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Heard Demling on R & R commenting on signing day

Summer and preseason of 2015

All we could talk about is how we beat Alabama and Auburn for Puma Pass. He was the big QB that would take us to the next level.

Game 1 of that year we wondered if Gardner, Bolin, Reggie, or that new kid Jackson may be the holdover QB for the year until Puma came to campus.

Little did we know that we had the greatest QB in college history in our program. Puma Pass turned out to be a bust. QB’s are the hardest recruits to project.
LOL some of these fans are sounding like sour grapes. The prettier girl got asked to the prom over us that's life.
 
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:) Really? Well let's see a pic!
Good looking family!
 
If 2019 is a lost class, then sign me up for 4 more just like it. It’s one of the best classes we’ve ever had. We will almost certainly finish in the top 35 when it is all finished up in February.
That's what excites me. Like you said, this is probably one of if not the best class we've had and the impact from all of the big wins are not yet factored in. I would take this class over and over again as well but I have a gut feeling if they can do this well in such a short period of time and with the hand they were dealt, once you factor in our great season and give this staff full year to recruit, we are very likely looking at top 10- top 15 class next year. I love me some Coach Satt
 
I have made this point on the premium board, but it bears exposure here today. Ideally the defensive front scheme needs dudes like Dewayne White, Amobi Okoye, Dumervil and Rankins. Guys who we didn't necessarily beat people from Power 5 conferences for but those constitute the best four down linemen we've had at Louisville in the last twenty years. Deemed undersized coming out of high school in the cases of Dewayne White, Dumervil and a lesser extent Rankins. Okoye was just plain young. But all went on to be first and second round draft picks. So that is the template that we have based much of our defensive success the last twenty years coupled with the type Bryan Brown projects into his defense. Did we sign that today...time will tell. But we have been in a dire situation with recruiting defensive down linemen for the better part of four years and this is a scheme that puts a premium on getting disrupters and gap shooters onto the field. We need them now, we need them in abundance and we need them to bridge the trench gap we not only clearly have with Clemson--and Notre Dame--but that we saw in stints against previously beleagured offensive lines at Miami and Florida State. We made a couple mediocre quarterbacks look really good as a result. Not to mention the historically meager effort against Kentucky who has put the type of consecutive classes together in the trenches that we so desperately need.

Recruiting in college basketball and football is zero sum. It's one thing to lose a kid to Florida State, but we didn't flip Schrader at a position of need or Griffis at a position of need and they flipped our most renowned recruit snapping their fingers. All of those in the last days going into Signing Day; we could have weakened their class...they weakened ours. We need talent in the front seven and have seen Weaver and Casey bolt for Lexington; Young gave Louisville at least polite consideration but he'll be throwing L's down before you know it. It's those two programs that we have to get back to competing with, and it has to start by winning the handful of head-to-heads we are going to have. That didn't happen last year obviously, and it isn't happening today.
 
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recruiting is mostly about relationships. Consider the amounts of time Satt and co. Have been here this class is awesome. Think about it. This class is currently 36-39 th. Our average the last 2 decades is somewhere between 35- 45 so Satt with almost no time to develop relationships with even local players pulled in a solid class . Our coaching staff obviously know how to relate to today's kids. We will without a doubt continue to build and improve on this. I don't and won't believe there is a ceiling to recruiting here at Louisville. I know we will consistently land better and better players and will sign classes ranked higher than we ever have. Satterfield is an architect. By year 5 our class ranking will hover in the teens and success on the field will inevitably follow. By year 5 we will be competing for acc titles and playoff entry. I see no reason at all we should have a limit on how successful we can be. Hell when LJ was here we hit #3 and forced people to take us seriously. Its coming folks.
 
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recruiting is mostly about relationships. Consider the amounts of time Satt and co. Have been here this class is awesome. Think about it. This class is currently 36-39 th. Our average the last 2 decades is somewhere between 35- 45 so Satt with almost no time to develop relationships with even local players pulled in a solid class . Our coaching staff obviously know how to relate to today's kids. We will without a doubt continue to build and improve on this. I don't and won't believe there is a ceiling to recruiting here at Louisville. I know we will consistently land better and better players and will sign classes ranked higher than we ever have. Satterfield is an architect. By year 5 our class ranking will hover in the teens and success on the field will inevitably follow. By year 5 we will be competing for acc titles and playoff entry. I see no reason at all we should have a limit on how successful we can be. Hell when LJ was here we hit #3 and forced people to take us seriously. Its coming folks.
I absolutely agree. Once we start getting back to 9-10 win seasons the recruiting becomes that much easier. I believe every year under Satt and Ledford 2 things will be a sure thing. We will run the ball successfully and we will put up points. If we can pull it together on the defensive side I don’t see why we can’t win 9-10 games a year.
 
