USC recruiting and everything else

Whiskeyjack

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<iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/-lZFnbezAu4" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Kiffin's face @ ~1:00 is priceless.
 

NDohio

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Anybody remember the youtube channel of the guy that absolutely blew a gasket last year about Lane? I wouldn't mind seeing his reaction to this past weekend.
 
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Kak7304

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He's done a good job recruiting at USC, especially given the sanctions he's had to deal with, but he's also had a winning football program to sell, and, as you said, USC will always recruit well so how much of that was really Kiffin? I'm not trying to make the argument that he's not a good recruiter, but USC isn't the hardest place to recruit for either.

Now that the shine has worn off and he's not selling a winning program (technically 7-6 is winning, but for USC it's not) look at where they are in recruiting...ranked #48 with only 8 commits. I'm sure that will improve as they get more commits, but IF (and that's a big if at this point) he were to return for next season, it's safe to say this year's class will be Kiffin's worst at USC.

A new coach will be able to sell the "return USC to prominence" card we often see new coaches play. What's Kiffin selling? He's not going to be around to see these recruits graduate and any recruit they get between now and the time we learn Kiffin's fate for 2014 will be committing to the school, not the coach.

People always thought ND would be able to recruit really well but Tyrone Willingham. Kiffin is a good recruiter and also was at Tenn. although I wouldn't be surprised if he used means which weren't completely by the rules.
 

IrishLax

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Supposedly unlikely to be let go this week but USC had a meeting of the minds and the buyout money is in place. If he loses to BC (should be impossible) expect him to get fired immediately. He's officially circling the drain.
 

IrishInFl

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Supposedly unlikely to be let go this week but USC had a meeting of the minds and the buyout money is in place. If he loses to BC (should be impossible) expect him to get fired immediately. He's officially circling the drain.

Dude, they just lost to Washington State, how is losing to BC impossible?
 

IrishLax

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Dude, they just lost to Washington State, how is losing to BC impossible?

Hard to lose to a vastly inferior team immediately after losing to a vastly inferior team. You're angry and on your guard. BC is even worse than WSU too. I'll be surprised if BC scores a single point.
 

ACamp1900

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That pirate lunatic is going to win more games like that at Wash St also... BC doesn't have a pirate lunatic for a coach last time I checked...
 

IrishInFl

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Hard to lose to a vastly inferior team immediately after losing to a vastly inferior team. You're angry and on your guard. BC is even worse than WSU too. I'll be surprised if BC scores a single point.

Huh? Why are you accusing me of being angry? You used the strong language of calling something impossible. With Lane Kiffin, anything is possible.
 

Emcee77

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Huh? Why are you accusing me of being angry? You used the strong language of calling something impossible. With Lane Kiffin, anything is possible.

I don't think he meant you; he meant the team that just lost to a vastly inferior team and is now playing another vastly inferior team.
 

IrishLax

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Huh? Why are you accusing me of being angry? You used the strong language of calling something impossible. With Lane Kiffin, anything is possible.

You're = USC. THEY will be angry and on their guard. They expected to roll WSU... and when they didn't lie down and cooperate, they had no idea what to do. They'll come into BC aggressive instead of conservative.
 

NDhoosier

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This should help ND with Damien Mama (can't think of other USC leans that ND wants).

Juju Smith maybe.

You know one job that Kiffin would excel at... recruiting coordinator... the problem is that are his tactics all within the rules or will the team that hires him face penalties down the road.
 

NDinL.A.

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Juju Smith maybe.

You know one job that Kiffin would excel at... recruiting coordinator... the problem is that are his tactics all within the rules or will the team that hires him face penalties down the road.

If USC hires the right coach, all will be forgiven and they'll clean up in recruiting. There's tons of talent in SoCal and many of those recruits want to go to USC BADLY (think about how many are still considering USC even though they such absolute balls right now and they all know Kiffin is a joke); all they want is a nudge in the right direction. Hell, they're basically begging for a nudge in the right direction.

So once Kiffin gets fired and a new coach gets hired, those kids will give USC every chance in the world to win them over. That is why I wanted Kiffy to go like 9-4 so they would probably keep him for another year. Now? It would take a near miracle to keep his job. And with the eay recruits reacted after that loss, he'll be gone sooner rather than later IMHO...
 

Sherm Sticky

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Hard to lose to a vastly inferior team immediately after losing to a vastly inferior team. You're angry and on your guard. BC is even worse than WSU too. I'll be surprised if BC scores a single point.
BC is 2-0...just saying
 

NDWorld247

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BC's defense could keep them in this game. I don't expect BC to win, but I also don't think WSU is any better than BC so who knows.
 

Rack Em

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I found this on the twitter machine:

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p>I have a feeling this won't be the only time a fire lane is used this way at the Coliseum this year <a href="http://t.co/p5rZNC4Qnw">pic.twitter.com/p5rZNC4Qnw</a></p>— John Ireland (@LAIreland) <a href="https://twitter.com/LAIreland/statuses/376812054935375872">September 8, 2013</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
 

dublinirish

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Don't forget all those 2 star champs from MA that BC is reeling in on the recruiting trail!
 

BGIF

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Hard to lose to a vastly inferior team immediately after losing to a vastly inferior team. You're angry and on your guard. BC is even worse than WSU too. I'll be surprised if BC scores a single point.


One would think that but wouldn't that be similar to losing to BC and Pitt back to back?

Or say Navy, Pitt, and UCon back to back to back?

Or Navy and Tulsa back to back under a new head coach?



Lest we forget '08, '09, and '10.

ND didn't have the plethora of 4 and 5 star talent that USC has but it wasn't on sanctions either. There was still more talent here than on those teams we lost too. Plus Weis and Kelly were both better coaches than Kiffin.

