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It’s important to look at recruiting classes in 2 year blocks. That is, you can afford to have a bad class or two but you can rarely overcome bad classes back to back. It’s also important that classes compliment each other. If you “miss” at a position one year it’s important to load up at that position the next. In this case, you have Brian Kelly’s first two full classes as the first true opportunity for a snapshot of the direction the program is heading.
QB
Kelly landed Everett Golson and Gunner Kiel in back-to-back classes giving Notre Dame a bright future at QB. If there is one truism in college football it is that a gamebreaking QB can make average teams great, and poor QB play can make very good teams bad. Look no further than the FSU, Stanford and USC games for examples of how even if you have a Ferrari if the driver can’t drive stick well you’re not going anywhere fast. With Golson as a mobile pass-first QB with incredible arm strength and Kiel as a 6’4” 5
QB prospect it’s safe to say one of these two will pan out as the QB of the future and that Kelly hit a homerun at QB recruiting.
WR
Kelly has recruited 5 WRs over the past two years between Matthias Farley, DaVaris Daniels, Keivarae Russel, Chris Brown, and Justin Ferguson. DaVaris Daniels is marketed as the next ND megastar and Chris Brown has tremendous upside… and Keivarae Russel is an elite athlete for the slot position but isn’t proven. Justin Ferguson has the physical tools but lacks top end speed and has shown to have a case of the dropsies when he’s been on television. Farley is as likely to pan out as a WR prospect as he is to be switched over to CB. In general this group lacks depth but as long as DaVaris Daniels produces how he is expect to we should be OK here. Had we held onto Greenberry, this WR corps would be set up for dominance.
RB
Between Will Mahone, Cam McDaniel, George Atkinson, and Amir Carlisle we are great at RB. Amir Carlisle showed himself to be the best RB at USC last year as a true freshman before being derailed by injuries. Mahone can bring a one-cut physical brand of football to the Irish similar to what Jonas Gray provided as a senior. Atkinson has tremendous upside as an athlete and McDaniel seems like he’ll be one of those guys who will be ready when called upon. Overall, 5 RBs typically bust just as often as they pan out to be Adrian Peterson-esque megastars and this is a very well rounded corps of RBs with sufficient depth to play BCS caliber football. We did very well here.
TE
Only one TE has been sign in the previous two classes and that man is Ben Koyack. Koyack is supposed to have tremendous upside and develop into a dominant player with time. Unfortunately we burned his redshirt last season so he’ll have, at best, 2 years as a starter post-Eifert. The scary thing is we will be dangerously thing at TE if we suffer injuries this year as we did not take another TE… opting to pass on Taylor McNamara who EE’d at Oklahoma. Had he been a regular NSD recruit, we would’ve likely offered him late in the cycle.
OL
ND has brought in a total of 7 OL in the past two years, 3 of which were elite prospects. Matt Hegarty was the #3 OT and Jordan Prestwood was the #4 OT on 247 in a year that was weak with OL prospects; and this year Ronnie Stanley was a top 15 OT by just about every service. Beyond these highly ranked guys, ND also added Nick Martin who from early returns looks in line to be an over-achiever (compared to his physical measurements) much like his brother along with Brad Carrico, Conor Hanratty, and Mark Harrel. 7 is a pretty good number of total OL for a 2 year haul and it looks like ND will target at least 3 and maybe 4 next year with mega-recruit Steve Elmer already onboard… so all things considered, we seem to be in good shape with both depth and talent here. The Jordan Prestwood transfer was absolutely huge.
DL
Without a doubt, DL is the position where we have the most depth and talent between the last two classes. It’s hard to determine where exactly to classify guys like Ishaq Williams and Troy Niklas but for argument’s sake I consider our DL haul to be Aaron Lynch, Tony Springmann, Stephon Tuitt, Chase Hounshell, Troy Niklas, Sheldon Day, and Jarron Jones. No matter what way you slice it, that’s a ton of talent… and then you also have to remember that Louis Nix is in the same class (eligibility wise) as the 2011 guys. Really good work on the defensive side of the trenches.
