Recruiting: Huff vs Doc

[BleedsGreen33]

It seems like Coach Huff offers a 4 or 5 star recruit every day. Is he really that much more aggressive than Doc or are we just paying more attention. Remember Doc was blazing the trails in his first four seasons posting the #54 class in 2011 and the #58 class in 2013.

To this point we know of Coach Huff getting a commitment from one 4-star for 2021 and has offered maybe four 4-stars and one 5-star recruits for 2022 thus far. So is he really that much more aggressive than Doc? How many 4 and 5 stars did Doc offer each season? If the offer lists on here are correct here are the numbers.

Year	4-star​	5-star​
2020	11​	0​
2019	28​	3​
2018	25​	1​
2017	29​	1​
2016	30​	2​
2015	33​	3​
2014	29​	2​
2013	27​	2​
2012	16​	1​
2011	13​	0​
2010	6​	0​

So it is still to be determined how many Coach Huff will offer over the next year for the 2022 class and beyond and then how many is he going to land. Over the years Doc has landed a few. In his first class he landed 4-star DB Brian Robinson and 4-star Travon Van and that class was put together in about the same time that Huff has now. The main difference being is there was not early signing period so Doc didn't already have any locked down players. I don't say that in a knock to Coach Huff. It's just hard to compare 2021 to 2010 because we don't know how aggressive Coach Huff would have been if he was needing to scramble to sign a class and didn't have to worry about the 2020 eligibility mulligan.

Doc's early years weren't without the excitement and drama. Remember the Chevelle Buie sweepstakes and the nearly landing of Kelvin Benjamin. I remember this place losing their mind when someone found him on registered here.

Still Doc has signed his share of 4-stars over the years and two 5-stars if you look at other services for Yulee and Durant's rankings. We've had guys like Kevin Grooms, AJ Leggett, Deontay McManus, Donaldven Manning, Stefan Houston, and that one RB we flipped from Louisville that got dismissed right before camp started. Then we have Xavier Gaines out there now. There have been others that I am just not remembering. We had transfers from P5 schools that were highly rated too.

Time will tell if Coach Huff will be able to land these 4 and 5 star kids or if we're just caught up in all the excitement of having a new coach and really this is just business as usual.

I don't post this for the sake of taking up for Doc or to take a shot at Coach Huff. I just got curious on how aggressive Doc was with offers and thought I'd share for no other purpose than maybe adding a little bit of perspective. I've seen some fans use the Coombs signing as a sign that Huff is the right guy, but I think it's unfair to use that as a sign because it has happened here. We were all giddy on NSD for the first several years of Doc's tenure too.

For the sake of argument Doc's classes ranked as follows.

Year	National Rank​	CUSA Rank​
2010	71​	5​
2011	54​	3​
2012	68​	3​
2013	58​	1​
2014	63​	1​
2015	73​	1​
2016	66​	1​
2017	90​	6​
2018	71​	1​
2019	67​	2​
2020	69​	2​

 

[BleedsGreen33]

A recap for those that don't remember Chevelle Buie


He was a 4-star 2011 RB that Doc was trying to bring in. He brought him to a MBB game and people were making "WE WANT BUIE" signs and it was nuts for the week leading up. People were making pictures of him standing beside green chevy chevelles. We thought we had him and then on NSD he picks ECU and never makes it to the school because he was an NQ. He tried to get released to come here and couldn't. Ended up at some lower level school for a season and fell off of earth.

 

[herdalicious]

I've learned over the years to never get excited about any recruit that comes to Marshall with more than 3 stars from the recruiting services. We can legitimately land 3-star athletes who come here because they want to be here, who have their grades, no major injuries and no prior convictions.

Above that, we're usually landing someone talented who has warts, and the "hyped-recruit-to-productive-player" conversion ratio seems to be less than 10%. When one actually pans out, its a surprise bonus.

