Obviously you take the best player regardless of school. But when it comes down to it, being at a top (football) school can help your grade. When the U was rolling, it was really annoying how few Canes were drafted by Miami. Thrill Hill comes to mind. A flyer on Melvin Bratton. Some others bounced to Miami later, like Lamar Thomas. But what are we talking about here with that?
I’m fine with us giving Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, Georgia and LSU extra benefit of the doubt every year. They are playing at a different level than everyone else. There can be a nice player anywhere, but I like peppering our roster with heavy weighting to those schools. Success can move in cycles. USC and Texas are sleeping giants and could move into that level again so you can adjust.
And we have essentially already been doing that, with significant success. Keep it rolling. Without tryIng very hard, Wilkins, R. Davis, Baker, Ferguson, Kindley, Tua. Lawson via free agency. Not bad at all. Tank and the tackle from OSU were failures but we’ve gotten some core players from those schools.
Two players per year from those schools is fine with me. I like going over weight with the big five schools. They will have the goods to have even been recruited by those schools. Then they are immersed in winning, the habits, the learning and development, the culture, the big games. Lots of good reasons.
Of course, we have landed Austin Jax from USC and others at big power programs. That’s really smart too. I’m not saying you only draft from the top five schools. Just that you over weight them.