OLB
Ishaq Williams, Ben Councell, and Romeo Okwara appear to be the only OLBs we’ve recruited the past two years… but then you have to consider the prospect of guys like Shumate and Baratti and Niklas contributing in LB type roles at times. Not a position with a lot of depth, and one of the reasons why I wish we’d taken a chance on Ekanem, but the talent sure seems to be there.
ILB
This an interesting position where we’ve taken Anthony Rabasa, Jarrett Grace and Joe Schmidt as a walk-on… and took them all in the 2011 class. Not a lot of depth or highly rated talent here and passing on ILBs in this cycle seems interesting.
CB
Jalen Brown, Josh Atkinson, and Tee Shephard are the 3 CBs we’ve managed to sign in the past 2 years. Both Brown and Atkinson have elite foot speed but were both rated far lower than Tee Shepherd by the experts. Conversely, Tee Shephard is supposed to be a lockdown corner but lacks the 40 time you usually see from the Champ Baileys of the world. This is probably the position of most concern for us moving forward as you’d like to have at least 2 CBs per class. This situation is better if you consider Eilar Hardy a CB and he doesn’t lose a step from his knee injury.
S
Between Chris Badger, Nick Baratti, Elijah Shumate, CJ Prosise, John Turner, and Eilar Hardy; Notre Dame has acquired 6 safety prospects. That’s a good number for depth, however the bad news is that none of them are very prototypical highly rated safety types… Elijah Shumate and Eilar Hardy are both consensus 4 players but also projected as possibly hybrid type fits in the defense. Eilar may play corner and Shumate may play some DOLB. CJ Prosise and Nick Baratti seem to both have high upside for different reasons but will take some time to develop. No one is really sure what to expect from John Turner and Chris Badger.
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The takeaway from these classes is that we are stacked at QB and on the DL… arguably the two most important positions on the field along with OL. We also got a very deep group of OL and RB prospects and top notch talent at TE, OLB, and WR even if we lack a little depth. ILB is an interesting position but not really a concern as both Rabasa and Grace were highly rated and it’s a position of depth in other classes. CB and S are nightmares where a couple injuries or “upside” prospects that don’t pan out could spell serious doom and gloom. We lack depth at CB and can’t really afford to move over any WRs (except maybe Farley) because of a lack of depth at WR.
Taking an analysis of the classes a bit further, it’s quite clear to me that we’re moving towards more of a hybrid 4-3 than a 3-4. By this I mean it looks like we’re going to use a front 4 of something like Lynch—Nix—Tuitt—Ishaq/Shembo with Ishaq/Shembo occasionally dropping and playing in space but most of the time bringing the pain. On the other side I expect to see Councell emerge and be complimented by some hybrid S/LB type guys… this position will be the wildcard of coverage and bringing a speed rush. So that all looks very promising. It appears our season will hinge on Austin Collinsworth emerging at S or Zeke Motta learning how to run fast… plus Benett Jackson and 1 of Atkinson/Brown/Shephard stepping up big time.
On offense… it is what it is. We have our QBs and skill players of the future; but it’s unclear if this is their year to shine or not. I personally expect Theo Riddick and Cierre Wood to be our RBs with TJ Jones playing slot for the next two years while Keivarae Russel learns how to play WR and a pretty wide open rotation at our outside WR spots. DaVaris Daniels is the only young gun that needs to contribute this yea for to be successful… everyone else is OK to take some development time.
So overall, Kelly is doing good but not great. He has some of the same issues Weis had with his classes albeit at different positions. Weis had huge holes on the DL and loaded up on highly rated talent everywhere else. Kelly has holes at the DB position. One of the most interesting things to look at is how Weis recruited nearly all football-first kids selling them on his super bowl rings... then got minimal effort, a rash of transfers, and a sense of entitlement. Kelly has recruited almost exclusively NOT football first guys... and so far has much better retainage. We'll see how the on field results come along. Next year is going to be a very big year on the field because we're going to need to pull in a class of 20+ kids with a lot of talent at CB, S, OL, and LB. ND cannot afford whiffs next year because if they miss on a lot of prospects the next two year snapshot will be very ugly. Very, very ugly.
