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Nigel Tufnel

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Posts posted by Nigel Tufnel

  1. Nothing CTJ said do I disagree with.  Having just completed this whole process, I could go on for days about this stuff.  A couple of things that became obvious to me.  First, coaches are looking for players who are physically ready RIGHT NOW.  These are the kids who when you see them, they look like they are physically 30 years old.  Sure, they have to project positions like OL and DL more than others, but they want mature bodies now (this may be even more so in baseball).  

    Second, you are at the whim of the evaluating person in "the system" and all their good and bad traits/qualities.  A lot of preconceived notions of the evaluators simply will not be overcome.  This can be infuriating because, like it or not, it is part of the system, and it affects the player.   

    Yes, stars matter, absolutely.  But it is still a crap shoot because they can't dig deeply into backgrounds.  Percentages say that 4* and 5* are more likely to pay off and they do.  Coaches who are good evaluators will have a mix of 2-5*, even though fans complain that they are taking "bread."   Smaller schools will be between unrated and 3*.

    Fans complain all the time about the services, recruiting evaluators, etc., but at the same time believe the bigger "system."  It's a pretty interesting dynamic.

    • Like 1
  2. 1 hour ago, F250 said:

    Yes, things ease up at 16U with games spread out over a few days instead of the the kiddie ball Sat/Sun format. The high school format is so much better than the kid tournaments. Oddly, the kids play a lot more games throughout the year and spend more time playing in a day than the high school players.

    Couple of thoughts here.  First: The high school format is significantly more expensive because they spread it out.  But they don’t really play more.  You go to Dallas, Atalanta, Hoover, and play one game Wed., Thurs., Fri., and keep going back to the hotel for the remainder of the day.  It can be frustrating.
     

    Second: the kids play more and it’s almost always too much.  Burnout shows up in a variety of ways and it is prevalent.  

  3. 14 minutes ago, ClubWhatever said:

    Did lots of teams "push" for your kid?  Did any "back off", or did they make him "a priority"?  And:  did anybody "surge"?

    Exactly.  If I can't answer that, how can anyone else? 

    We were very clear from the start for him to do his best to "see through" the recruitment.  It's sales.  It's his (and our) job to try to see the best school for him that also fits well with football.  If you base things on how well a staff recruited you, there is a really good chance that you will not go to the best place for you.  We told him that it shouldn't matter if the school that is the best combo of school and football wasn't the best recruitment.  The best choice may be the school that was 5th best recruiting you.  I am well aware that we are a minority among the recruited families in this line of thinking.

    I could go for days about recruiting services, the head scratching dance of how to get rated, etc.  Again, even among the "experts" it's 50/50.  

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  4. 7 hours ago, closetojumping said:

    I don't think calling Brown a "bust" is fair by @texifornia. It's not like any of us were projecting him to be a starter during his recruitment. I think you can follow recruiting and project them within reason and the understanding that any single player is always a wild card and can never be considered a sure thing.

    Little Nigel just finished the recruiting process.  It was actually like I expected but even more so.  As he got older and his teammates/opponents were recruited, I realized how little any of the coaches knew about the player, history, tendencies, etc.  It hammered home why it is basically a 50/50 proposition in recruiting.  The coaches can only know so much.  It is interesting to see coaches recruit kids and see how superficial it almost has to be.  More than a few times I was scratching my head as to why they were looking at certain kids.  But I don't bat 1.000 either.

    It was certainly fun, but it got tiresome really quickly.  That, and coming out of conversations with coaches thinking, "I am doing life wrong."  It is mind boggling that some of them make the money they do.  But I guess it's like that with most things.  One thing I can say with certainty, the $9.95ers don't know anything unless the player has told the coach and they share that with the $9.95er.  It is all guessing.  They have no idea.  Most of the time the player doesn't know yet, and the family certainly doesn't know, but they are reading things about where the player is leaning.  Comical.

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  5. 20 minutes ago, Hook1997 said:

    Those teams did it despite Pierce no because of him..  Called that last year.  Pierce was riding on talent that wanted to play for Texas.  Then he made himself the pitching coach and even screwed the talent part up.  Troy Tulowitzki saved his ass for a couple years.  

    Little Nigel and a couple of teammates were recruited by both UT and A&M.  I am not surprised at all at what Schloss has put together so quickly.  

    At camp, Schloss was in full uniform, and met every player after they checked in.  He was fully engaged and in charge of everything.  
    UT and Pierce were much more of the “We are UT, you should want to play here,” but weren’t going to bend over backwards to recruit.  Schloss was the opposite.

    UT was very arms length and I didn’t know a lot of the kids they recruited (and the ones I know are questionable).  I knew a lot more of the kids A&M was after.

    Teammate ended up with LSU even though part of family is Aggie.  Schloss can be tough too, but he is a relentless recruiter.  Pierce and his assistants are not.

    And let’s get off the hiring of a HS coach.

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    • Like 1
  6. 18 hours ago, Kermit said:

    Because it is. They had a falling out (JTE and Isbell), and the family doesn’t like him. Of course, everything I learned about this stupid ass non-story came from the gossip section of Saving Country Music. Someone claiming to be her father is going stark raving mad. 