To REDFISTFURY3:

Willis gave Painter a verbal and I actually went out to see what he looked like one night at Bullitt East. Painter happened to be there that night along with a bus load of Purdue fans (probably 40-50 if them). They sat right behind Bullitt East’s bench and cheered his every move. It’s was actually pretty impressive.
 
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I have made this point on the premium board, but it bears exposure here today. Ideally the defensive front scheme needs dudes like Dewayne White, Amobi Okoye, Dumervil and Rankins. Guys who we didn't necessarily beat people from Power 5 conferences for but those constitute the best four down linemen we've had at Louisville in the last twenty years. Deemed undersized coming out of high school in the cases of Dewayne White, Dumervil and a lesser extent Rankins. Okoye was just plain young. But all went on to be first and second round draft picks. So that is the template that we have based much of our defensive success the last twenty years coupled with the type Bryan Brown projects into his defense. Did we sign that today...time will tell. But we have been in a dire situation with recruiting defensive down linemen for the better part of four years and this is a scheme that puts a premium on getting disrupters and gap shooters onto the field. We need them now, we need them in abundance and we need them to bridge the trench gap we not only clearly have with Clemson--and Notre Dame--but that we saw in stints against previously beleagured offensive lines at Miami and Florida State. We made a couple mediocre quarterbacks look really good as a result. Not to mention the historically meager effort against Kentucky who has put the type of consecutive classes together in the trenches that we so desperately need.

Recruiting in college basketball and football is zero sum. It's one thing to lose a kid to Florida State, but we didn't flip Schrader at a position of need or Griffis at a position of need and they flipped our most renowned recruit snapping their fingers. All of those in the last days going into Signing Day; we could have weakened their class...they weakened ours. We need talent in the front seven and have seen Weaver and Casey bolt for Lexington; Young gave Louisville at least polite consideration but he'll be throwing L's down before you know it. It's those two programs that we have to get back to competing with, and it has to start by winning the handful of head-to-heads we are going to have. That didn't happen last year obviously, and it isn't happening today.
I wouldn’t be quite so down. The Purdy saga is depressing- but the kid didn’t want to compete apparently. Good luck to him, but I can do without guys like that. Webb never flinched. I like that. We met a lot of our immediate needs. If we are patient, this staff will build depth across the board and we will see results.
 
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The issue with improving your recruiting is how long it takes. Many fans think U of L can field successful teams, have coaching stability, and see rapid improvement in recruiting. That's not gonna happen because it never happens unless your program has a history of highly ranked recruiting.

IMO it would take a decade of sustained excellence in our football program before our recruiting would become a fixture in the Top Twenty. If Satterfield is successful and stays here that long, we might see it. Top 35 or so is as much as we can hope for now on an annual basis...
 
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There is a reason the same 8-10 schools are always in the the playoff or only considered to be a national champion. The majority of elite talent is at these schools. Everyone knows the rest of college football has no shot. It has been that way forever but every fan base still has hope. Unless the system changes talent will migrate toward these schools.

Playoff needs 8 if not 16 to give the opportunity to play for titles. That could potentially spread talent out.

Reduce the number of scholarship. 85 is too many. 66 would be plenty.

All Louisville can do is try to recruit in the 30’s and hope to get in the 20’s. It will be a slow grind. Not many schools with Louisville’s history of on field success has had this much trouble in recruiting. Louisville can’t maintain their head coach is part of the issue.
 
If your son has a choice to become the Qb @ Fl.St. or Louisville would you be mad if he picks the Noles. I know i wouldn't be mad at him. If he feels that's the better opportunity for him . . Alot of this is just like these BB players whom pick schools . It's a business decision. We as a top BB school have seen that enough with recruits who pick the more exposure schools over us all the time.

I am not blaming the UK loss for these flips that have happened, but it feels like momentum has trended down because of that loss, now these flips, and the coming expected loss against Miss State. IIRC, when Purdy was signed, the QB position was very much in the air with most (myself included) thinking Pass was the answer for now. Things have changed, the truth is Cunningham has QB locked down for the next two years, and while we don't know if that bothered Purdy or anyone else, a lot can happen over the next 2 seasons. Plus we signed some guys at QB.

As far as this class overall, I think I saw 35th ranking? Historically that is right in line with what we've seen recently and actually pretty good. I think we'll see most classes hover 30-35, occasionally get in the high 20's. If we start seeing some success then maybe it'll trend higher than that, we'll have to see.
 