So that's my opinion on how things look in the aftermath of the epic string of CB misses and Deontay-to-Houston fiasco that will live in infamy. I think we're going to be OK as long as we take care of business next year. What do you all think?
QB
Kelly landed Everett Golson and Gunner Kiel in back-to-back classes giving Notre Dame a bright future at QB. If there is one truism in college football it is that a gamebreaking QB can make average teams great, and poor QB play can make very good teams bad. Look no further than the FSU, Stanford and USC games for examples of how even if you have a Ferrari if the driver can’t drive stick well you’re not going anywhere fast. With Golson as a mobile pass-first QB with incredible arm strength and Kiel as a 6’4” 5
QB prospect it’s safe to say one of these two will pan out as the QB of the future and that Kelly hit a homerun at QB recruiting.WR
Kelly has recruited 5 WRs over the past two years between Matthias Farley, DaVaris Daniels, Keivarae Russel, Chris Brown, and Justin Ferguson. DaVaris Daniels is marketed as the next ND megastar and Chris Brown has tremendous upside… and Keivarae Russel is an elite athlete for the slot position but isn’t proven. Justin Ferguson has the physical tools but lacks top end speed and has shown to have a case of the dropsies when he’s been on television. Farley is as likely to pan out as a WR prospect as he is to be switched over to CB. In general this group lacks depth but as long as DaVaris Daniels produces how he is expect to we should be OK here. Had we held onto Greenberry, this WR corps would be set up for dominance.
RB
Between Will Mahone, Cam McDaniel, George Atkinson, and Amir Carlisle we are great at RB. Amir Carlisle showed himself to be the best RB at USC last year as a true freshman before being derailed by injuries. Mahone can bring a one-cut physical brand of football to the Irish similar to what Jonas Gray provided as a senior. Atkinson has tremendous upside as an athlete and McDaniel seems like he’ll be one of those guys who will be ready when called upon. Overall, 5
RBs typically bust just as often as they pan out to be Adrian Peterson-esque megastars and this is a very well rounded corps of RBs with sufficient depth to play BCS caliber football. We did very well here.TE
Only one TE has been sign in the previous two classes and that man is Ben Koyack. Koyack is supposed to have tremendous upside and develop into a dominant player with time. Unfortunately we burned his redshirt last season so he’ll have, at best, 2 years as a starter post-Eifert. The scary thing is we will be dangerously thing at TE if we suffer injuries this year as we did not take another TE… opting to pass on Taylor McNamara who EE’d at Oklahoma. Had he been a regular NSD recruit, we would’ve likely offered him late in the cycle.
OL
ND has brought in a total of 7 OL in the past two years, 3 of which were elite prospects. Matt Hegarty was the #3 OT and Jordan Prestwood was the #4 OT on 247 in a year that was weak with OL prospects; and this year Ronnie Stanley was a top 15 OT by just about every service. Beyond these highly ranked guys, ND also added Nick Martin who from early returns looks in line to be an over-achiever (compared to his physical measurements) much like his brother along with Brad Carrico, Conor Hanratty, and Mark Harrel. 7 is a pretty good number of total OL for a 2 year haul and it looks like ND will target at least 3 and maybe 4 next year with mega-recruit Steve Elmer already onboard… so all things considered, we seem to be in good shape with both depth and talent here. The Jordan Prestwood transfer was absolutely huge.
DL
Without a doubt, DL is the position where we have the most depth and talent between the last two classes. It’s hard to determine where exactly to classify guys like Ishaq Williams and Troy Niklas but for argument’s sake I consider our DL haul to be Aaron Lynch, Tony Springmann, Stephon Tuitt, Chase Hounshell, Troy Niklas, Sheldon Day, and Jarron Jones. No matter what way you slice it, that’s a ton of talent… and then you also have to remember that Louis Nix is in the same class (eligibility wise) as the 2011 guys. Really good work on the defensive side of the trenches.
OLB
Ishaq Williams, Ben Councell, and Romeo Okwara appear to be the only OLBs we’ve recruited the past two years… but then you have to consider the prospect of guys like Shumate and Baratti and Niklas contributing in LB type roles at times. Not a position with a lot of depth, and one of the reasons why I wish we’d taken a chance on Ekanem, but the talent sure seems to be there.
