Jimmys and Joes
I decided to look at all of Hopson’s recruiting classes just to see how many of the players we’d gotten that had offers from Power 5 schools. At the end of the day, you might know the Xs and Os, but if we don’t have the Jimmys and Joes, we aren’t going to be competitive, even against a very bad Mississippi State team playing a ton of Freshmen. So here’s the results. I didn’t include all offers people had due to length, but did include all of the P5 offers (and AAC for the most part). These players may have had interest from P5 schools, but if they didn’t receive an offer, I didn’t include it. I also didn’t include 2016, since this was Monken’s recruiting, even if he bailed last minute.
2017
Jaylon Adams (Illinois, Indiana, Iowa State)
Travion Clayton (SWAC and Charlotte)
Paul Gainer (Memphis)
Wydale Flott (Sun Belt schools)
Shannon Showers (FCS schools)
Justus Satterfield (UNT)
Kris Reed (Tulane and FCS)
Jimmie Terry (Minnesota)
Tyler Jack (Memphis)
Bryce Foxworth (Temple and FCS schools)
Emmanuel Dabney (Cincinnati and Sun Belt)
Steven Anderson (FCS schools)
Woodlyson Alicius (South Florida)
Delmond Landry (Sun Belt schools)
Tim Jones (Memphis)
Darius Maberry (Bottom CUSA teams)
Tahj Sykes (literally no one else)
Trevor Terry (James Madison)
Bubba Fludd (Western Michigan)
Tyler Barnes (Troy and FCS)
Andrew Cole (Memphis)
Marcelo Rodriguez (no one)
Santrell Latham (Memphis)
Briggs Bourgeois (FCS)
Freddie Hartz (Alabama, Ole Miss, Mississippi State)
Lamarque Davis (Houston and Fresno State)
Robert Reeves (Cincinnati and UCF)
T’Rod Daniels (MTSU)
2018
Trivenskey Mosley (ULL and SWAC)
Ky’el Hemby (only us)
TJ Harvey (only us)
Nick Dawson (Arizona and Memphis)
Deuntra Hyman (LSU, Ole Miss, and Mississippi State)
Ty’ree Evans (only us)
Ty Williams (only us)
Neil McLaurin (only us)
Nicario Harper (Sun Belt and FCS)
Tairek Johnson (only us)
Jack Abraham (Sun Belt schools)
Ethan Edmondson (Rutgers, Memphis)
Kameron King (Memphis, Tulane, UNT)
Von’darius Freeman (only FAU)
Jemaurian Jones (Arizona, Florida State, Georgia, Louisville, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Oklahoma, Oregon State, Tennessee, Texas, Texas Tech, UCLA)
Trace Clopton (CUSA schools)
Shannon Carswell (South Florida, UCF)
Curry Benn (Arizona)
Hayes Maples (Memphis)
Tate Whatley (FCS schools)
De’Michael Harris (Marshall)
Malik Shorts (Memphis and Tulane)
Denzel Washington (ULM)
Travion Williams (only us)
William Robinson (Mississippi State)
2019
Deliqua McCoy (only us)
Demarcus Jones (only us)
Antavious Willis (only us)
Khalique Washington (Kansas, Kentucky, UCF)
Gerquan Scott (only us)
Swayze Bozeman (Tulane)
Markel McLaurin (only us)
Chandler Rogers (Air Force)
Tanner Hawthorne (New Mexico)
Tre Johnson (Indiana)
Naricuss Driver (only us)
Eriq Kitchen (ODU)
Jaden Johnson (Georgia, Louisville)
Avery White (South Alabama)
Matthew Ryals (only us)
Dee Baker (Mississippi State)
Coker Wright (Nebraska and Illinois)
Khalen Leonard (only us)
TQ Newsome (Kansas)
Luke Baker (only us)
Louis Paul Smith (Mississippi State)
Chris Scruggs Jr (Indiana, Kentucky, Syracuse)
James Dall (only us)
Corey Wilson (only us)
Jadarrius Perkins (only us)
Jakyrus Williams (Kansas)
So that’s 40 P5 offers across three different classes. Of that, those offers came from 18 players (I may have missed someone along the way when quickly skimming the list for these numbers, so forgive me if so). That means that for three years, we have less than a set of offensive and defensive starters with P5 offers. That’s bad. Really bad. 25 of these players best offer besides us was an FCS team, and many of those 25 players had no offers other than us.
You can look and see how bad it is.
Now, let’s look at the 2010 class. This is a Fedora class two years in of 7-6. So it’s not like players are thinking we’re about to compete for the Sugar Bowl.
2010
Kody Williams (UConn, Illinois, Louisville, Maryland, Ole Miss, North Carolina, South Florida, Tennessee, Vanderbilt)
Reggie Hunt (Memphis)
Josh Magee (UAB)
Jamal Woodyard (Louisville, Mississippi State)
Kelvin Bolden (Mississippi State)
Jason Weaver (Arizona, Kansas State, Miami)
Taylor Peterson (Memphis, UAB)
O.C. Brown (Colorado, Kentucky, Mississippi State)
Justin Penn (only us)
Corey Acosta (Memphis)
Brandon Smith (Clemson, Florida, Florida State, Miami, South Carolina)
Steve McNair Jr (Minnesota, Ole Miss, Mississippi State, Nebraska, West Virginia)
Seth Reedy (Sun Belt schools)
A. Walters Jr (only us)
Anthony Wilson (Auburn, LSU, Oklahoma, UCLA)
Jacorius Cotten (South Florida, UCF)
Zeke Walters (Air Force, Sun Belt schools)
Jeremy Hester (Air Force, East Carolina, Louisville, Memphis)
David Fowler (Duke)
Dasmund Macullum (Memphis)
Arsenio Favor (Sun Belt schools)
Dominique Sullivan (Tulane, Sun Belt schools)
Cortez Bowen (Texas Tech)
Lamar Holmes (Auburn, Mississippi State, Oklahoma State)
Markese Triplett (Mississippi State)
Allen Howze (only us)
Furious Bradley (only us)
Marquese Wheaton (only us)
LJ Hollings (only us)
In this class, we have 39 P5 offers, 12 players with P5 offers, and 8 players who’s best offer is Sun Belt or only us. And again, as with the other lists, this doesn’t include interests shown by other schools, just offers.
In ONE CLASS, we have almost the same amount of offers and players with P5 offers. Is it any surprise that we can’t compete with bad teams from P5 leagues when this is the talent our current staff is recruiting. And the biggest get our staff got based on offers (Jemaurian Jones) has played no notable downs at USM. Don’t tell me our coaches are out there trying to recruit the best. Our team is bad because we have no talent. Period. And until that changes, don’t expect things to change. We’ll be middle of the road in the worst conference in the country.
And that wasn’t even Fedora’s best class...
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