Check out Kiffin's play calling against WSU. I commented on it in the USC GameDay thread.
 

NDWorld247

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Don't forget all those 2 star champs from MA that BC is reeling in on the recruiting trail!

I'm not sure what the purpose of this comment was, but since I'm offended by what I perceive is an attempt to knock the HS football played in the great commonwealth of Massachusetts, I'm going to call you out on the accuracy of this statement.

First, BC has ONE two-star committed from MA in this cycle, which is the average of two-stars from MA they've brought in over the past four recruiting cycles.

Second, 90+% of BC's scholarship players come from outside of MA. They recruit nationally with a focus on the east coast and Midwest. The new regime is trying to reel in more MA players which is smart because there is more div 1 talent here than ever before, regardless of the star rankings.

Third, a team of those "no-star champs from MA" just went down to MD and knocked off their defending state champion Dunbar HS last week.

Fourth, no one is going to confuse MA with TX, FL, or CA when it comes to HS football, but the commonwealth is grossly under evaluated by recruiting services/division 1 programs.

Finally, stop being a star chaser.
 

Whiskeyjack

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Matt Hinton just posted an article (on Deadspin unfortunately) about Kiffin's incompetence:

It's fitting that Kiffin's 2012 USC team began the season ranked No. 1. Unearned privilege has always been his thing. And in any case the best measure of Lane Kiffin is the height from which he falls. (Even before the fall, we were given the spectacle of Kiffin forfeiting his vote in the coaches' poll for lying to reporters about voting his own team in the top spot—he said publicly he had not, until it was revealed that, in fact, he had.) The 2012 Trojans failed to beat a ranked opponent, dropped five of their last six games and became the first team since 1964 to begin the regular season ranked No. 1 and end it outside of the polls altogether. The offense finished dead last in the conference with 34 giveaways. The defense, still overseen by the elderly Monte Kiffin, was ripped for 62 points by Oregon in the worst defensive performance in USC history. At one point, when USC's season began to turn south, even a handful of opposing coaches lined up to take anonymous potshots at Kiffin. In the same article, Kiffin was forced to admit, "With the players we have, we should not be 6-3." It's been all downhill from there.

Has any coach in recent memory managed to accomplish less with more? Every school has its reigning pariah coach, the cautionary tale who looms as a measuring stick for futility by which his successors will be judged after nearly every loss. But very few of them were ever bequeathed a roster remotely of the caliber of USC's, and the ones who were—Larry Coker at Miami, maybe Frank Solich at Nebraska—were at least able to get a couple of BCS bowls out of it before they lost the thread. Alabama, while cursed by a decade of underachievement and unloved coaches between Gene Stallings and Nick Saban, had not yet built the monolithic recruiting empire in those years that it's imposed under Saban. The roster Rich Rodriguez inherited at Michigan was ravaged beyond recognition by attrition; Louisville, despite plummeting from a BCS bowl under Bobby Petrino to last place in the Big East under his successor, Steve Kragthorpe, has never enjoyed first-rate talent even in fat times. Even the despised Charlie Weis coaxed back-to-back BCS bids at Notre Dame out of players recruited by Tyrone Willingham, who was fired in large part for being an indifferent recruiter.

USC, on the other hand, remains as loaded as ever: The one aspect of the job in which Kiffin clearly measures up to his mentor, Pete Carroll, is recruiting. Despite scholarships restrictions, Rivals.com has ranked each of USC's last four recruiting classes from 2010–13 in the top 15 nationally. No team in that span has signed more five-star headliners, including Alabama. Out of 22 starters against Washington State, all but two (offensive linemen Chad Wheeler and Marcus Martin) arrived at SC with at least four-star ratings, compared with one four-star talent (wide receiver Gabe Marks) on Washington State's entire roster. That number includes the highly touted quarterbacks, Max Wittek and Cody Kessler—both in their third year in Kiffin's system—who would have been more productive against Wazzu if they had replaced every passing play with a kneel-down. (At least then Washington State would not have scored a touchdown.) If last year was a clinic in how to blow a golden opportunity, last weekend was a clinic in how to prevent an ostensibly blue-chip lineup from even having a chance.
 

Rhode Irish

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Matt Hinton just posted an article (on Deadspin unfortunately) about Kiffin's incompetence:

Deadspin has some populist anti-ND thing going on, no doubt, and they were exposed for targeting ND as much as they exposed Manti in that whole affair. In general, their college football perspective is probably the thing about deadspin with which I identify the least. But on the whole, it is a great site. Not at all surprising that they hooked up with football outsiders. For the most post, deadspin "gets it," with the obvious exception (in my opinion) of their anti-domer bias.
 

IrishLion

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Deadspin has some populist anti-ND thing going on, no doubt, and they were exposed for targeting ND as much as they exposed Manti in that whole affair. In general, their college football perspective is probably the thing about deadspin with which I identify the least. But on the whole, it is a great site. Not at all surprising that they hooked up with football outsiders. For the most post, deadspin "gets it," with the obvious exception (in my opinion) of their anti-domer bias.

I don't frequent Deadspin very often, but the limited things I've seen made me believe that they share that "anti-domer bias" towards most teams. It seems to me that they just like blasting anyone when they can.
 

Rhode Irish

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I don't frequent Deadspin very often, but the limited things I've seen made me believe that they share that "anti-domer bias" towards most teams. It seems to me that they just like blasting anyone when they can.

That is partially true, but they specifically don't like Notre Dame or Duke. Their whole bent is anti-establishment. I don't take it personally.
 

dshans

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Not that it matters one iota, my only experience with Deadspin was my pathetic "dancing" at certain concerts I've attended. And many private moments with the stereo cranked to 11.
 
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