Anytime you lose your top rated QB recruit right before signing day, it’s a significant blow. No point in sugar-coating it. The positive thing is that Cunningham has improved greatly this season so we have a solid #1 going into next year.

YES to this post. It is what it is with Purdy, the reality is MC was one of the better QB's in the country last year statistically, and he's back for 2 more years (unless he breaks out and goes to the NFL, which means 2020 is amazing and is fine by me).
 
The ONLY way anybody competes with the historical top 15 in recruiting is with a scholarship reduction.

Then you will have a top 30 in recruiting, and maybe 10-15 teams with a legit shot at the NC.

35 P5 schools will still be on the outside looking in.
 
recruiting is mostly about relationships. Consider the amounts of time Satt and co. Have been here this class is awesome. Think about it. This class is currently 36-39 th. Our average the last 2 decades is somewhere between 35- 45 so Satt with almost no time to develop relationships with even local players pulled in a solid class . Our coaching staff obviously know how to relate to today's kids. We will without a doubt continue to build and improve on this. I don't and won't believe there is a ceiling to recruiting here at Louisville. I know we will consistently land better and better players and will sign classes ranked higher than we ever have. Satterfield is an architect. By year 5 our class ranking will hover in the teens and success on the field will inevitably follow. By year 5 we will be competing for acc titles and playoff entry. I see no reason at all we should have a limit on how successful we can be. Hell when LJ was here we hit #3 and forced people to take us seriously. Its coming folks.


I agree, give the guy a chance to build some connections and relationships.... sheesh tough crowd!
 
There is a reason the same 8-10 schools are always in the the playoff or only considered to be a national champion. The majority of elite talent is at these schools. Everyone knows the rest of college football has no shot. It has been that way forever but every fan base still has hope. Unless the system changes talent will migrate toward these schools.

Playoff needs 8 if not 16 to give the opportunity to play for titles. That could potentially spread talent out.

Reduce the number of scholarship. 85 is too many. 66 would be plenty.

All Louisville can do is try to recruit in the 30’s and hope to get in the 20’s. It will be a slow grind. Not many schools with Louisville’s history of on field success has had this much trouble in recruiting. Louisville can’t maintain their head coach is part of the issue.
This is a very good post. I agree. Reduce the schollys, expand the playoff!
 
Wouldn't reducing scholarships hurt the players more? That means all of the elite talent will still go to the top schools and the recruiting pool would shrink.
Just like doing away with OAD BB players.

Still be an arms race for the rest of the best. Players can still get an education if that’s what they want.

They will just have to go G5, FCS. If they’re good enough The NFL will find them
 
Here's what has hurt us in the past. We have never put a lock on our territory. Most people aren't aware of this but in the last 10 years the overall number or good d-1 players in this state and surrounding areas has exploded. 10-15 years ago you may not harve seen 5 4* recruits a year in my. Today that # is 10-15 . if we made a point to keep em home that alone would put us in top 20 area. ReAlistically with great relationship building we could keep 8-10 home annually. Satt knows this. UK has came into OUR CITY and picked 10 4* up in the last 4 years. 1 city and not close to all there was to get. Fact. Protect our turf and we see an instant jump in class rating .
 
Sever all people have posted the importance of relationship building in recruiting. Its absolutely true. Understand over the lat 20 years we haven't kept a coach for more that 4 years. Hell we haven't Been able to build trust with us coaches and young players. Satt has to stay and if he does we will reach heights never seen before
 
Sever all people have posted the importance of relationship building in recruiting. Its absolutely true. Understand over the lat 20 years we haven't kept a coach for more that 4 years. Hell we haven't Been able to build trust with us coaches and young players. Satt has to stay and if he does we will reach heights never seen before
I think this is the number 1 reason why the program has been up and down over the years. The move to the ACC was huge and unfortunately Bobby wasn’t the right guy. I think Jurich believed in Bobby and felt he would be loyal. What he didn’t see was how much the staff would turnover.

Coaching continuity matters mainly in the recruiting world. It impacts relationships and the overall plan of building a program. As we have found out they really didn’t have a long term plan in recruiting. Too many key coaches left.
 
Wouldn't reducing scholarships hurt the players more? That means all of the elite talent will still go to the top schools and the recruiting pool would shrink.

It would but if we are being honest most fans don't actually care about the players.
 
Wouldn't reducing scholarships hurt the players more? That means all of the elite talent will still go to the top schools and the recruiting pool would shrink.
I think the opposite- not all the elite talent could to to just a few schools. There wouldn’t be space.
 
