Redfishag93 said:
Jimbo and his staff are crazy good recruiters, excluding 2023 due to our poor 2022 season. Jimbo has recruited better than anyone else in the history of the school. That is alot of years to be considered and Jimbo is the best, and he deserves alot of credit for that. You can't consistently win at a high level until you do this...see Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State, Clemson.
Really not being argumentative but I would take Clemson out of there as we have out recruited them since Jimbo has been here (or atleast in the 4 years you have decided to measure). Obvious exception would be 23 but your already excluded this past class. I would add Lsu as they have definitely out recruited us in those years you listed not to mention how much better they have done in the transfer portal picking up more talent and much needed experience in certain positions of need. I think their advantage is much more sizeable than most on here realize. We will get to that later in the post.
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Our recruiting rankings, not including 2023 (I don't expect many of these guys to play meaningful snaps this year thankfully):
2019 - #5
2020 - #6
2021 - #8
2022 - #1
That averages to #5 over a 4 year period. That's step 1, and we have done that.
This is a massive, positive point that can't be ignore or made light of. I agree it's awesome but as I will show later in the post some of these rankings are a little misleading where we got more quantity and a little less quality than some of the other teams in the top tier of recruiting and a couple or few in the SEC that we either have to face or could potentially face if we make it to the SEC champ game.
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We have a massive amount of talent on campus right now, in spite of a fair amount of defections, due to Jimbo's extraordinary recruiting. I also give Jimbo credit for doing a decent job with the transfer portal this year for the first time.
Here again, absolutely kuddos to Jimbo and crew and can't say enough about the talent on campus. Yes, he's accumulated more talent on any given year's roster than any other coach before him and yes, it took a while and many on here were upset that we missed out on a lot of opportunities in the portal but I agree, he has gotten aggressive in the late window and picked up some very important and crucial pieces in this 23 cycle. I can't wait to see how they utilize it going forward. I think we are going to start seeing them get aggressive earlier and pick up a regular 3-5 haul out of the early window in the portal going forward. Yes, I do think there will be years that are the exceptions and skew from that range but I think for the most part, that is what I am expecting to see from them.
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I would go so far as to say this is the greatest amount of football talent Texas A&M has ever had on campus at one time. Is there a Myles Garrett or Von Miller or Mike Evans on campus? Not that we know of yet. But as far as total numbers of highly talented players, we've never had more.
Here again, I already agreed and stated as such on my previous post but I will add, although there may not be a Myles Garrett or Von Miller that we know of, I have said since he committed that Noah Thomas is going to be the closest thing to Mike Evans we have seen and it won't surprise if he turns out to be just as good. Not saying he will b/c those are huge shoes to fill but they both had limited play in HS and Mike Evans went off in his second year removed from HS (didn't play as a true fish) and I truly believe we are about to see something similar with Thomas either this season or next, won't surprise me if he becomes as household name to Ags on here as Mike Evans. His style of play will remind you of Mike Evans. When I watched him in HS, that's all I could think about. Man this is Mike Evans 2.0. Can't wait to see him blow it up either this year or next. You can bet on it, telling you, stays healthy, it's gonna happen.
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Looking at our schedule, only Alabama has more talent. I would guess that LSU is pretty much of a toss-up. Other than that, I feel confident saying we have more talent than everyone else on our schedule. Is it unreasonable to expect to win the games against teams with inferior talent? We go 10-2 if we lose to only Alabama and LSU which I would certainly say was a successful season, especially considering 2022.
