To succeed in recruiting, I think we have to look for niches that may go overlooked. Places I think we can focus:

1. ATH types. We can use them in several spots.
2. Fullbacks and tight ends. A lot of spread offenses don't use them. I remember Pat Hill at Fresno (the "anybody, anywhere, anytime" guy) saying that his offense would always use a FB and a TE because those were positions that not everybody recruited, so there were good athletes that the big boys would pass on. And lots of those guys can help at LB or d-line if they don't make it at their recruited position.
3. Multi-sport athletes who want to continue to play multiple sports. Jess recruited a lot of those, nobody since has really done that. I realize that sports have become really specialized since Jess's time, but if we could pick off one or two great athletes a year, that would obviously help both football and whatever the other sport was.
4. Running quarterbacks. OK, I know I've said I liked the Erk Russell/Bob Wagner/Paul Johnson flexbone that combined the wishbone and the run-and-shoot, and this kind of player would be more effective in that scheme. And the big boys who are looking for pocket passers will pass on these guys. But this kind of player can also make an outstanding safety, or even LB if he grows like Dan Dawson did. If Texas tells a kid who was a running QB in HS, "We want you but we want you to play DB," and we say, "We'll give you a sot at QB, and if that doesn't work then we'll get you on the field as a DB," then we ave a chance to get that kid.
5. Defensive linemen that can convert to offense if they don't work out on defense. This was a favorite of Fred's, and I think it makes a lot of sense for us.
6. Smaller schools. Bill Yeoman had a Cotton Bowl team that had more starters from 3A and smaller schools than any other SWC school. Places like Brenham and Van Alstyne. I think we can find some diamonds in the rough.
7. Guys who may not have all the measurables, but are simply good football players.

Some of those represent contrarian thinking, and I realize that other than perhaps the FBs/TEs, those really aren't the people we need to pound the rock. But I'm not all that fond of pound the rock. My feeling there is that at least I know what Bloomgren is trying to do, and if he can make it work then more power to him, but I just don't think that gives us our best chance to win. If there's a common objective to them, I'd say it's to accumulate a more athletic talent pool that can help on both sides of the ball. With our chronic depth issues, I think that's a huge consideration.

If we took this approach, we might well end up with a team that were better athletes than football players. I think that's a good problem to have.