be a starter (and a potential hero) at a P5 program. I think Hurd also realized that Baylor was his best option to truly transition into the WR position in such a short amount of time.
I think Thornton and Bohannon are also excellent examples of the recruiting under Rhule. These are players who recieved offers from their dream schools in their home states, and yet they chose to go far from home to play for Baylor!! THAT is huge, and speaks volumes about our coach. You can't even begin to compare our facilities, history, etc. with FSU, Florida, or Miami. Yet we got one of the guys that they were all fighting over in Ty Thornton! Give the credit where it is due... Rhule & Co. made some magic happen.
And now we have another amazing class coming up! How can you explain Jalen Ellis?? Are you really going to argue that it is our facilities, Briles era success, or something other than Rhule that has given Baylor an advantage over UT, Michighan, Ohio State, UTenn, UCal, Oregon, etc. Give the man his credit. He is very good at recruiting.
The facilities and recent history of winning are important in that if you took them away, Rhule would have a much steeper hill to climb with recruiting. We should appreciate all of those factors.
Of course we all appreciate those factors, but they are not enough to explain the recruiting success after such a massive scandal and regime change. Even without the scandal, you have to admit that our facilities & history don't match up to UT, Ohio State, Mich, etc.
Now, given that Rhule is an amazing recruiter, I don't see how we will ever overcome the advantages of the massive state schools like UT & A&M. This is just common for any state. The biggest recruiters are almost always the University of blank and the blank State University. UT and A&M, Florida & FSU, Georgia & Georgia Tech, OU & OkSt, Mich & MSU... There are some exceptions, but this is the general rule. There are almost no examples of a small, private school becoming the powerhouse recruiter in their own state. It's just not realistic.
I think a much more realistic goal is to aim for a top 15 recruiting class. Of course, to make top 15 would also mean that we were the #1 or #2 in the Big XII, which would mean we beat out OU and/or UT... do you realistically see that happening in the near future? As far as I can research, Baylor has never been higher than #3 in our conference recruiting... am I wrong about that?