    Heard Isbell talk about JTE a couple of years ago in an interview.  He said JTE got pissed at Jason and Amanda after JTE split with his significant other.  Jason and Amanda wanted to stay friends with both and that upset JTE.  So, as there is no doubt, more to the story, it sounds like there was some high-maintenance drama coming from JTE's side of things.  Sounds like things are still a mess with his survivors.

  7. 12 hours ago, Pescado_Rojo said:

    If you all will indulge me a proud dad moment, my daughter's 4x400 team finished 3rd at area last night and will advance to regionals for the first time in school history (centex 5A school, opened in 2009 so not that big a deal)

    Congrats!  Area meets are such a beat down. Coming off the adrenaline of District and looking forward to Region.  Area seems to “get in the way.”

    Little Nigel won District in the 100m, 200m, LJ, and 4x100.  Area is Friday, all in one day.  Survive and advance is the motto.

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  8. 39 minutes ago, jeevsie said:

    Tangentially related:

     

    Watkins committed to LSU. 'Member him?

    Duncanville has Durham (same comment as above) but also Moore who we're still chasing. (SWIDT?)

    Also, Watkins was at a Klein school last year. Consipiracizing Atascosita recruited a dream team to pull this off? Don't know the other kids.

    Other kids are Tory Blalock, who is a fantastic athlete and D1 RB recruit, then a kid going to Iowa for track, and another to TCU for track.  Watkins on the anchor.  We were there.  Perfect conditions and a perfectly executed race.

    • Hook 'Em 5
  9. 15 hours ago, Fudge Nuggets said:

    I'm heading over to the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays next Saturday.  They usually have some pretty good college teams at it on top of the HS teams.  Last year UGA with Matthew Boling were there.

    Our district has its meet split between Tuesday April 2 and Thursday April 4... not sure why they aren't doing anything on Wednesday, but that's their schedule.  UIL finals are the weekend of May 4.  I'll be there for the Saturday 6A/1A finals.

    Texas Relay will be light on High School this year because of its proximity to District meets.  The Bluebonnet Invitational at A&M was the proxy for the Relays this year.  We are a bit bummed that little Tufnel will not be competing.

    Most District meets will be running prelims day one, field events day two, and finals day three.  If it’s only Tues. Thurs. most likely they are building in a rain day just in case.

  10. 58 minutes ago, cmontexas said:

    The national 4×100 record set by FW Wyatt 26 years went down this weekend by 2 teams in the same race. Duncanville (ft D Moore) went 39.65 and Atascocita ran a completely absurd 38.92.

    Jelani Watkins is the fastest high schooler Ive ever seen

    I was there.  Perfect conditions and a perfectly executed race.  Texas (Houston in particular) has some serious speed.

    • Hook 'Em 3
  11. 26 minutes ago, closetojumping said:

    We've had a couple of select tournaments this winter out in Sealy. That's 60+ minutes from doorstep to the field and the first game on Saturday was 8am both times. Got to be there an hour early. Getting up on a Saturday for kid's ball at 5:15am sucks. Sucks for the little kid too.

    Few things light the fire to put a really strong team together more than wanting to avoid the   8-10am games on Saturday and Sunday.

  12. 10 hours ago, jimmyjazz said:

    The Hole In The Wall has had many things go down, musical and otherwise.  I was there for two -- the theft, chase and recovery of a guitar off stage during a Magneto USA (now Fastball) set, and Don Henley's surprise appearance to sing "Don Henley Must Die" with Mojo Nixon.  

    I don't suppose either will be a top 10 moment on my deathbed, but they were pretty cool, nonetheless.

    See, so this is pretty cool.  Any specifics on the Henley appearance to share with the group?

  13. 2 hours ago, Texas Jeff said:

    How do high school football programs attract and compensate "elite" football coaches?  Do the boosters just pay the coach a bonus?  I understand that it's attractive to have a nice stadium and facilities, but school districts are kinda broke right now.  Do they just make football a priority and fire a science teacher so that they can pay the coach more?

    Looking at Lovejoy's website, they have all kinds of stuff about budget woes, needing to charge students for bus transportation, charging out of district transfers tuition, having a tax-rate election to access copper pennies (basically taxing yourself more when you know that some of the tax is going to go back to the state).  They have maxed out their bond debt at 50 cents by building facilities.

    They are a wealthy district but a small school and they don't seem to be in the financial position to go for an elite coach.

    This could be an entirely different discussion. With Dodge, this was the plan all along.  Sit out 1-2 years so that his TRS would kick in.  Then because he was out for more than 1 year, he continues to get TRS and whatever LL pays him so, he double dips.

    As for how they compensate.  Anything approved by the school board is public.  However, it is usually relatively easy to have a booster in a school district that has close ties in some way, shape, or form to a car dealership.  Coach gets a lease-free car to drive around every X-thousand miles and then repeats that again and again.  That is not part of the school district’s compensation package.  That, in and of itself, is fairly substantial.  That is the main effort to compensate that I am aware of off the top of my head.

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