The Badgers of WI vs. The Nittany Lions of Penn State.

[skones]

We suck.

[Bernman]

Hey Bernman and whoever else is a recruiting junkie, what do you think about the last two years of recruits? Next year, we should start seeing that group of players get some real playing time and I hope we have some talent there. I know T.J. Williams was amazing when he played at Bradford for example and I would have to think that kid could do something in the next few years at the WR position and Toon seems to have the measurables and definitely the pedigree to become a good one possibly.

Overall the talent level Bielema has amassed during his tenure has been pretty good.

However, the negatives:

My knocks on him would be that he tends to under-recruit positions and over-recruit "athletes". Three great case in points are how he approaches filling needs at DT, S, and WR. Those aren't only big voids in the present but project to remain that way for a while in the future.

Bielema assumes he can take a 240-pounder, pack about 45-50 pounds on him, and he'll be able to maintain the quickness asset that he previously possessed, while also being able to hold his ground at the point of attack. That's a fallacy.

He also believes that he can take a corner with average size, bulk him up, and create a free safety w/ plus athleticism, w/ safety instincts, and tackling ability. Also a fallacy.

Finally, he thinks that track stars with little route running refinement, body's of skeletons, and swiss cheese hands, make good wide receivers. Once again, a fallacy.

IMO, DT recruiting has been an immense failure from 2007-2009. My homie 4-Star Jordan Kohout is a hard-worker, strong, and a solid athlete; but he doesn't project to help out for a few years. The rest of the DT's we acquired in that span have been limited in # and of the slow play variety following losing out on higher rated targets on our board. JJ Watt was a God send when he transferred from CMU (received offers from Colorado + Minny), but the unit will still have major depth and quality issues if there isn't a sudden turnaround.

At safety in 2007 we were on track to enjoy a great class, but suffered decommits from highly rated C.J. Peake, Donte Neal, and fellow highly rated Quincy Landingham transferred after we moved him to running back to cover that leak. In '08 the safeties we secured, Kevin Claxton and Shelton Johnson, were pretty average recruits. What they might do is convert stud Marcus Cromartie from corner to replace Carter at free safety. He'll be playing out of position though and we are sub-standard at SS, so in conjunction w/ below average DT's, we'll probably struggle against the run.

WR recruiting from '08 to '09 was an epic fail. We took one player who was an "athlete" with no offers in 2008 (T.J. Williams). The player we scored in '09 (Duckworth) has the opposite problem. Not very quick or fast. He's kind of a long strider in spite of only being 6 feet. At least he he actually has hands. I never had an affinity for Gilreath and Jefferson before the '07 class wrapped. But I liked Nick Toon and Daven Jones because they were very polished route runners, with pretty good hands, and are underrated athletes. Bielema/Chryst disagrees. I question their ability to evaluate talent even on their own team. The potential for improvement at wide receiver lies within, but we need to do a better job recruiting soon.


On more positive notes:

QB: The signal callers who we netted in '08 and '09 are a higher caliber than we've seen during the Alvarez era and beyond. Hope is on the horizon at that position. True Frosh Curt Phillips arguably looked better than any of our QB's at the spring game, in spite of him only being 17-18 at the time. He was kind of like a poor man's Tim Tebow in high school dominating opponents in Tennessee on the ground and through the air. You can watch numerous highlights of him within the video mix I created starting at the 6:08 mark: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tBtm1KuilEw Our '09 recruit Jon Budmayr was the MVP of Nike Camp, ESPN has him in their top 150 players in the nation, and long time recruiting analyst Tom Lemming proclaimed he was the best player the Badgers procured out of the Chicago area in 10 years. Kid has a very live arm, pretty good mobility, and spreads the ball around the field. Think Aaron Rodgers. He also has an injury history like A-Rod unfortunately. Here's some video of him also: http://www.brightcove.tv/title.jsp?titl ... 1417400162

RB: Obviously everyone knows about John Clay and he should be tearing it up in cardinal and white for a few years when the coaches finally come to their senses. In '09 we got a commitment from a really underrated prospect from Missouri by the name of Montee Ball. He's in the Brent Moss mold and threatening all-time state rushing records at this point. Above average size/speed combo, decent burst through the hole, and good vision.

OL: Collecting big, strong Wisconsin farm boys as always. Everybody knows about Oglesby from the 2007 class. Zeitler was an outstanding G prospect in '08 and Groy can double as a guard and tackle.

