Are WE Fisching In No Man's Land?
WoolleyDoog
Member, Swaye's Wigwam Posts: 3,847 
I like that it seems we're getting a hat on the table with better recruits after nearly half a decade of mostly signing guys who they had to fight it out with Kansas and other Little Sisters of the Poor. My only problem is I go through the visits and the better recruits and I always see at least one school that seems like UW hasn't won recruiting battles against since the Pete years then the TBS "experts" say he had a great visit but he's ultimately gonna go to Alabama, Texas, USC, Georgia, the school whose dad gives them way too much money to go to the strip club, etc.
It seemed like there used to be a sweet spot of good recruits who had parents who cared a bit about academis and culture etc who UW could beat UCLA and Stanford for during the Pete era and more instate talent, but those days seem over. Seems like there's gonna only be 1-3 WA guys worth offering forever now.
Long story short, are we going to get some sexy visits but just end up signing the guys we were in the Jimmy/Kalen eras anyway?
Comments
I want results now especially when you open your big fucking flapper and say this is going to be the best class at udub ever. Dumb fucking fish… he didn’t realize it’s going to take tim.
This years going to suck ass and I honestly think the following won’t be much better but it’s going to take Fish time to get his guys in… yeah I know. His guys aren’t going to get in until they are proving they can win with this staff. Doesn’t seem like they are emphasizing the portal enough or they are not allocating enough to the portal but I expect that to change after this year.
‘27 crooting class going to be speshul.
#visoronthetable
I'm officially worried. I trust Fisch's scouting and knowing which of the three star guys who you have to duke it out with Kansas to take. I just worry we're never getting those legit high four star guys like McDuffie, Fautanu, Rome, McMillan, Rosengarten types which UW needs to be a contender like they were.
Looking back, I think my periphery how is Jedd and Arizona in on these recruits may have been:
I'm not worried yet. Every visitor that was here last weekend has trips planned most every weekend up until June 21. Most will be committing at the end of June or early July.
I'm not following recruiting as closely but have things circled back to where guys take their full 4-5 trips again and then decide? It seemed like that was the way then for a long time it moved to where guys would frequently not even taking official visits anymore and once they locked onto a school actually commit pretty early?
I'm worried in that it felt like for a long time if a guy was actually going to UW, he shut things down at or after the visit and just committed or committed early and the guy who do the full process almost never go to UW anymore and they're the guys probably auctioning themselves off to the highest bidder, which won't be UW.
i think guys stop their visits when they are sure way more often now.
Recruiting has changed. You have to be a good staff that offers comparable comp to whatever the other schools offer. If this was 2018 I think we would be doing very well based on this staffs efforts. Just not how the game is played any more.
When DeBoer crooted like this I didn’t mind cause I knew we were gonna be a good team.
This isn’t gonna be that good of a team.
Demond Williams needs to save us in 2025 I guess🤷♂️🤷♂️
I have no idea. Fisch seems like a good salesman, and those guys used to clean up in crootin'. I just don't know how much it matters when cash is now directly involved.
With the conference changes losing out to any of the schools not in the B1G or SEC for west coast recruits is unacceptable.
I have some optimism in that:
I’m worried you’re right. Fisch is a salesman, and it appears we got sold on great recruiting and may have prematurely unleashed our inner doogs. I think you’re spot on that he’ll get some guys KDB wouldn’t have because he has a personality, but I don’t think we’re going to be pulling our best classes ever like he claimed.
As a reminder, fishers wife is hot so he can close the big deal. Just not with recruits.
I now wonder if Deboer could have gotten these guys to visit too but ultimately he knew they would cost energy and money that could be used for other stuff and he figured to just pass on hosting and stalking guys who aren't signing anyway.
I do think there is a bit of a bs game you have to play to land better recruits. I assume there's an appeal to creating a fake buzz that UW is a place you should visit and the same with signing or getting commits from overrated 4 stars just to bump up the rating so you don't look like some weird outlier school. I just don't know if UW can pull it off and the results seem to be mixed.
I think there are two things working against early commits now. One is that the extreme blue chips, like guys rated mid 90s or higher,want to create a bidding war and it's in their interest to let that play out.
The lower 4*and high 3* guys, if I understand correctly, haven't all been guaranteed cash just for showing up. Some get it, especially if they're one of the few higher rates recruits at a school that doesn't recruit with the big boys, but many/most don't. These guys are motivated to hold off as long as they can stand, with the hope that some money will eventually be part of the equation.
Uninformed guesses from the fringe...
I think these are decent theories. The problem is college football is so cloak and dagger you never really know with stuff so you kind of have to just guess and theorize a lot.
Exactly. I've always felt that way about college football. It's probably worse now though and it sure doesn't have the same intrigue for me that it used to. Maybe once all of this new shit settles out a bit.
I would think that at some point the $ being paid to players is going to become public and that would remove one of the bigger topics to speculate about.
It seems like the staff wants guys to take all their visits.
Money is always talked about but the glaring issue is that in an era where players will follow their position coaches around to random shit hole campuses, we've had 3 different staffs in 4 years. And the one consistently productive recruiter was the guy that survived multiple staff changes.
Fisch might need to do a little more than bullshit kids for a bit to get it going.
All I know is DeBoer had zero personality for it, had no track record of developing players for the NFL, and was liking posts on Twitter criticizing pay for play, and still put together a fringe top 25 class that many TBSers thought was much better than that ranking. So we will be fine.
I’ve been having a hard time understanding the angst over recruiting this early in Fisch’s tenure and going into a rebuilding season but this comment turned on a lightbulb for me-
Were y’all really expecting him to come in and put up a top ten class? In his first year?
I at least don't have angst yet, just worry. I'm not expecting a Top 10 class but he did big talk saying best recruiting class in program history and that would be Top 10. There's so many god damn things going against UW to make a Top 10 class right now and I think the system is more rigged and fucked up than it used to be. Still, I just wonder if what Deboer was doing may have been the way.
Agree on all this. Shepherd and Huff and possibly the DB coach seemed like the only real good recruiters on the staff and Huff seemed to even not recruit the higher TBS guys under DeBoer, but that also could partly be the West Coast OL talent being fucking thin.
I really liked Deboer's first class and what this one was gonna be before he took off. Until proven otherwise I did trust his strategy of seemingly taking guys who had great tools and not necessarily TBS hype and taking 4 star guys just to boost your rating. Plus, probably focusing on guys that are actually coming and not burning a million calories to get a hat on a table.
Thats just standard coach speak and puffery.
Top 25-30 should be expectations which is where Petersen was until maybe last couple years after they’d established dominance in the PAC.
I mostly agree with that but do think they have to swing more in the 11-20 range to be a team that can compete like the last two years. If you're getting Romes, Jalens, Troys, Rogengartens, Buddas, McDuffies you will be in that range and it's even trickier now with how shitty the talent is in-state and on the west coast. I think to actually win a natty last year they needed a couple Shaq Thompson types too.