#7 is Braden Smith

[ponyboy]

3 stars are for highly recruited players.

Not necessarily so. Rivals doesn't always do a good job of linking offers (which you've rightly said is the true measure of a candidate) with stars. And even basing a recruit's worth off of numbers of offers is flawed as offers come and go, are often contingent, are unrreported, or never happen if a recruit solidly commits early.

[Mustangs35SMU]

Very happy to see this.

Good quarterback that can obviously get better. Brought the Rockwall program all the way back from nothing basically to a district champion.

[Cadillac]

His page is up on Rivals now.

http://www.smu.rivals.com/viewprospect. ... _key=62694

-CoS

[jtstang]

2 stars, he leaped right over 1 star!

[MustangIcon]

Until PB puts a winning team on the field I will continue to assume his recruiting classes, as a whole, are below average. I have to assume, against my better judgement, that he is somewhat competent as a coach. Therefore, it can be assumed we have been bad during his tenure largely due to his recruiting efforts, which I would have to deem poor based on our performance.

You can't say the guy is a good coach and has done a good job recruiting when we have had no success in his tenure. This is especially true considering the patsy schedule we play. So which one is it- bad coach or bad recruiter??? Its gotta be one, the other, or a combo of both.

[George S. Patton]

Until PB puts a winning team on the field I will continue to assume his recruiting classes, as a whole, are below average. I have to assume, against my better judgement, that he is somewhat competent as a coach. Therefore, it can be assumed we have been bad during his tenure largely due to his recruiting efforts, which I would have to deem poor based on our performance.

You can't say the guy is a good coach and has done a good job recruiting when we have had no success in his tenure. This is especially true considering the patsy schedule we play. So which one is it- bad coach or bad recruiter??? Its gotta be one, the other, or a combo of both.

If someone can find the 1996 and 1998 records to compliment 1997, please let me know.

But I'll say this...I can't think of a better 2-year run 11-12 between 2005-06 (which isn't saying much but it is what it is and better than 3-9s) AND there was greater anticipation for that third year and there were expectations since the death penalty.

[D]

1996 was 5-6
1998 was 5-7

I think that is right on both. So, 11-11 from 1996-1997 would be the best 2 year run.

[tmustangp]

why? 3 stars are for highly recruited players. What is it with some of guys that can't figure this out. Just be contented with the thought that he was a Phil Bennett 3 star and hope he was right. No hope he's right about more than half of this recruiting class so far because Phil is recruiting "off the board" in August already. Looks like Phil's rounding up a heck of a high school All-District team with the assistance of tmustangp's advice rather than a Division 1A recruiting class.

wow the 5th grade bully must have been on summer vacation and is back w/ a vengence..

Stallion, have you seen any of these players at all? I have and I was at the camps this summer.. While you were scouring rivals in your cave, I was out in the heat of the day coaching and watching 3 of our current recruits..

MustangIcon, to combat your bad recruiter question:
-Justin Willis, pretty good recruit
-Demyron Martin
-Jessie Henderson - was a diamond in the rough
-Thomas Moorestead - pro prospect
-Emmanuel Sanders - soph all Conf USA
-Cory Muse
-Joe Sturdivant - apparently had offered from ACC and Big 10 schools
Last but not least.. A guy who was drafted by the Patriots.. I think his name was Justin Rogers.. a true diamond in the rough

The list can go on but I am tired of proving you and Stallion wrong..

Stop looking BACK at Bennett's records and start looking forward.. For all who read this, MustangIcon is a huge die hard fan and is really just being a devils advocate here, but if we (Mustang Fans) don't start changing our attitude toward the program then the non fans will not change their attitude toward us..

I cannot wait till the end of the season when people tell me that I wasn't an idiot by saying that the program is turning around and that they are looking forward to SMU games next fall. That is the attitude that we PonyFans need to have.

[westexSMU]

[quote="Stallion"]why? 3 stars are for highly recruited players. What is it with some of guys that can't figure this out. [/quote]...........Easy...My statement was "if" Braden has another year with a great Completion/TD/low pick percentage, and leads his team to another playoff, I think his stock would rise this year. Perfect Example: redshirt freshman WR/TE Phillip Burley was a Rivals 2 Star before his SR. year. Had a great SR. year, commited to SMU, and after commiting to SMU, Rivals changed his rating to 3 stars after reveiwing his SR. season success.

[ponyboy]

Forget about changing his rating. Burley had offers from Arizona, Arizona State and Boston College. That's what matters. But point made above that on field performance matters even more.

[Stallion]

Willis, Martin, Henderson, Muse, and Sturdivant all meet the standards of what I suggest would be the type of players SMU should be tickled to get. ie 3 star or high 2 star with multiple offers from quality programs. I'm not going to count Sanders because he was rated 4.9 by Rivals which means not enough was known about the recruit for Rivals to evaluate the prospect. However, he does meet my other standard since he had reported offers from UH, Kansas, TCU and Baylor(I can't find the 2005 recruiting wrapup but I'm 99% sure he had 4 quality offers from among those schools_ i know UH offered for sure). So ALL the players listed above meet that standard except for a walk-on Punter which are rarely awarded D-!A scholarships anyway. So basically tmustangp has simply listed some of our best recruits over the years and suggested this proves that Bennett has recruited great sleepers. Doesn't make much sense. That list emphasizes the importance of quality recruiting not vice-versa. Now Justin Rogers would be a good example of an overachieving sleeper on which Bennett hit the jack-pot.

[George S. Patton]

1996 was 5-6
1998 was 5-7

I think that is right on both. So, 11-11 from 1996-1997 would be the best 2 year run.

Thanks for the help. But it seems to me that there is more anticipation for what could happen in 2007 than what we were expecting for 1998. My thinking was a bona fide QB. There appears to be a better nucleus.

But we'll see.

[George S. Patton]

3 stars are for highly recruited players.

Not necessarily so. Rivals doesn't always do a good job of linking offers (which you've rightly said is the true measure of a candidate) with stars. And even basing a recruit's worth off of numbers of offers is flawed as offers come and go, are often contingent, are unrreported, or never happen if a recruit solidly commits early.

And as with any recruiting service, there is always a decent amount of politics involved in rating players a certain number of stars. Don't think for one minute that is never the case.

[tmustangp]

3 stars are for highly recruited players.

Not necessarily so. Rivals doesn't always do a good job of linking offers (which you've rightly said is the true measure of a candidate) with stars. And even basing a recruit's worth off of numbers of offers is flawed as offers come and go, are often contingent, are unrreported, or never happen if a recruit solidly commits early.

And as with any recruiting service, there is always a decent amount of politics involved in rating players a certain number of stars. Don't think for one minute that is never the case.

Huge politics.. Marcus Mosely.. remember him.. Either a state top 100 or national 100 by DMN and he never played a down for SMU..

[Cadillac]

I Met Bradon today. Seemed like a nice enough kid. He was at practice watching the QBs run drills. I asked him why he chose SMU, he said it was because of Bennett and Burns. He continued to talk about how he worked with Burns at camp, but didn't say anythign specific about Bennett.

I know, no actual news here. Just thought I'd mention his being at Practice today. I believe that Andrew Ellison was there too, but I couldn't for the life of me remember his name, and I didn't talk to him.

-CoS