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The lack of upperclassmen and the transition to Petersen's culture
whatshouldicareabout
Member, Swaye's Wigwam Posts: 12,947 
The strength of any good college football team is its upperclassmen, right? After all, these are the veterans who have the experience, knowledge, and leadership to drive a team toward a championship. And for every team in college football this year, the upperclassmen hail from the 2011 and 2012 recruiting classes which should all be SRs or RS Jrs at this point.
So why not take a look back at those two wonderful recruiting classes and see who our leaders are heading into 2015?
For 2011, we pulled in:
Derrick Brown
Dexter Charles
Connor Cree
Travis Feeney
Jarett Finau
Marvin Hall
ASJ
Jamaal Jones
Scott Lawyer
Kyle Lewis
Matthew Lyons
Josh Perkins
Marcus Peters
Dezden Petty
James Sample
Bishop Sankey
Danny Shelton
Siosifa Tufunga
Taniela Tupou
Corey Waller
Kasen Williams
Evan Zeger
And 2012 was:
Kalei Auelua
Brandon Beaver
Shane Brostek
Nathan Dean
Korey Durkee
Jake Eldrenkamp
Cory Fuavai
Taylor Hindy
Jeff Lindquist
Cory Littleton
Ryan McDaniel
Jaydon Mickens
Cyler Miles
Blake Rodgers
Kendyl Taylor
Shaq Thompson
Damion Turpin
Pio Vatuvei
Cleveland Wallace
Darien Washington
Dwayne Washington
Erich Wilson
Psalm Wooching
That's a total of 45 players who committed to UW over recruiting 2 classes. And if you haven't already noticed, the names in bold are those who are still on the team. That's 18. Of the 45 players we signed in 2011 and 2012, only 40% remain.
Of course, a few players were not so much as lost to attrition but advanced to the NFL early, whose names were italicized, so we should really only expect 40 players from those classes to be on the team. But even with that fact, only 45% of what was intended to be the foundation of this program in 2015 still remains with UW today. FWIW, 30% of Sark's last class at UW, 2013, have already left the program.
One final sobering fact... despite only being 1 year removed from Sark, there are only 37 players left from Sark's recruiting classes on the team whereas there are 48 from Petersen (including everyone from 2015 including Rice and Carty). That means that 58% of the this team will be Petersen's recruits this year, an improvement from last year which was 71% Sark's players.
So what does all this mean? What's the point of all these numbers?
The point I am hoping to make is that, due to Sark's mismanagement of the roster, this team is already a majority of Petersen's players. Maybe it's not Petersen's team yet, in terms of starters, but we expect to see significant contribute from his players this season like Baker, Jones, Pettis, and Dissly. What's important about this fact is that these are players that Petersen has evaluated, that he's gotten to know, that he's determined if they fit his system or not, and that he's offered a scholarship to. And the same is true the other way around: these are kids that have gotten to know Petersen, that buy into his vision and embrace his culture.
The point here is that the culture and vision of Petersen is beginning to set in, and the fact that a majority of this team is his players should speak to this transition. In his first season, not many players were exposed to this system... and those that were exposed to it were true freshmen. Who knows how many bought in, resisted, or just didn't fit like Petersen wanted. Now, the team is being made up of Petersen's players and it should begin to show on the field this fall. The transition year is over and the culture should be in place by now... and when the incoming recruiting class arrives this fall, over half the team will be Petersen's players for the first time.
So why not take a look back at those two wonderful recruiting classes and see who our leaders are heading into 2015?
For 2011, we pulled in:
Derrick Brown
Dexter Charles
Connor Cree
Travis Feeney
Jarett Finau
Marvin Hall
ASJ
Jamaal Jones
Scott Lawyer
Kyle Lewis
Matthew Lyons
Josh Perkins
Marcus Peters
Dezden Petty
James Sample
Bishop Sankey
Danny Shelton
Siosifa Tufunga
Taniela Tupou
Corey Waller
Kasen Williams
Evan Zeger
And 2012 was:
Kalei Auelua
Brandon Beaver
Shane Brostek
Nathan Dean
Korey Durkee
Jake Eldrenkamp
Cory Fuavai
Taylor Hindy
Jeff Lindquist
Cory Littleton
Ryan McDaniel
Jaydon Mickens
Cyler Miles
Blake Rodgers
Kendyl Taylor
Shaq Thompson
Damion Turpin
Pio Vatuvei
Cleveland Wallace
Darien Washington
Dwayne Washington
Erich Wilson
Psalm Wooching
That's a total of 45 players who committed to UW over recruiting 2 classes. And if you haven't already noticed, the names in bold are those who are still on the team. That's 18. Of the 45 players we signed in 2011 and 2012, only 40% remain.