DE: Our pass rushing woes should soon be rectified. We scored commitments from several lanky DE's who explode off the line, especially Anthony Mains and Brendan Kelly. Nzegwu from 2007 was a freak athlete who at the very least can rush the passer, they just haven't trusted him because he's very raw. A couple weeks ago we snagged a Rivals 250 DE named David Gilbert who identified as a stud way back when when he only had interest from Wisconsin and an offer from UCONN. The guy has burst off the line, can discard linemen because of his long arms and strength, long arms and lateral quickness help him snare ball carriers so he won't lose contain a lot (unlike Shaughnessy, the most overrated player on the team besides Hill). Tyler Westphal and Shelby Harris are a couple solid SSDE's who are very accomplished in Wisconsin and fairly highly rated (4-stars).

LB's: Mike Taylor from Ashwaubenon was possibly my favorite player from the '08 class. I saw him in a game he played against Sheboygan South and he was all over the field. Covered sideline to sideline, stood players up who attempted to run up the middle, and wreaked havoc in coverage. Very underrated player. The Badgers got a guy in '09 from the top program in the country, St. Thomas Aquinas (FL). He's another instinctual, athletic LB w/ the frame to add weight ala Taylor. From the 2007 class, Kevin Rouse is a very stout backer who plays with a lot of intensity, sheds blocks comfortably, and can go sideline to sideline. We have a good future there.

CB's: Henry and Goins will be around for 3 more years more likely. I already mentioned Marcus Cromartie (not related to Antonio). He really has everything but ball skills. Very good size for a corner, fluid hips, good quickness, great speed, confident. Here's his tape: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUTF1iYFk7A Otis Merrill is a great athlete who had no problem staying with receivers step for step in the spring game. Only thing he lacks really is ball skills also. Devin Smith from '08 is sort of the opposite, but a very solid player. Haven't done anything in 2009 at corner thus far. Had an important prospect we were in good shape at the PSU game but couldn't have made a good impression on him. Regardless, in conjunction with the pass rush our DE's will provide, our woes against spread passing teams should subside for the most part at least.

Wild Card:

TE: We didn't do anything at the position in 2007. In 2008 we scored an Andy Crooks-esque jumbo, blocking TE named Jake Byrne. But if we don't land a Graham, Beckum, Kendricks, etc; receiving type TE, in 2009, we won't enjoy the mismatches we present currently. We were high on the list of a couple of studs, but probably lost an immense amount of ground due to our recent performances.

That goes for recruits at several different positions. We missed out on a golden opportunity to pick up an immense amount of recruiting momentum the last few weeks.

Here is information on the commits from the '08 and '09 classes:

'09: http://www.recruitingplanet.com/forum/w ... ments.html

'08: http://www.recruitingplanet.com/forum/w ... gnees.html

[bigkurty]

Thanks for the info Bern. Thats good stuff. I actually saw the Horlick Bradford game this past Friday and there were some impressive kids in that game as well. Horlick had a guy catch 14 passes which seemed pretty crazy for a high school game but I hear he is not really a prospect anyway. Bradford has some big guys this year and another decent receiver from what I saw so I was surprised they didn't have a better record. They did end up beating Horlick though in a great game. I also saw the first half of the Tremper Muskego game. Tremper didn't really have anyone that stood out to me. Muskego had one bigger lineman guy who looked good but I dont know his name. Muskego also has this guy who plays nose tackle, is a senior and is like 6'7" 380 and is a nationally ranked power lifter but some little dude starts before him. Its amazing. That guy should be able to just dominate people but I guess he has slower feet and is easily cut blocked from what I hear. Muskego also has this kid Kyle Costigan who is a junior I believe and he seems like he could be a talent. I just wish more local school passed more. Muskego just runs that damn Wing T for example so its like the same 3 or 4 plays all the time. I don't understand that. I know most high school QB's can't really read the field for the most part but I don't get why high schools don't run more bubble screen, and boot legs where you have a receiver crossing shallow and another receiver doing a deeper post, corner or hook route on one side of the field. That is two receivers which should be easy enough to read for a high school QB and if they are covered, the QB can either run it or throw it away. But teams in this state seem to love the damn run way too much.

[ReasonablySober]

The Badgers simply need to become faster. They look slow at every position.

[El Duderino]

The Badgers simply need to become faster. They look slow at every position.

Yea they could use more speed, but their problems run much much deeper.

They have nothing at quarterback, hard to win football games at any level with terrible QB play.

Their starting safety, Shane Carter just might be the worst tackling safety in the history of college football.

They have no really high quality pass rushers

Zero depth at DT

Their hyped and very experienced offensive line is very overrated

They have WR's that can run fast, but they aren't skilled receivers

They have some good backs, but none are overly fast and struggle to break off long runs


The coaches really need to step up their recruiting of defensive lineman, receivers who can do more than run fast, playmakers in general, and stop playing a starting free safety that for going on two years gives up countless big plays because he can't tackle anyone even if his life depended on it.