Adam Cushing to take HC job at EIU

[NUCat320]

A good barometer for our recruiting being where it needs to be will be when a board like this no longer has our annual smattering of posts about alumni making a team as a free agent. Or getting playing time in the NFL. Or just getting a start. Or making an interception. Or scoring a TD. Or getting 5 tackles, or whatever....

Do you think they post like that on any of the top teams boards when an alum does something? NFL success by alumni is expected.

It’s not a cause for celebration at Michigan when a football alum gets elevated from the practice squad!

We will know our recruiting has truly upticked when the mere fact of an NU player seeing a little bit of success in the NFL is no longer something that anybody around here feels is worth posting because it’s simply routine.

As much as I *love* “[xxxxxx] scored a touchdown!” threads, they are an indicator of NU’s recruiting and development. That said, there are way more candidates for those types of threads today than there were in the “Baz might see some action” days of a decade ago.

On the rare occasions I see the personal intros on NFL games, it’s shocking the number of OSU guys who show up. (Well, not shocking, but frequent.)

 

[Turk]

True about the depth. But it’s not just the depth. It’s the star players, too. Their star players are Heisman candidates and First - Team All Americans and top-level NFL draft picks. And they have a handful of those every year. We get a few guys on the All-Big Ten squad.

We've upticked recruiting. There’s no doubt about that. Particularly in the depth department.

But it’s not enough to just do a little bit better. It needs to be a lot better to hang in the same recruiting realm as Michigan or PSU or Wisconsin or MSU. And I’m not sure we will ever be able to recruit like OSU. Or that we’d want to.

A good barometer for our recruiting being where it needs to be will be when a board like this no longer has our annual smattering of posts about alumni making a team as a free agent. Or getting playing time in the NFL. Or just getting a start. Or making an interception. Or scoring a TD. Or getting 5 tackles, or whatever....

Do you think they post like that on any of the top teams boards when an alum does something? NFL success by alumni is expected.

It’s not a cause for celebration at Michigan when a football alum gets elevated from the practice squad!

We will know our recruiting has truly upticked when the mere fact of an NU player seeing a little bit of success in the NFL is no longer something that anybody around here feels is worth posting because it’s simply routine.

I don't know if we ever had that one player, or two players, who came in as true game changers like OSU, etc. Maybe Hunter? And clearly Paddy is close to that now.
But I disagree with you on all of the stud recruiting. I really think we are 1 or 2 players from winning the ND, Michigan, or OSU game, and those 1 or 2 don't have to be 5 star players because of the system we employ. We have a 4 or 5 year harvest, OSU player harvest is 1 and done, or maybe 2 years. We harvest a different crop.
It isn't a cop out, our players are a different cloth than what OSU generally recruits. A 3 star guy isn't the same as a 5 star guy for the first year. But the great equalizer is 4 or 5 years of experience. Essentially, we play like a suburban team against a city team. Our team has been playing longer together. That's our mantra.

If Hunter is a game changer then we are lucky because if there is one position where a true game changer needs to be is at QB and we simply haven't a game changing QB come in and start his first year.

But, yea, if we had 1 or 2 more players on the depth chart then it would have been equal chances against OSU, Michigan ND. In all 3 games, we had injuries kill us and hose us the fourth quarter.

 

[BobbCat14]

I don't know if we ever had that one player, or two players, who came in as true game changers like OSU, etc. Maybe Hunter? And clearly Paddy is close to that now.
But I disagree with you on all of the stud recruiting. I really think we are 1 or 2 players from winning the ND, Michigan, or OSU game, and those 1 or 2 don't have to be 5 star players because of the system we employ. We have a 4 or 5 year harvest, OSU player harvest is 1 and done, or maybe 2 years. We harvest a different crop.
It isn't a cop out, our players are a different cloth than what OSU generally recruits. A 3 star guy isn't the same as a 5 star guy for the first year. But the great equalizer is 4 or 5 years of experience. Essentially, we play like a suburban team against a city team. Our team has been playing longer together. That's our mantra.

If Hunter is a game changer then we are lucky because if there is one position where a true game changer needs to be is at QB and we simply haven't a game changing QB come in and start his first year.

But, yea, if we had 1 or 2 more players on the depth chart then it would have been equal chances against OSU, Michigan ND. In all 3 games, we had injuries kill us and hose us the fourth quarter.

We may only be one or two stud players from squeeking out a win against an OSU or ND or Michigan. But I’m not taking about one win that we can hang our hat on for a decade or two until the next one.

How many studs do we need to play them at least . 500 for rest of Fitz’s tenure? That’s the question. And I don’t think the answer is one or two.

Also, flip it around. How many studs can they afford lose and still beat us? I think that number is more like a dozen or more - because that’s what happens every year, so that’s not speculation. That’s reality year in and year out when the draft comes along.

If we want to be able to consistently win against teams that can afford to lose 20% of their best players every year to the NFL and still beat us every year or almost every year, I don’t think that one or two extra stud recruits moves the needle. I think it’s more like 6-8- and maybe 10 guy who can go toe to toe with their guys as athletes and win battles. That’s a giant move in talent, but that’s what I think it would take to be able to consistently play even up with the big boys and win at least as often as we lose.

 

[Turk]

We may only be one or two stud players from squeeking out a win against an OSU or ND or Michigan. But I’m not taking about one win that we can hang our hat on for a decade or two until the next one.