Of course, a few players were not so much as lost to attrition but advanced to the NFL early, whose names were italicized, so we should really only expect 40 players from those classes to be on the team. But even with that fact, only 45% of what was intended to be the foundation of this program in 2015 still remains with UW today. FWIW, 30% of Sark's last class at UW, 2013, have already left the program.
One final sobering fact... despite only being 1 year removed from Sark, there are only 37 players left from Sark's recruiting classes on the team whereas there are 48 from Petersen (including everyone from 2015 including Rice and Carty). That means that 58% of the this team will be Petersen's recruits this year, an improvement from last year which was 71% Sark's players.
So what does all this mean? What's the point of all these numbers?
The point I am hoping to make is that, due to Sark's mismanagement of the roster, this team is already a majority of Petersen's players. Maybe it's not Petersen's team yet, in terms of starters, but we expect to see significant contribute from his players this season like Baker, Jones, Pettis, and Dissly. What's important about this fact is that these are players that Petersen has evaluated, that he's gotten to know, that he's determined if they fit his system or not, and that he's offered a scholarship to. And the same is true the other way around: these are kids that have gotten to know Petersen, that buy into his vision and embrace his culture.
The point here is that the culture and vision of Petersen is beginning to set in, and the fact that a majority of this team is his players should speak to this transition. In his first season, not many players were exposed to this system... and those that were exposed to it were true freshmen. Who knows how many bought in, resisted, or just didn't fit like Petersen wanted. Now, the team is being made up of Petersen's players and it should begin to show on the field this fall. The transition year is over and the culture should be in place by now... and when the incoming recruiting class arrives this fall, over half the team will be Petersen's players for the first time.
Comments
Grades, injuries, transfers. Shit happens.
- if Sark were like Sabin... a *real* James disciple... he would have signed 50, not 45. He would start the sorting process after they arrived on campus, not while they were still on a commitment list.
- sign and enroll 25 players, develop them and you should end up with 12-15 seniors every year.
Next time I suggest paragraph breaks sandwiched with Swayes greatest hits, and maybe a couple of one liners to remind us this is the HHB.
I think a better exercise is to look at what kind of players the upperclassmen (the ones still here) are. All the talk about culture is fine, but the real problem is a lack of talent.
2011
Charles - Decent Player
Feeney - Above average Pac 12 LB
Finau - Bum, little to no impact
Hall - Bum at WR. Best QB on the team.
Lawyer - Barely better than being a bum
Perkins - Decent player
Tufunga - Average
Tupou- Bum, little to no impact
Sark signed some elite talent for 2011. Shelton, Sankey, ASJ, Peters, and Kasen (first 3 years) is a hell of a core. Unfortunately, over half that class was filled with average to shitty players.
2012
Beaver - Bum
Brostek - Bum so far. Some still hold onto hope. I don't.
Durkee - He's a punter, who cares?
Eldrenkamp - Average is probably being generous
Fuavai - Bum
Lindquist - Bum
Littleton - Decent player
Mickens - I hate him, but I guess he's okay
Turpin- Bum
Wooching - Bum
The 2012 class was a total dreckfest.
The best upperclassmen are Charles, Feeney, Perkins, and Mickens. None of them are projected to be All Conference players. And this is why we are projected to suck.
That should read Sarkasm, but whatever. Nah, more a point of how the transition and culture change that Petersen has been talking about should be evident by now. Also a slight to Sark's roster management since his last 3 classes only account for 37 players total, but that should be a good thing since Petersen is trying to bring a culture change and bringing in his own players for his own system will be a big part of that. Disagree I didn't count JUCOs since those players would have graduated already, so these are only HS numbers. That's true for someone like Sark, but at BSU, Petersen usually recruited about 20 kids per class since he was able to retain most of his players each year. In fact, the 2010 recruiting class only had 10 kids. I'm expecting something stable like that from Petersen every year, rather than getting 25 kids and running 10 off each class.
Peterman had lots of guys drafted from BSU, but many of them were guys who developed over 4-5 years, instead of the 3-and-done level of talent. Most of those guys aren't going to BSU no matter who the coach is.