To be fair, there is another NSD in early Feb and there are a lot of good players still unsigned. The âflipsâ could occur over the next two months. