Are y'all excited about signing day?

[Diamond Girl]

There are positive posts about many of the recruits, but I haven't seen anything about anyone being really excited about the new group of recruits as a whole. PonyPride has done a lot of hard work recruiting, and he's pumped about these guys. What about the rest of y'all?

[OC Mustang]

I am sure that PonyPride will do a great job...he ALWAYS does. And tempted as I might be to sling a zinger, I will NOT join the westex/Billy Joe/Stallion line (oh woe is me...rivals says we suck), but frankly, I have to say, until I read Pride's comprehensive comments, or we shake loose a surprise here at the end who is clearly a cut above, I am pretty much of the opinion that this year is a mild yawner.

But that said, I am still a recruiting dork, and man oh man do I enjoy the recaps on these kids. But this bunch's high school recruits should immediately put on a redshirt at the beginning of the season and leave it on until August '07, leaving Coach Bennett & Co. another shot at recruiting a good class.

Somebody surprise me. Please, I WANT to believe.

p.s. It's all about the wins. I dunno how to put that at the bottom of every one of my posts, but if it is good enough for Denny Crane, it is good enough for me.

[Lotus]

I'm a complete recruiting nut, at least an SMU recruiting nut, and I can't wait to read the Roundup. Signing Day is like Christmas to me.

Congratulations, coaches!

[Billy Joe]

The SMU Christmas tree is pretty bare then. How can we expect to get to a bowl game when we are consistently ranked in the bottom half of all Division 1-A teams in recruiting? I am very disappointed SMU did not get more juco players and have not gone after transfer players more aggresively. These facts indicate SMU still has not made the necessary changes to field a winning team. Do not get too excited for next season as we will start a qb that has taken ZERO Division 1-A snaps unless Phillips gets back in the mix. I would think if the coaches planned on playing Phillips at QB this year then they would have given him some snaps instead of Mr. Interception, oh yeah, his name is Mr. Eckart. The last time Bennett started a qb that had taken zero Division 1-A snaps we did not win a game.

[abezontar]

the time before that we won three, and if we can't win three with this schedule then we have problems.

[PK]

I am very disappointed SMU did not get more juco players and have not gone after transfer players more aggresively.

I agree more juco players would have been great, but I don't think it was a problem of not going after them, but rather not being able to transfer all their credits. Also, by NCAA rules, we cannot go after D-1 transfers, agressively or otherwise, they have to come to us.

[Billy Joe]

That is the problem. The coaches still are not allowed to play by the same rules as our competition. UTEP, TCU, Houston, and now Tulsa rarely, if ever, turn a juco player away because of credit or transfer hour issues. While a school may not be able to actively seek transfer players, the word gets out that a school (SMU in this case) is stingy on accepting tranfer hours so why would a recruit waste his time looking at us. Regardless, the pressure is on Bennett this season to give us a winning season with the cream cake schedule he has. If we cannot make a bowl game this season it may be a long time coming. Let's all hope whoever is the qb he can play.

[me@smu]

That is the problem. The coaches still are not allowed to play by the same rules as our competition. UTEP, TCU, Houston, and now Tulsa rarely, if ever, turn a juco player away because of credit or transfer hour issues.

How can you possibly know what the admission process for any of these schools are in terms of Jucos? I realize they accept more than we do but no one knows how many and who they turn away.

[BringBackThePonies03]

We picked up some good players, good work SMU!

[Stallion]

How can you possibly ignore 20 years of evidence. I'm pretty sure you don't have any idea of what you are talking about. Hey P.K. could you give me a cite on that captivating NCAA rule that seems to be holding SMU down. Some of you have to be the most gullible people I know.

[me@smu]

How can you possibly ignore 20 years of evidence. I'm pretty sure you don't have any idea of what you are talking about. Hey P.K. could you give me a cite on that captivating NCAA rule that seems to be holding SMU down.

Here is link for NCAA transfer guide, check page 9: http://www.ncaa.org/library/general/transfer_guide/2005-06/2005-06_transfer_guide.pdf

20 years of evidence about who and who cannot transfer? I would love for someone to provide me a list of every person who applied to transfer to UTEP in the last 20 years. I am not saying they might be more lax, just that we cry about all the other schools being so lax in transferring in and yet we have no real proof of who they deny or accept.

[Stallion]

UTEP had ABOUT 15 transfers in one year a couple of years ago plus about 6 Division 1A Transfers icluding both ther talanted RBs who were Parade All-Americans. You think this is just coincidence? Geez

[DiamondM]

I understand the constant refrain about jucos. But we signed 20 players this year total -- 16 high school and 4 juco. That means 20% of the signees were jucos, and of the ones that will actually be enrolled next fall, 25% will be jucos. What mix of jucos vs. high school players are you complainers expecting?

Tulsa had 5 jucos and 17 high school players
UTEP announced 28 high school players and 1 juco
TCU signed 18, 2 of which were juco
Houston's official site doesn't have their list up yet.

I just don't see that BJ's complaints are valid this year. Only Tulsa had 1 more juco than us. This certainly doesn't suggest either (1) we didn't "go after" jucos, or (2) have the ability to get jucos enrolled -- at least as compared to the schools that BJ and Stallion say we should be acting like.

Am I missing something? If not, then move the needle on the record and let's hear another song.

[Stallion]

Obviously its NOT the JUCOs we're are signing. Duh! Its the JUCOs and transfers not getting in making us recruit platoon JUCO QBs with 46% passing percentages and no other offers out of High School or College. Do you honestly think that Phil Bennett doesn't get inquiries all the time from recruits looking to transfer to SMU.

[DiamondM]

I understand that. But it still doesn't answer my question. What mix are you looking for? How does the current juco signee situation of us versus the other schools cited as evidence show that we are turning away people only to have them show up on the rosters of those other schools?

I'm just asking the question. And don't give me stats from the last 5 years. As I've said before, certain things have been changed in those past 5 years to make the process of enrolling jucos easier and I believe we've signed more jucos in each of the last 3 years than the previous year, so that suggests improvement. I'm talking now. This year. Today.

But again, I may be missing something.