adoniijahsooner
1/20/2011, 06:29 PM
Good Stuff
http://insider.espn.go.com/ncf...&id=6041904
First Down: America's top five recruiting coordinators
National Signing Day is now less than two weeks away. To some, it should be a federal holiday. To others, it is merely a confusing time of big boards, blogs, grainy Friday night video, and talk radio chatter that might as well be in Portuguese.
For a recruiting coordinator at a big-time program it means one thing -- caffeine. Anyone who has read my man Bruce Feldman's milestone recruiting book "Meat Market" knows what I'm talking about. Every member of the coaching staff will spend the days between now and February 2 stumbling through a sleepless haze of Red Bull and NCAA compliance papers.
But if the right kid puts on the right ball cap, it will all be worth it. Maybe. The truth is that no one will know until that kid hits the field in August.
So, who are the best in the business when it comes to reeling in the prep talent? In my humble opinion, these are the top five:
5. Ed Orgeron, USC Trojans
Coach O was the primary subject of Feldman's book, which camped out with the then-head coach in the Mississippi Rebels' recruiting War Room. Orgeron's intensity on the recruiting trail is unmatched, skills he honed at USC and then carried to Mississippi, to the Tennessee Volunteers and then back to Southern California. There was a time -- a very long time -- when Orgeron would have been the undisputed number one on this list.
But a trail of issues has followed him from one school to another. Some say that's simply the result of his aggressive personality (example: his current selling point to recruits is that USC will beat their current NCAA bowl ban and scholarship restrictions win they win their pending appeal). Others say he lives life with a "ready, shoot, aim" mentality that is a blatant disrespect of authority.
But no matter how you feel about him personally, the talent that he has put on the field over the last decade cannot be questioned.
4. Jim Cavanaugh, Virginia Tech Hokies
The Commonwealth of Virginia has always been a quiet gridiron gold mine, particularly in the northernmost tip of the state and the Norfolk-Virginia Beach area. Before Frank Beamer took over in Blacksburg, the players from these regions either went to play for the Virginia Cavaliers or escaped north to play for Bobby Ross and the Maryland Terrapins. Cavanaugh was the receivers coach at U.Va. in 1981 and coached running backs and the offense during Maryland's glory years of the mid-1980's.
What's more, he coached high school football in Newport News, right smack in the middle of Virginia's biggest talent pool, Hampton Roads, a.k.a. the home region of Michael Vick. So it's no surprise that since Cavanaugh came to Tech in 1996 they stopped losing that in-state talent to other schools and starting making annual appearances in top-10 recruiting class listings.
3. James Coley, Florida State Seminoles
Coley mastered the fine art of tweeting perhaps quicker than any other coach in the country, creating a platform from which he is about to sign his third consecutive top-10 recruiting class (closoing in on No. 1, in fact). The first came when many believed the program was on the decline, the last of Bobby Bowden's freshman classes. The last two groups have fueled a furious FSU comeback that got the Seminoles to within one win of a BCS bowl berth and already has them in most analysts' 2011 preseason Top 15. Historically known as one of the best final-week recruiting closers around, Coley got the bulk of this year's class inked early, smartly swooping in to sell stability to kids and their families while the Florida Gators and Miami Hurricanes were caught up in head coaching changeovers.
2. Cale Gundy, Oklahoma Sooners
Some might argue that anyone could recruit in a gridiron-obsessed state that also happens to border the Lone Star State, which is the greatest football factory of them all. But it is still no small task to compete with the Texas Longhorns, not to mention the growing influence of the Oklahoma State Cowboys. Still, Gundy continues to hold his own. And since the former Sooners QB took over recruiting duties in 2005, he has managed to stretch the corners of OU's search net beyond the southwest. Last year he stunned the SEC, ACC, and Pac-10 by snatching up three four-star recruits out of Southern California, along with landing blue-chip running back Roy Finch from the Florida panhandle.
1. Don Pellum, Oregon Ducks
The first four coordinators on our list all have one very important advantage in common: they live and work right smack in the middle of football talent pipelines. Not Pellum. An Oregon grad and a former recruiting coordinator for the California Golden Bears, he long ago established footholds up and down the West Coast, helping to build up the Ducks from a longtime also-ran into a national power. Now he routinely stakes claims in far-flung locales to the east. Of the Ducks' 20 early commits, there are two apiece from Florida and Texas and three of those four are listed among the ESPN 150. "It's a long way from Florida to Eugene," says former Ducks coach Mike Bellotti, "But if anyone can sell that move it is Don Pellum. Of course, winning doesn't hurt either."
