Word is getting out that Ohio football is on the rise
I’m guessing people have been saying this for Frank’s entire tenure with the same results.
To a certain extent it's true that people have been hoping it would be true for a long time, but for a long time there was a lot of frustration here that the recruiting classes just didn't seem to improve. In the early years, from 2005-2010, most classes had very few early commitments, and were filled mostly in December and January, and mostly from players with no other offers. Some unknown players were good, but some were not.
From 2011-16 there were more early commits, and that got us excited, but in the end, did that make the classes better? If you look at National Rankings, no, nothing changed. From 2005-2019 Ohio's class ranking has averaged 103 in the country, and for the last five years it's about the same, though I suppose 103 of 130 is better than 103 of 120.
On a different measure, one that I look at, there is a change, that being how many competing offers the players had.
From 2005-10: average was .9 other FBS offers
From 2011-16: average was 2.5 other FBS offers
From 2017-19: average was 4.2 other FBS offers
From 2005-10, Ohio relied on finding diamonds in the rough, good players like Lavon Brazill and Travis Carrie, who had no other offers. The last few years they are still trying to find those in players like Julian Ross and Hagan Meservy, but are also getting players with multiple competing offers, guys like Denzel Daxon in last year's class and Mency in this year's class.
So, for a long time, people hoped that Ohio's recruiting was finally improving, but were frustrated because things stayed more or less the same. In recent years something has definitely changed. Will that produce different results on the field? This year we will see a number of players from the 2017-19 recruiting classes on the field, so it won't be long before we know if recruiting really is improving.
Last Edited: 6/27/2019 4:07:30 PM by L.C.