Illinois Football Recruiting Thread

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#476      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
ChiefGritty
willillini said:
Here's the thing, without a overhaul that somehow evens the playing field. (see below) We are still going to have the big 4-6 schools doling out $10's of millions every year to the top kids.
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Think about that for a second though.

When we talk about that money, we're talking about gigantic, super-engaged fanbases with a lot of rich, football-crazy alumni.

So we're talking about Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Nebraska, Notre Dame, USC, Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, LSU, Arkansas, Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Florida, Miami, Clemson, Tennessee, you see where I'm going with this?

A world which is measured by coaching quality and ability to sell winning and tradition to kids in non-financial ways is one which can be comprehensively dominated by a couple schools, at least for dynastic stretches of time.

A world of sheer vulgar money is one where there is much MORE competition than that, not less. There are not 4-6 schools that have more money than everyone else, that's not the lay of the land at all. It's more like 20, many of whom struggled under the old paradigm.

This isn't perfect news for Illinois Football, but it's great news for Illinois Basketball, a program which between 2006-2019 punched unimaginably below its weight in terms of the numbers and combined net worth of the people who deeply care about the program.
 
#477      

Mr. Tibbs

Mr. Tibbs
southeast DuPage
Mr. Tibbs
NIL as it is NOW is unsustainable and doomed to fail.
Numerous unimaginably bad things are going to happen to these players with money like that and all you need to do is look at child actors and musicians.
Im not against players getting paid a free market dictated rate, but as it is now, its setup to fail , in a terrible way
 
#478      

GILL-INOIS

G
GILL-INOIS
willillini said:
Maybe tightening the portal is one answer?
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Agree!

The portal will be tinkered with for awhile until the kinks are worked out. There have been small modifications of time periods, coaches fired, etc.

The spring transfer portal is May 1-15. I think they need to modify the current transfer portal from December to January that lasts 45 days. That is such a long period and needs to be shortened down to two weeks. I think the last of the conference championship games were on December 3rd this season.

My proposal is you make the transfer portal open 2 weeks from the day after the last conference championship game. Also no bowl games get played until the day after the portal closes. If you enter the transfer portal than you are ineligible to play in the bowl game automatically. Give and take for both sides.....
 
#479      

DaChief4ever

D
Urbana
DaChief4ever
Is there a disclosure site for the NIL money passed out. I would think it would be public.....kinda interesting to see what schools AUBURN have to offer in $$$$.
 
#480      

Calvin

C
Calvin
Mr. Tibbs said:
NIL as it is NOW is unsustainable and doomed to fail.
Numerous unimaginably bad things are going to happen to these players with money like that and all you need to do is look at child actors and musicians.
Im not against players getting paid a free market dictated rate, but as it is now, its setup to fail , in a terrible way
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I think you have to define 'fail' when making a statement like this. I mean, people in all walks of life have lessons to learn when they're young, and in the broadest sense, NIL is no different. The stakes may be higher for the very top athletes, but deciding on a college is already a very expensive "investment", often exceeding $100k, and millions of kids make it.

The money for NIL is there --that's already proven. And IMO, when they expand the playoffs, there will be plenty of excitement to go around, since many of the passionate fan bases will have a shot at the CFP going into the final weeks. If 12 teams make it, there will be at least a handful more with a chance to get a bid based on their final games.

To me, one of the big concerns is turnover. The conferences aren't stepping up with multi-year commitments, and have left it as an annual free for all. The athletes have every reason to test the market every year, and I think that part needs some stability that will only come if the colleges/conferences pony up more reasons for kids to stay on the team they signed with. JMO.

They could probably work on professional insurance for the playoffs as well, since opt-outs are becoming more common. I don't think any of the issues are rocket science --just need the parties to get to work on it and agree what's best for the sport.
 
#481      

ptgrd23

ptgrd23
ptgrd23
Loyalty goes both ways

Deon Colorado intro press conference

...“I’m coming. And when I get there, it’s gonna be changed, so I want y’all to get ready to go ahead and jump in that portal and do whatever you’re gonna get because the more of you jump into (the portal), the more room you make because we bring kids that are smart, tough.”....