Neither does that giant Nike swoosh. But you still have to go out and sign the kids. That's exactly what Coach Pellum does.
http://insider.espn.go.com/ncf...&id=6041904
First Down: America's top five recruiting coordinators
National Signing Day is now less than two weeks away. To some, it should be a federal holiday. To others, it is merely a confusing time of big boards, blogs, grainy Friday night video, and talk radio chatter that might as well be in Portuguese.
For a recruiting coordinator at a big-time program it means one thing -- caffeine. Anyone who has read my man Bruce Feldman's milestone recruiting book "Meat Market" knows what I'm talking about. Every member of the coaching staff will spend the days between now and February 2 stumbling through a sleepless haze of Red Bull and NCAA compliance papers.
But if the right kid puts on the right ball cap, it will all be worth it. Maybe. The truth is that no one will know until that kid hits the field in August.
So, who are the best in the business when it comes to reeling in the prep talent? In my humble opinion, these are the top five:
5. Ed Orgeron, USC Trojans
Coach O was the primary subject of Feldman's book, which camped out with the then-head coach in the Mississippi Rebels' recruiting War Room. Orgeron's intensity on the recruiting trail is unmatched, skills he honed at USC and then carried to Mississippi, to the Tennessee Volunteers and then back to Southern California. There was a time -- a very long time -- when Orgeron would have been the undisputed number one on this list.
But a trail of issues has followed him from one school to another. Some say that's simply the result of his aggressive personality (example: his current selling point to recruits is that USC will beat their current NCAA bowl ban and scholarship restrictions win they win their pending appeal). Others say he lives life with a "ready, shoot, aim" mentality that is a blatant disrespect of authority.
But no matter how you feel about him personally, the talent that he has put on the field over the last decade cannot be questioned.
4. Jim Cavanaugh, Virginia Tech Hokies
The Commonwealth of Virginia has always been a quiet gridiron gold mine, particularly in the northernmost tip of the state and the Norfolk-Virginia Beach area. Before Frank Beamer took over in Blacksburg, the players from these regions either went to play for the Virginia Cavaliers or escaped north to play for Bobby Ross and the Maryland Terrapins. Cavanaugh was the receivers coach at U.Va. in 1981 and coached running backs and the offense during Maryland's glory years of the mid-1980's.
What's more, he coached high school football in Newport News, right smack in the middle of Virginia's biggest talent pool, Hampton Roads, a.k.a. the home region of Michael Vick. So it's no surprise that since Cavanaugh came to Tech in 1996 they stopped losing that in-state talent to other schools and starting making annual appearances in top-10 recruiting class listings.
3. James Coley, Florida State Seminoles
Coley mastered the fine art of tweeting perhaps quicker than any other coach in the country, creating a platform from which he is about to sign his third consecutive top-10 recruiting class (closoing in on No. 1, in fact). The first came when many believed the program was on the decline, the last of Bobby Bowden's freshman classes. The last two groups have fueled a furious FSU comeback that got the Seminoles to within one win of a BCS bowl berth and already has them in most analysts' 2011 preseason Top 15. Historically known as one of the best final-week recruiting closers around, Coley got the bulk of this year's class inked early, smartly swooping in to sell stability to kids and their families while the Florida Gators and Miami Hurricanes were caught up in head coaching changeovers.
2. Cale Gundy, Oklahoma Sooners
Some might argue that anyone could recruit in a gridiron-obsessed state that also happens to border the Lone Star State, which is the greatest football factory of them all. But it is still no small task to compete with the Texas Longhorns, not to mention the growing influence of the Oklahoma State Cowboys. Still, Gundy continues to hold his own. And since the former Sooners QB took over recruiting duties in 2005, he has managed to stretch the corners of OU's search net beyond the southwest. Last year he stunned the SEC, ACC, and Pac-10 by snatching up three four-star recruits out of Southern California, along with landing blue-chip running back Roy Finch from the Florida panhandle.
1. Don Pellum, Oregon Ducks
The first four coordinators on our list all have one very important advantage in common: they live and work right smack in the middle of football talent pipelines. Not Pellum. An Oregon grad and a former recruiting coordinator for the California Golden Bears, he long ago established footholds up and down the West Coast, helping to build up the Ducks from a longtime also-ran into a national power. Now he routinely stakes claims in far-flung locales to the east. Of the Ducks' 20 early commits, there are two apiece from Florida and Texas and three of those four are listed among the ESPN 150. "It's a long way from Florida to Eugene," says former Ducks coach Mike Bellotti, "But if anyone can sell that move it is Don Pellum. Of course, winning doesn't hurt either."
Neither does that giant Nike swoosh. But you still have to go out and sign the kids. That's exactly what Coach Pellum does.