I love ya, Signing Day, you’re only a day away

The Wizard of Odds today has a pretty good rundown of the sham that is recruiting rankings. The Wiz is right on as he almost always is. From just a WVU basis, we have built a top-five contender every season on the backs of no Top 25 recruiting classes (We finally busted into the Rivals Top 25 last year at #23.) There are plenty of examples of great recruiting classes that don’t pan out. Then again, LSU had Top 2 classes in 2003 and 2004, which fed into their national championship team this year.

I’m not denying that a team needs top talent to compete in college football. It’s just that the evaluation of recruits coming out of high school is such a crap shoot, that you can’t put a lot of stock in it. You can measure 40-yard dash times, vertical leaps and weightlifting reps, but you can’t measure football IQ, level of competition, work ethic, or even things like injury proclivity. There are just too many examples out there to cite. Remember 3-star Steve Slaton? Nobody was talking about him on Signing Day, 2005. There was an awful lot of talk about 5-star Jason Gwaltney (whereabouts unknown, January 2008).

Remember when Signing Day was somewhat climactic? I remember a press release, the next day’s paper maybe picking up with a list of signees and a capsule about a particularly interesting recruit. Today, there are coverage of recruits beginning about their sophomore year, every verbal commitment is tracked on the internet, plenty of grown men agonize over every decision and every interview of a potential stud recruit. Lists of oral commitments are available and constantly updated 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I’m not putting myself above the fray, I have subscribed to WVU’s Rivals site pretty much since it’s inception. But it is sickening how much recruiting coverage has blown up in the last 6-7 years. Now even mainstream media report on oral commitments and such just to keep up with the websites. You never saw them mentioned just a few years ago until after Signing Day.

Then again, Signing Day might not even be the day to sign. If you’re Noel Devine or Terrelle Pryor, you can play it up for another few weeks before deciding where to commit your services. I am just fed up with the whole process.

However, I will be posting on our signings tomorrow or Thursday, nothing earth-shattering but I think it does deserve mention. This season could be a little more interesting than others, with the new coaching staff reportedly working right up to the last minute with some guys that were off the radar under the previous staff. So it may not be as cut and dry as it has been in some years. Right now, Rivals has us fourth in the Big East (behind Pitt, Rutgers, SYRACUSE?!) so I don’t look for a lot of critical acclaim so to speak, but I think there will be some compelling stories out of this recruiting class. So sign that dotted line and get those letters faxed in.