Recruiting Country: The latest recruiting news surrounding the Maroon & White

TexAgs' recruiting analyst Ryan Brauninger joined TexAgs Radio on Wednesday morning for another edition of Recruiting Country, highlighting the latest news and notes from the recruiting trail surrounding Texas A&M.

Key notes from Recruiting Country

• We don’t know how Mike Elko is as a recruiter at a place like this as a head coach. He has run the roads more now. For anybody to come up with a narrative about what kind of recruiter he is or isn't up to this point because of what you think you know, that is preemptive. It's shortsighted. We don’t know yet. We have a good idea. He is organized and running the roads like crazy.
   
• Hard working is the No. 1 attribute I can give to him right now. In terms of how effective he is, we will wait and see. The organizational structure is much different than what Jimbo Fisher had rolling. He has a portal guy, a high school guy, a general manager and directors of player personnel. It is very structured.
   
• Getting the ball to the finish line is important. It is a mad scramble. That is the best way to describe it. 
   
• I cautioned everyone when I put out a DJ Lagway‍ update because I knew how it would be received. He might be the state Offensive Player of the Year this year. I had to put it out. Another service had run quotes from a family member of DJs.
   
• Florida was aware that if this happened with A&M, this could be a real problem. Ahead of time, they were scrambling to thwart any kind of momentum with DJ Lagway. He is an option for A&M. He met with Mike Elko. He met with Collin Klein. By all accounts, those visits went extremely well, but he has been committed to Florida for a long time. They had plans in place on and off the field that was going to be tough to beat.
   
• What kind of situation will he have in Gainesville? He may have a really nice bedroom and a house that is on fire. If things don't go well, is Billy Napier fired? I am not speculating on this. These are things that are being talked about among top Florida media members. As of this morning, I put on the site I did not have a quarterback update. I thought if Lagway visited anywhere this weekend, it would be Florida. 
   
• From what I was told, Collin Klein was over the top impressive in terms of football knowledge and ability to explain his offense. He knew the exact percentage of what he ran when. He knew the certain effectiveness of 21 personnel, 22 personnel and five wide personnel.
   
• You are asking Elko to push a giant snowball up a hill with the sun beating down on it. It's tough. I have not been given 1000 percent confirmation that he is visiting Florida this weekend.
   
• You had two commitments off the visitor list. They were at positions where you needed impact players and depth. Corner and receiver. You got Will Lee, who was the highest-rated defender on the Kansas State defense. That was an important get. 
   
• A&M has five scholarship receivers right now. They needed to add. Javon Harvey played in a really poor offense at Old Dominion. We have seen it with Jahdae Walker, guys coming from the lower level and making an impact. Harvey is a guy that staff thought, "He has been pretty productive, but he was on offense that struggled to get him the ball. Is there another level of production here?" They thought he could make an impact on the team next year. The first two commits of the Elko era are portal guys. 
   
• With the current state of NIL and the current recruiting calendar, something has to change, probably on both fronts. This may be a hot take. I think the way NIL is currently structured is a house of cards. It is coming down. I don't know when or how. I think it will topple down soon. It cannot last.
   
• People were upset with Deshaun Watson's contract in the NFL because it changed the market from quarterbacks. The owners of NFL teams are all working under the same financial restrictions. There is some fair play. In college football, you have 65 Power 5 teams who have no intention of working together to find common ground. You have different laws in every state.
   
• Let's say Christain Nuño is a class of 2024 offensive lineman. There is one school that is recruiting him hard, and they want to pay him $750,000 in his first year. Now. Buck Buchanan, Olin's dog, is a class of 2025 offensive lineman from the same area as Christain Nuño. Whenever Buck goes out, he is expecting the same money. The market value for every offensive tackle who is rated near Christain Nuño, everyone thinks that is what they should get. Do that across every position. 
   
• News flash for people going into these NIL negotiations, that certain school may have enough money to pay you, but what will they put around you?
   
• Last year, Florida promised Jaden Rashada money they did not have. How often will that happen? When do we start seeing high school players going to college who hold out because they were promised X amount of dollars and are not happy with their compensation plan?
   
• College football fanbases have massive numbers of people. Not many programs have massive numbers of people willing to give to NIL. Every dollar impacts NIL. The difference makers are the guys at the top writing the big checks. Who has the most of those? When do they get tired of writing the checks? As more guys jump in the portal, if the lifespan of a college football on campus is 18 months on average now, where is the incentive for these people giving money to be loyal to the program?
   
• As a player, you can endear yourself to these fanbases. Texas A&M changed my life. I have a lot of things right now because of A&M and the connections I made there. Look at this long-term. 
   
• The preemptive financial decision would be to come out in favor of the school that you are at as early as you can because you are building loyalty among the fan base. 
   
• I'm sure Mike Elko would like to be doing current player evaluations while trying to hire coaches and recruit. They need to alter the portal window and move it back later. Do away with Early Signing Day. Go back to one in February or the old docu-sign theory when a guy can sign whenever he wants. 
   
• I think Tyanthony Smith‍ is conflicted. A lot has happened. He has great ties to the A&M recruiting staff. He was very close with D.J. Durkin. It is becoming increasingly unlikely that Durkin will be here beyond the bowl game. That doubt may have allowed things to creep in.
   
• Behind the scenes, Texas has done a good job of working that relationship and moving up the pecking order. Texas had real momentum on Sunday and Monday with Tyanthony. As it started to get out that he was planning to visit, it made him think about if he wanted all this attention. He is taking a step back and re-evaluating.
   
• There is still a chance. I think it's a coin flip. On Early Signing Day, regardless of whether he shows up in Austin this weekend, I do anticipate him having a Letter of Intent from both schools.
   
• Tristan Jernigan‍ is supposed to come to A&M this weekend on an official visit. If you want to keep him from signing from Alabama, you need to get him to visit A&M. Before Alabama had offered, he had called it his dream school. The coaching change at A&M made it difficult for him. Alabama has that thing rolling in their direction. If A&M gets him on campus, they have a chance to get that in their favor.
   
• I do not think Drelon Miller‍ will change his mind. That was out of the blue. It caught me by suprise. The last conversations I had about Drelon, it sounded like Colorado had a lot of work to do. I would put that as increasingly unlikely. 
   
• What is next Wednesday going to feel like? Who knows? Recruiting is inherently fluid. When you have a coaching change and an old staff still on campus, it adds to the fluidity.
   
• There are guys I am very certain A&M will sign on Wednesday. Probably 12 of them. I don't know about Terry Bussey‍. I don't know about Dominick McKinley‍. I think he will wait until February. I don't know about Tristan Jernigan. I don’t know about Tyanthony Smith. Jernigan won't sign until Friday.
   
• A&M will sign Ashton Funk‍, Isendre Ahfua‍ and Miles O'Neill‍. They have a great group of commits coming in this weekend. They have some interesting transfers and high school players visiting. Maybe some names you have not heard of before show up this weekend and sign with A&M on Wednesday. One of those is a running back out of Tampa, Florida, Anthony Carrie‍. 
   
• I have the latest on our site about the trio from Oregon State.