My son's HS coach was fired after going 6-5 winning one playoff game then losing in playoffs (he was there 2 years). The new coach has already recruited new transfer QB and LB. They announce the transfers in the local newspaper. HS in Orange County CIF division with Mater Dei etc. NIL allowed in HS too.
 
#482      

mhuml32

mhuml32
Cincinnati, OH
mhuml32
2024 in-state top-10 recruit (Christian Bentancur) commits to Clemson. TE from Marian Central Catholic.
 
#483      

Simeon Rice

S
Simeon Rice
mhuml32 said:
2024 in-state top-10 recruit (Christian Bentancur) commits to Clemson. TE from Marian Central Catholic.
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2024 in-state is going to be a tough climb. Justin Scott eliminated us. Dupree from Mt Carmel just got an ND offer. Cam Williams already committed to ND. Bolingbrook's Stewart has visited UM a bunch. We don't seem to be able to get into Kenwood, and Lightfoot has offers from all over

Hopefully we can make some traction with Tuerk, L. Williams, Bradford, Griffin, Stec, etc. but they will have tons of offers as well
 
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#484      

willillini

W
willillini
ChiefGritty said:
Think about that for a second though.

When we talk about that money, we're talking about gigantic, super-engaged fanbases with a lot of rich, football-crazy alumni.

So we're talking about Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, Nebraska, Notre Dame, USC, Texas, Texas A&M, Oklahoma, LSU, Arkansas, Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Florida, Miami, Clemson, Tennessee, you see where I'm going with this?

A world which is measured by coaching quality and ability to sell winning and tradition to kids in non-financial ways is one which can be comprehensively dominated by a couple schools, at least for dynastic stretches of time.

A world of sheer vulgar money is one where there is much MORE competition than that, not less. There are not 4-6 schools that have more money than everyone else, that's not the lay of the land at all. It's more like 20, many of whom struggled under the old paradigm.

This isn't perfect news for Illinois Football, but it's great news for Illinois Basketball, a program which between 2006-2019 punched unimaginably below its weight in terms of the numbers and combined net worth of the people who deeply care about the program.
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I'll agree maybe more than 4-6. I still think that year in year out its less than 20. (ND, Clemson, Alabama, Georgia, Ohio St, Texas, Michigan, Oregon, USC, plus maybe 3-4 others) Look at Texas, Auburn, Tennessee and Nebraska as an example, they think they should go 10-2 or better every year, but they don't and fire their coach and nothing improves. Note the article re: Florida not having the NIL dollars to spend this year. I'll wager even many on your list doesn't spend the money the top 4-6 do. (BTW: Does that NIL $ list exist by school?, man that would be something to see.) But in any given year four more beyond the 10-12 above might see the opportunity to break into the National Championship series and pay up for the big time QB, WR or MLB to compliment a great junior/senior class. Its a system that is just unsustainable.
 
#485      

ChiefGritty

ChiefGritty
ChiefGritty
willillini said:
I'll agree maybe more than 4-6. I still think that year in year out its less than 20. (ND, Clemson, Alabama, Georgia, Ohio St, Texas, Michigan, Oregon, USC, plus maybe 3-4 others) Look at Texas, Auburn, Tennessee and Nebraska as an example, they think they should go 10-2 or better every year, but they don't and fire their coach and nothing improves. Note the article re: Florida not having the NIL dollars to spend this year. I'll wager even many on your list doesn't spend the money the top 4-6 do. (BTW: Does that NIL $ list exist by school?, man that would be something to see.) But in any given year four more beyond the 10-12 above might see the opportunity to break into the National Championship series and pay up for the big time QB, WR or MLB to compliment a great junior/senior class. Its a system that is just unsustainable.
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My actual view of the competitive landscape is that coaching still matters a lot, and that is a less evenly distributed resource, I don't care what you do about money and players.

