Looks like our roster in football is better this year, with few injuries and a few breaks, do you thing we can win 7 ball game?
KQ- They need to win two of the first five and then the schedule eases up some, that will be the make or break. They have the talent to do that IMO, I think the OL will swing the offense and the secondary the defense either up or down.
RJ- While there are still a few holes on the roster that need filled, I have been impressed by GT’s efforts in portal recruiting thus far.
While it is unclear whether or not a team can sustain this amount of turnover and be successful, on paper this looks like a team that could win enough games to get to a bowl game.
The beginning of the schedule hasn’t changed since this question was asked. If they can find a way to survive that, they’ll have a chance to play some football in December/January.
In your opinion, and I know you have to be careful somewhat, do you see the light at the end of the tunnel for Football and Mens Basketball or does this year seem a little bleak considering some of the Recruiting and Portal misses so far?
KQ- What is bleak? Nothing is permanent in college sports and there are hundreds of examples of that. Hell Rutgers basketball has been historically terrible and they went to back-to-back tournaments after going 30 years without going to the NCAAT, so things can change quickly there. The lack of NIL money is hurting GT's hoops more than anything right now with the kind of guys who can step in and be an immediate + several wins type impact players. Kansas has $2 million earmarked for NIL for hoops right now to put that in perspective. Between NIL and the academic hurdles it is a tough gig. Some folks have met with Josh to access the landscape and are trying to put together a NIL package for hoops finally. The good thing about basketball is they only need to hit on one or two more guys to have a pretty good team and a bubble team IMO assuming the player development continues with how it has historically worked with Josh Pastner teams at GT with the young core Deivon/Kyle/Deebo/Miles/Jalon.
Football, the talent level is up, the coaching and player development hasn't been in the same line with the improved talent and they made a ton of staff changes. How that plays out is really difficult to tell at this point. The team is executing at a higher level in practice on both sides of the ball, they've added some quality pieces via the portal and some younger players that are more unknowns especially on the OL, that will have to shake out and I still need to see what the final three or four transfers look like that they may take.
What is the current list of OL transfer prospects you believe GT is pursuing?
KQ- So here is the deal with some of the portal stuff these days, until someone comes on a visit and they post stuff it is kept extremely quiet. We've had to sit on a lot of different targets and the bigger the name, the less likely we are to share anything. There are other guys they are in touch with that we are aware of, but again until those guys visit it is not very fruitful to mention them. Brent Key might talk to 30 different portal OLs for example, but maybe 10 have mutual interest and 5-6 end up actually being able to visit/get into school and again we share what we can there. Neither Russell or myself are going to burn our sources to put a list up of possible portal targets especially when sources don't want that public and are being cagey (rightfully so) to avoid poaching situations.
So our position right now is holding back on kids that are trying to keep things quiet and sharing what will not blow up on us. It is a tricky deal. I spent Friday diffusing a situation with another site I run with a source at that school who was upset that we broke news on a transfer visiting that was a huge deal. In that case, the news was on another Rivals site and becoming public so it worked itself out and the source was cool with me, but it goes to show how sensitive this stuff is.
Just a request in this new world of portal transfers. When transfer verbal commits are announced it would be helpful to also include projected enrollment dates since that is the apparent equivalent of true commitment analogous to HS signing dates.
RJ- Sure, this is something that is attainable. Feel like this request is in response to a transfer commit continuing to take visits? Similar to that of a HS prospect, a transfer commitment is able to continue evaluating his options, just as the school can, until the moment he enrolls as a student.
There is no NLI needed for transfer portal kids, which can make things even more unpredictable.
Any transfer committing now is expected to be on campus this month, or early next month at the latest unless there is some kind of wait needed for classes/graduation before leaving their current school.
What is your understanding of Ramsey's new coaching role - any different than his current role or just a way to send a signal and give him a raise?
RJ: Job titles are primarily about avenues for two things: wage increases and future promotions.
I don’t believe this new title to be any different.
Collins seemed to be great at connecting with kids, and it looked like he had a very high ceiling for recruiting classes. With the new NIL world, will that negate Collins' recruiting strengths, or will he still be able to bring in highly ranked kids (assuming we win games)?
RJ: The relationship aspect is always going to be a big factor for kids in recruiting, no matter how much money is involved or on the table.
The NIL world is something that (currently) has evened the playing field a bit on some of the kids that in the past GT would have somewhat of an advantage with.
Down the road, the relationships built by the staff, if they are also able to also win games, will loom large.
The staff, though they are on the road recruiting primarily HS right now, seem to be focusing on finishing the 2022 roster before starting the 2023 class.
Not calling it a strategy, not arguing the fact that it is unusual to not have a commit in May, just passing along the vibes I have been feeling from sources for several weeks now.
The ACC coaches seemed to be universally against expanding the playoffs. I am not following the logic of this with the Pitt coach being one of the most vocal against it. Expansion would have ensured that at minimum the ACC champ would get a bid. Do you understand this?
KQ- They don't want 3 SEC teams in the playoffs or more. That would allow the SEC to possibly swallow up more schools and weaken the other four power conferences in their view. That is the objection at the core as I hear it from people.
Remember all the interviews with CGC about how NIL was "in our DNA" ? Pretty clear he overpromised on this, but were there external factors that were different than anyone expected ? Did things just escalate more quickly to legitimized bagmen ? Or were we just talking out loud with hope but no real plan. CGC certainly talked like NIL was going to be an asset for GT - it hasn't worked out that way (which really should not have surprised anyone, imo)
KQ- No one at GT or most schools including Bama or UGA expected what has happened with NIL over the last 7-8 months particularly schools like Texas A&M. GT was quick to have some deals in place, but they were not throwing hundreds of thousands of dollars around in inducements. This is basically as I've said on here repeatedly benefitting schools that had tons of money, donors willing to spend in on bags in the first place now happy to do it outwardly. Cheating has been going on forever and the amounts just keep going up. NIL can be an asset for GT, but the reality is GT's fanbase is not one that will spend every dollar they have on GT sports. The wealthy GT fans I know are not sinking in six-plus figures on buying players and many object to the principle outright. TAMU or UGA or BAMA have double or triple the number of fans so it is also easier to find people willing to buy in and that want to help their team win. There are some GT fans or alums like that, but they have more common sense with their money than a lot of other fan groups I deal with. So GT has to be more creative and people are working on that, but again it has to be run by boosters and GT cannot run it on their own, they cannot solicit people to give money for NIL or anything like that.
Basketball: Has Deivon Smith been fully cleared from the concussion that ended his season?
KQ- I have not asked, but I can.
Do you have any insight into tweaks to the offense CJP would like to make heading into '22-23? Is that entirely dependent on who they can land in the Portal, or do you think some change to some of the Princeton heavy stuff will happen either way?
KQ- I think the move away from the Princeton stuff will happen just based on the personnel and what they are recruiting before I even get into what Pastner has said about it. I think that system had been so good to them they stuck with it too long with a big man who couldn't run it. It worked out really well because of how skilled the big men were and how they learned and adapted to the system the first years of Pastner's time, but ultimately that is difficult to maintain and they hit a road block and will change it up this year.
I don't see them adding some dynamic passing big man and they've found most of them can't play on the defensive end the way they need to like Saba for example so that ends up hurting the program.