What I'm most interested in with Coach Huff is how well he evaluates the talent he has. Brenden Knox was a three star recruit and a four star player, and it took a transfer and an injury for him to get off special teams. In the time we waited for Holliday to realize what he had, we lost to MTSU because we had no running game and had to put everything on Alex Thomson's wet noodle of an arm (another failure of evaluation), and that loss cost us the division that year.

 

[mlblack16.]

What I'm most interested in with Coach Huff is how well he evaluates the talent he has. Brenden Knox was a three star recruit and a four star player, and it took a transfer and an injury for him to get off special teams. In the time we waited for Holliday to realize what he had, we lost to MTSU because we had no running game and had to put everything on Alex Thomson's wet noodle of an arm (another failure of evaluation), and that loss cost us the division that year.

Wasn't that the case with Devon Johnson as well? Maybe he wasn't a 3 star, but he clearly did wonders for us, sans injuries, once Holliday finally moved him to offense.

 

[BleedsGreen33]

I've learned over the years to never get excited about any recruit that comes to Marshall with more than 3 stars from the recruiting services. We can legitimately land 3-star athletes who come here because they want to be here, who have their grades, no major injuries and no prior convictions.

Above that, we're usually landing someone talented who has warts, and the "hyped-recruit-to-productive-player" conversion ratio seems to be less than 10%. When one actually pans out, its a surprise bonus.

What I'm most interested in with Coach Huff is how well he evaluates the talent he has. Brenden Knox was a three star recruit and a four star player, and it took a transfer and an injury for him to get off special teams. In the time we waited for Holliday to realize what he had, we lost to MTSU because we had no running game and had to put everything on Alex Thomson's wet noodle of an arm (another failure of evaluation), and that loss cost us the division that year.

Look at what it took to get Devon Johnson to RB.

 

[BleedsGreen33]

Wasn't that the case with Devon Johnson as well? Maybe he wasn't a 3 star, but he clearly did wonders for us, sans injuries, once Holliday finally moved him to offense.

Yes. Part of his rating is he didn't entertain other offers or attend camps he was invited to. Once he got his offer here he committed and shut his recruiting down. I remember reading that VT was going to offer him and he politely told them not to waste their time.

 

[herdalicious]

I hope one day we learn the whole story about Devon Johnson. Not for whatever seemingly salacious aspects of it might exist, but because I continue to believe he was the victim of something.

 

[BleedsGreen33]

I hope one day we learn the whole story about Devon Johnson. Not for whatever seemingly salacious aspects of it might exist, but because I continue to believe he was the victim of something.

Honestly what I think happened just from what I observed from a far is that he had a back injury that was neglected. He had no business being out there against Kent State when he could barely walk and then he broke that long run against FAU and he said his legs went numb which means he had a pretty bad injury. He probably got on pain meds and either OD'd or accidentally OD'd by mixing it with something else not knowing it could be lethal.

Nothing I ever gathered about Devon would make me think that he would take his own life on purpose or he was a hardcore drug user.

I'd have to see a lot more evidence to sway me from thinking that back injury led to it.

 

[muherdfan2]

Man he was a great one. God Bless Him and His Family. Was a GREAT PERSON!

 

[herdalicious]

I'd have to see a lot more evidence to sway me from thinking that back injury led to it.

That's been my impression too. Given how much of a bond there was between his family and Holliday, I'm sure the decision to play was mutual at least to some degree, but you still wish there would have been somebody there to put their hand up and say "no, y'all ain't doing this."

We talk alot about whether or not players deserve to earn an income while playing college football, but maybe just as important is that there could be some sort of collective bargaining entity established that could force schools to make player health and safety a greater priority. (And maybe even collect money from member institutions to help with after-play healthcare.)

The older I get, the more awful it seems when young people die. He was such a good kid, and his story was so sad, you just kind of hope that something good could come out of it, for the kids who are coming up.

 

[19MU88]

Nothing I ever gathered about Devon would make me think that he would take his own life on purpose or he was a hardcore drug user.

I'd have to see a lot more evidence to sway me from thinking that back injury led to it.

I think what you state is true, however, it only takes once to OD. I think he was a good kid and not sure what all led to his poor decision (back injury, peers, whatever).