I definitely think talent gaps can be considered as a factor but not the end all determining factor. I mean we lost several games last year that are no where near as talented as we were. It happens and for various reasons. I think this schedule is much tougher than last year and will present different problems. Getting a dramatically improved Miami team on the road that early in the season (game 2) could definitely be a problem. I put it in the toss up category. Auburn in game 4 with Hugh Freeze working with more talent than he has ever had and yet, we all saw what he could do at old piss with slightly lesser talent now count in the fact that we will have virtually no film to prepare b/c their first 4 games are powder puffs in OOC and they will play as Vanilla as possible, pretty much like a scrimmage for them or a spring game, like we didn't show anything of Bobby P. Trust me he will pull out the tricks on us, we are their first real test. I put this game in the toss up category as well. I think Bama is a loss. Saban will be pissed and everybody will pay. He will be on the revenge tour as he doesn't like losing 2 games in a season. Last time that happened, he came back and went undefeated to claim another Natty the following year. I know what Looch has said so many times but I don't see things that way. I don't agree that they will take a step back this year. I think their defense is gonna be awesome and they finally have a WR that will dominate games again. He filled in nicely with the portal and I would say they are my favorite to win the Natty this year. With that said, following a loss to Bama and having a shortened travel week since we have to go face Tenn in Neyland and following that very physical game with Bama, I think Tenn takes us in their house, makes perfect sense to me. Lastly, I have Lsu as a toss up b/c I don't know how much of a big step forward they will take under Kelly but I know Jimbo really took it to them last year so they will want revenge, always expect the most improvement in year 2 under a coach and we are playing in the bayou which is always tough. I put this in my toss up category as well. So, 2 losse and 3 toss up games. I honestly think we at least go 2-1 in the toss ups and that would get us to 9-3 and with a bowl win, back to a 10 win final record. If we go 1-2 in the toss ups, obviously, it leaves us at 8-4 the way I have it predicted and there will be many on here jumping off the cliffs. I don't want to think about 0-3 in the toss ups but obviously if I predicted the rest of it correct and my predictions make complete sense to me, 0-3 would leaves us at 7-5 and if people weren't already calling for his head a thousand times, you can beat they will be. Which doesn't matter, he isn't going anywhere even at 7-5
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Is 8 or 9 wins good enough after last season? I say 8 wins is a bad season considering our talent level. Maybe 9 wins is a grey area? depending on who we beat, how we finish, what does 2024 class look like, etc.
The thing is, it doesn't matter what you think or what I think or anybody else on here, I promise you this, if we win 9 wins, there will still be plenty b**ching on here. If 8, even more and if somehow 7 wins, almost everybody but none of that matters b/c he won't be going anywhere. THE POWERS THAT BE who make those decisions and pay the large salaries aren't sending him packing no matter how much dismay there is on TAs.
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Is it reasonable to expect 9-10 wins after last year's debacle? I say it is.
Many seem to think so without really considering the tougher schedule and we still don't know how Addazio and Durkin will coach this year. I mean they both absolutely s**t the bed this past season and made terrible, unforgiveable decisions last year that cost us 4-5 wins (ruined our season) and sure I expect, even if they don't coach any better for our OL and run defense to be improved just b/c it's the second year under these coaches. I am hopeful that Bobby P can't generate some more scoring and that alone should win us the games against teams like Arky, Miss St, old piss, S Car but 4 wins and a 4-4 SEC record means at best 8-4 and that's if we can pull out that win on the road so early in the season in game 2 @ Miami.
See us comparative to Lsu............
Just looking at the HS recruits. I mean we could add in the transfers but that just makes things far more skewed in Lsu's direction. Let's face it, we haven't done anything in the transfer portal except Jahmir Johnson, Max Johnson and Miciah Overton and they brought in 15 transfer just in the 22 cycle (first year under Kelly) and many of those guys with talent but more importantly experience are scattered throughout their depth chart and will get plenty of playing time. I think when you consider that, it makes the gap larger to Lsu's advantage. I know many will say but we dominated them last year and that is true but they say the most significant year of improvement is typically year 1 to year 2 under a new coach. So I expect a big step forward from Lsu this year and that makes it a toss up game in my mind. I think Jimbo out coached him last year with lesser talent in depth and obviously lesser experience overall but we will see just how much of a step forward Lsu takes this year.
So here is my look at the class comparisons between us and Lsu. Just comparing the 4 you did as well. Even though most on here realize that their 23 class with so many more transfers on top of a #7 ranking, really pulls the gap wider, but let's just focus on the 4 you brought up.
2019--------many would argue, Lsu had a slightly better quality class and we had the quantity on them in 19
AGGIES #4 w/ 27 commits and total points 285.70
Lsu--------#5 w/ only 25 commits (2 less commits) and total of 284.94
2020-----Here again, many would say Lsu had the quality edge and we had quantity in 2020
AGGIES-----#6 w/ 26 commits, total of 289.26
Lsu-----------#4 w/ only 22 commits (yes 4 less commits and 2 spots in front of us) total of 298.62
2021--------Same # of commits, obviously Lsu has better quality in 21
AGGIES---------#8 w/ 23 commits and total of 280.49
Lsu----------------#3 w/ 23 commits, total of 295.97
2022-----------Obviously, new HC and for a while there nobody knew who it would be, really hurt their numbers
AGGIES----------#1 w/ 30 commits, total of 333.13
Lsu----------------#12 w/ only 15 commits, total of 245.76
GIG EM AGGIES!!!