ILB
This an interesting position where we’ve taken Anthony Rabasa, Jarrett Grace and Joe Schmidt as a walk-on… and took them all in the 2011 class. Not a lot of depth or highly rated talent here and passing on ILBs in this cycle seems interesting.
CB
Jalen Brown, Josh Atkinson, and Tee Shephard are the 3 CBs we’ve managed to sign in the past 2 years. Both Brown and Atkinson have elite foot speed but were both rated far lower than Tee Shepherd by the experts. Conversely, Tee Shephard is supposed to be a lockdown corner but lacks the 40 time you usually see from the Champ Baileys of the world. This is probably the position of most concern for us moving forward as you’d like to have at least 2 CBs per class. This situation is better if you consider Eilar Hardy a CB and he doesn’t lose a step from his knee injury.
S
Between Chris Badger, Nick Baratti, Elijah Shumate, CJ Prosise, John Turner, and Eilar Hardy; Notre Dame has acquired 6 safety prospects. That’s a good number for depth, however the bad news is that none of them are very prototypical highly rated safety types… Elijah Shumate and Eilar Hardy are both consensus 4
players but also projected as possibly hybrid type fits in the defense. Eilar may play corner and Shumate may play some DOLB. CJ Prosise and Nick Baratti seem to both have high upside for different reasons but will take some time to develop. No one is really sure what to expect from John Turner and Chris Badger.------------------------------------------------------------------------
The takeaway from these classes is that we are stacked at QB and on the DL… arguably the two most important positions on the field along with OL. We also got a very deep group of OL and RB prospects and top notch talent at TE, OLB, and WR even if we lack a little depth. ILB is an interesting position but not really a concern as both Rabasa and Grace were highly rated and it’s a position of depth in other classes. CB and S are nightmares where a couple injuries or “upside” prospects that don’t pan out could spell serious doom and gloom. We lack depth at CB and can’t really afford to move over any WRs (except maybe Farley) because of a lack of depth at WR.
Taking an analysis of the classes a bit further, it’s quite clear to me that we’re moving towards more of a hybrid 4-3 than a 3-4. By this I mean it looks like we’re going to use a front 4 of something like Lynch—Nix—Tuitt—Ishaq/Shembo with Ishaq/Shembo occasionally dropping and playing in space but most of the time bringing the pain. On the other side I expect to see Councell emerge and be complimented by some hybrid S/LB type guys… this position will be the wildcard of coverage and bringing a speed rush. So that all looks very promising. It appears our season will hinge on Austin Collinsworth emerging at S or Zeke Motta learning how to run fast… plus Benett Jackson and 1 of Atkinson/Brown/Shephard stepping up big time.
On offense… it is what it is. We have our QBs and skill players of the future; but it’s unclear if this is their year to shine or not. I personally expect Theo Riddick and Cierre Wood to be our RBs with TJ Jones playing slot for the next two years while Keivarae Russel learns how to play WR and a pretty wide open rotation at our outside WR spots. DaVaris Daniels is the only young gun that needs to contribute this yea for to be successful… everyone else is OK to take some development time.
So overall, Kelly is doing good but not great. He has some of the same issues Weis had with his classes albeit at different positions. Weis had huge holes on the DL and loaded up on highly rated talent everywhere else. Kelly has holes at the DB position. One of the most interesting things to look at is how Weis recruited nearly all football-first kids selling them on his super bowl rings... then got minimal effort, a rash of transfers, and a sense of entitlement. Kelly has recruited almost exclusively NOT football first guys... and so far has much better retainage. We'll see how the on field results come along. Next year is going to be a very big year on the field because we're going to need to pull in a class of 20+ kids with a lot of talent at CB, S, OL, and LB. ND cannot afford whiffs next year because if they miss on a lot of prospects the next two year snapshot will be very ugly. Very, very ugly.
So that's my opinion on how things look in the aftermath of the epic string of CB misses and Deontay-to-Houston fiasco that will live in infamy. I think we're going to be OK as long as we take care of business next year. What do you all think?