Programs used to be able to have an unlimited number of football players on scholarship prior to 1975. The NCAA limited the number to 95 beginning in that year, and further reduced it to 85 beginning in 1994.

Making the sport more competitive for more programs has been one of the reasons given each time the limit has been reduced, but in 1994 the main reason was to hold athletic departments accountable for implementing gender equity (eventually getting to equal scholarship numbers for men and women’s sports).

If it were to be reduced further, I am somewhat fond of the number 70.... That would allow you to go 3 deep on offense and defense, plus it would give you 4 more spots for specialists like placekicker, kickoff specialist, punter, and long snapper.

But if the total number of football scholarships per FBS school was reduced, I’d like to see more schools added to the FBS level so that the overall number of scholarships stays the same.
 
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Programs used to be able to have an unlimited number of football players on scholarship prior to 1975. The NCAA limited the number to 95 beginning in that year, and further reduced it to 85 beginning in 1994.

Making the sport more competitive for more programs has been one of the reasons given each time the limit has been reduced, but in 1994 the main reason was to hold athletic departments accountable for implementing gender equity (eventually getting to equal scholarship numbers for men and women’s sports).

If it were to be reduced further, I am somewhat fond of the number 70.... That would allow you to go 3 deep on offense and defense, plus it would give you 4 more spots for specialists like placekicker, kickoff specialist, punter, and long snapper.

But if the total number of football scholarships per FBS school was reduced, I’d like to see more schools added to the FBS level so that the overall number of scholarships stays the same.
70 seems like a reasonable number.
 
The scholarships would “trickledown” to the lower levels.

Everybody would still get to “go to school” somewhere.

Meanwhile, the historical to 20 would still get the “cream” but there would be a lot more for the rest of us to fight for.
 
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The argument against reducing the number of scholarships is the physicality of the sport and the fact that the players aren’t paid. It’s not a good look to lengthen the season to 15 games and at the same time reduce the number of scholarship players who are playing in those games.

Rather than reducing the number of scholarships, I’d actually prefer to increase the scholarships to about 100 and expand the playoffs to at least 16 teams.
 
100 scholarships?

So Rivals “ranks” 350-400?

The PO won’t need to expand because the usual suspect will still sigh the majority of the “stars”. They’re the only one that will be able to pay that many.

There will be no “trickle down” of talent.
 
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100 scholarships?

So Rivals “ranks” 350-400?

The PO won’t need to expand because the usual suspect will still sigh the majority of the “stars”. They’re the only one that will be able to pay that many.

There will be no “trickle down” of talent.

I happen to think that the expanded opportunities to play in the playoffs will cause the trickle down you seek. Right now, the playoff committee relies as much on their preconceived notions of which teams are the best as they do results on the field to pick 4 teams. You’ve got to be very deep and talented to make the top four, but not so much to make the top 16. Once you make the playoffs, it’s a matter of which team is playing the best.

Just think of how differently 2016 might have turned out for us if the playoff were 16 teams. Instead of going into the Houston game knowing we were going to be shut out of the playoffs because we lost the tiebreaker to Clemson, we would be sitting there knowing that we would be in by just winning against Houston and at home against UK. Going 11-1 might have even gotten us a 5th or 6th seed that year and a favorable matchup in the first round.

And win or lose, we instantly become one of those elite schools to have made the playoffs and possibly even to have won a playoff game.
 
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When I think back to that 2016 season, I very clearly recall that Ohio State was on the outside looking in just as we were. Penn State won their division by taking the tiebreaker over Ohio State, just like Clemson did over us. But at the time when we were both 9-1, Ohio State was ranked ahead of us. And there’s no way to deny that those rankings were based as much on Ohio State’s reputation as it was on the performance of both teams on the field. Just think of how differently our close loss at Clemson that year would be perceived now that they have won 2 of the last 3 championships.

The very small playoff field is the biggest reason for the elite remaining elite.
 
I don’t think an expanded field changes the end result for years but with time there would be more parody in college football.

It is amazing how poplar the sport remains with only a few teams with a realistic chance. I think part of the the reason for the decline in attendance is once you lose 1 or 2 games your team is eliminated. Really what is the point for the other 110 teams. Could you image going into a basketball season with no hope of making the tournament?

Conference realignment was really about keeping the elite teams elite not about giving other teams a chance. It made it harder on the middle of the road teams because the 2nd tier talent would be spread out even more.
 
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Something that would help is for the KHSAA to change their mindset of everybody gets a trophy. Instead of restricting schools from practicing more let them practice like the schools in Florida and Texas. It would help increase better talent in our state.
 
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