So the 2010 recruiting class had the highest average recruit ranking of any class we have had since the 2007 class. That includes all of CGC's signing classes. You can look this up on Rivals and verify for yourself if you'd like. So he did build off the 2008 and 2009 seasons and was able to recruit fairly successfully. However the 2010 season's relatively poor results followed and brought recruiting down for 2011. But his classes bounced around - 2010 as I mentioned was the high point: 26th nationally for average recruit ranking, 5th in conference. 2012, 2014, 2015 and 2017 all rated around 34th nationally. Other classes were in the low to mid 40s, with the exception of 2013 and 2015 which were both low 50s and followed mediocre to horrible seasons. CGC's classes have ranked right around 31 nationally for comparison, basically on par with about half of CPJ's classes.
I agree with you that it wasn't a big part of the program for him - he was not a particularly avid recruiter to begin with, and the fact that lots of people said he couldn't get those players and couldn't win at this level I think led him to give his doubters the proverbial finger and say screw you I'll do it with the guys that fit what I need and I can easily get - frees up a little more time for golf. This is definitely one of his bigger weaknesses, and one our ADs should have addressed by hiring more/better support staff while everyone else was opening up their pocketbooks to try and be competitive - can you imagine someone like CGC out there recruiting for CPJ? We would have been destroying everyone we played. Instead we got Bobinski who wanted to fire him and did nothing to help that he didn't have to, leaving Tech lagging majorly behind our competitors and leaving recruiting as a notable issue.
This past off season tStan has moved to address some of the weaknesses of CGC, which seem to be primarily in the coaching department. The same was not done for CPJ.
Yes to this and the comparison with Wisconsin. Having an AD who wasn't going to support your program doesn't help one bit. I've never understood hiring him.
And, actually, I think Paul put in a good effort in recruiting. The main thing with him, however, was to concentrate on the players that a) could help run the schemes on O and D, b) could get into Tech, and c) could stick. (Update: this meant he was economical in his recruiting; if a top player said he had little or no interest in Tech, Paul would move on. This in turn was a wise use of scare resources.) We actually succeeded in recruiting fairly high powered D recruits, especially under Ted. The O side brought in its share of 4 star recruits and was - I'll say it again, since people seem determined to forget - consistently effective and sometimes almost unstoppable. There's an equation here: the recruits we brought in on O were highly effective in delivering
results. That, btw, is how we all should evaluate recruiting - by results.
Now Wisconsin. Yes, to all points. We can recruit like the Badgers and, if we have a decent player development program in place and coaches who know what they are doing, Tech can win at about the same rate. Problem = we don't have either the program or the coach to do either at present. Again, the
results tell us this.
I'm not pulling for Tech to lose. I want us to go 10 - 2 or better. But I'm certainly not expecting it. And that's too bad.