The entire GDP of the United States won't clone Nick Saban.

But my observation from there is that's college football as it ever was. Love it or leave it.
 
#486      

Simeon Rice

S
Simeon Rice
'25 ESL stud Sael Reyes (I believe related to Antonio Johnson) transferring from ESL to DeSoto, TX. Not sure if we had a chance, but I'm guessing even less likely now
 
#487      

bluemountain

B
bluemountain
Simeon Rice said:
2024 in-state is going to be a tough climb. Justin Scott eliminated us. Dupree from Mt Carmel just got an ND offer. Cam Williams already committed to ND. Bolingbrook's Stewart has visited UM a bunch. We don't seem to be able to get into Kenwood, and Lightfoot has offers from all over

Hopefully we can make some traction with Tuerk, L. Williams, Bradford, Griffin, Stec, etc. but they will have tons of offers as well
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It has always been like this - even when we had consistently good teams under White and Mackovic most of the top 10 in-state HS players would go elsewhere. UM and ND were always the big dogs, but Iowa generally pulled one or two and inevitably you had guys go to big national programs like USC or Nebraska. Our bread and butter were the guys in that 10-30 range in state along with a few good players from St. Louis, Indy and under the radar players from CA, FL and TX.
 
#488      

GILL-INOIS

G
GILL-INOIS
Simeon Rice said:
'25 ESL stud Sael Reyes (I believe related to Antonio Johnson) transferring from ESL to DeSoto, TX. Not sure if we had a chance, but I'm guessing even less likely now
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Antonio Johnson is his older brother who went to Texas A&M. Declared for the NFL Draft and will be a 1st-2nd round pick. Likely heading to SEC country with this move and can't blame him.
 
#490      

ptgrd23

ptgrd23
ptgrd23
Football is different from other sports. Your chance of success and recognition in football is significantly enhanced if you play for a top 10 program.

It is so much more a team sport than basketball, baseball etc.

Assuming you have what it takse to be a star player you are going to get more TD passes, runs, TV exposure playing in BCS for Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State, USC etc.

However not everybody can be the starting QB at Alabama so if you cannot star there then feel free to transfer and become the big fish in the small pond at Illinois!

Now if we got a $5M/year NIL fund for Bret then that might change things!
 
#491      

GILL-INOIS

G
GILL-INOIS
ptgrd23 said:
Football is different from other sports. Your chance of success and recognition in football is significantly enhanced if you play for a top 10 program.

It is so much more a team sport than basketball, baseball etc.

Assuming you have what it takse to be a star player you are going to get more TD passes, runs, TV exposure playing in BCS for Alabama, Georgia, Ohio State, USC etc.

However not everybody can be the starting QB at Alabama so if you cannot star there then feel free to transfer and become the big fish in the small pond at Illinois!

Now if we got a $5M/year NIL fund for Bret then that might change things!
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I agree with you.... but also besides all the NIL talk there is winning

I love where the program is now and the direction it is heading. Culture change has taken place in the program and somewhat in the state of Illinois but we aren't by any means going from zero to hero in one season or even a few when it comes to landing recruits.

Illinois has arguably been one of the worst Big Ten schools over the past 10 seasons. It usually came down to Illinois, Rutgers and Indiana.

Past 10 seasons

Rutgers 1 winning season and 1-2 in bowl games

Indiana 2 winning seasons and 0-4 in bowl games

Illinois 1 winning season and 0-3 in bowl games


BB has this program in great shape and we have had more success under him than many coaches before him already. He needs time to build this thing up and we aren't going to miraculously land tons of 5 star recruits all of a sudden. I don't like Iowa, Purdue, Minnesota, etc but one season doesn't make or break the recruiting trail.
 
#492      

Battle89

Battle89
Battle89
ChiefGritty said:
That stinks, it feels like we never land sought-after kids from McHenry County.
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#493      

Chillinini

C
Chillinini
If anything is close to being true that’s being reported to keep Stroud at tOSU….NIL is NOW out of control.
 
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