How many studs do we need to play them at least . 500 for rest of Fitz’s tenure? That’s the question. And I don’t think the answer is one or two.

Also, flip it around. How many studs can they afford lose and still beat us? I think that number is more like a dozen or more - because that’s what happens every year, so that’s not speculation. That’s reality year in and year out when the draft comes along.

If we want to be able to consistently win against teams that can afford to lose 20% of their best players every year to the NFL and still beat us every year or almost every year, I don’t think that one or two extra stud recruits moves the needle. I think it’s more like 6-8- and maybe 10 guy who can go toe to toe with their guys as athletes and win battles. That’s a giant move in talent, but that’s what I think it would take to be able to consistently play even up with the big boys and win at least as often as we lose.

Well, yea, but that's a whole different program I think you are talking about. What is the value of a 5 star nowadays when they bail out and skip a bowl game or playoff game to focus on an NFL combine? And what good is it if we win the west then (dream) a playoff but our best players skip out and announce NFL?
While it is tempting, I'm not really sure I want the 5 stars to routinely come here, play 1 or 2 years and leave. And, as it turned out, we ended up with 5 stars in Walker, Lowry, JJTBC, Lanny but they were closet 5 stars and might not have had the NFL agents calling them as much to skip out of college. If any of those played for OSU, they would have started and been brands.

 

[BobbCat14]

Well, yea, but that's a whole different program I think you are talking about. What is the value of a 5 star nowadays when they bail out and skip a bowl game or playoff game to focus on an NFL combine? And what good is it if we win the west then (dream) a playoff but our best players skip out and announce NFL?
While it is tempting, I'm not really sure I want the 5 stars to routinely come here, play 1 or 2 years and leave. And, as it turned out, we ended up with 5 stars in Walker, Lowry, JJTBC, Lanny but they were closet 5 stars and might not have had the NFL agents calling them as much to skip out of college. If any of those played for OSU, they would have started and been brands.

I agree with you that we don’t want the kids that aren’t interested in going to school at all - the “we ain’t here for no school” types.

We want 4 and 5 year players. So I think we want the kids whose inclination and instinct is to stay and graduate, but who can be swayed if the NFL situation is just too good to be true. There’s another telltale of where we are. We’ve never had one of those, ever — a guy who was torn between staying and graduating or taking high first round, life- changing money. OSU has a few every year.

Actually, I take that back. OSU hardly ever has any of those guys either because almost none of those kids ever had a chance at graduating in the first place. They had one foot out the door the minute they set their first foot on campus.

 

[hdhntr1]

What it all says is we are good enough to win the West (none of whom are great at recruiting) but we have a ways to go to beat the cream of the East and win the B1G.

Depends on what you mean by great. If you mean at the level of OSU, then the West teams have not been great but then again, who would be considered great compared to that?. But if you mean recruiting to their system, WIS and NU have been pretty good. NEB seems to be improving dramatically as is Purdue. Does not mean they will equal OSU.

 

[Turk]

I agree with you that we don’t want the kids that aren’t interested in going to school at all - the “we ain’t here for no school” types.

We want 4 and 5 year players. So I think we want the kids whose inclination and instinct is to stay and graduate, but who can be swayed if the NFL situation is just too good to be true. There’s another telltale of where we are. We’ve never had one of those, ever — a guy who was torn between staying and graduating or taking high first round, life- changing money. OSU has a few every year.

Actually, I take that back. OSU hardly ever has any of those guys either because almost none of those kids ever had a chance at graduating in the first place. They had one foot out the door the minute they set their first foot on campus.

I think we currently have a player or two who could opt out of their last year for the NFL. Paddy or Hunter seem to have the talent, and Paddy is already gathering post season awards. We may get there in basketball eventually as well. One thing is sure, as you mentioned, our recruiting is on the uptick and that may get us better players who will do even better under Fitz/Collins. We will lose some players to the NFL and NBA, given our new facilities. As Fitz said, our facilities are the best in college and maybe the best in the NFL. Smart to sink the money into a practice facility since that is where all the hours will be spent, as opposed to a stadium that will only see 6 or 7 days of attendance. Then again, W/R 2.0 did wonders.

 

[NUCats]

Definitions I suppose. You apparently believe our performance is good enough. I don't, and what is holding us back (as seen in the B1G title game) is our talent. We need to recruit (and develop, at least on the OL) better. We will never get past dOSU or UM with the mediocre recruiting we have had to date. To do it, we will need more players that could actually play for them.

Our commits have a few marquee offers, but we don't have as many name offers as we should aspire. How many had Ohio State, (commitable) Michigan, OU, Clemson, or Alabama offers? Or even Stanford? Not enough and not nearly as much as Barnett's peak years. So, yes, mediocre. Whatever you want to call it, our recruiting since Barnett left has been good enough to win us exactly zero B1G titles (2000 being won with a team of largely Barnett recruited talent). If it's not the recruiting (regardless of whatever excuses you might make for it), what do you attribute the reason for us being mired in a dearth of conference championships, CFP appearances, and NFL draft picks?

Hunter Johnson is a step forward, and I hope Kirtz and Genson Hooper are the breakthrough type of talent we need for him to throw to (though neither are considered top 150 at least by Rivals).

Bring back Barnett! He is only 1 year older than Hank! Give him an honorary assistant H/C title.

/s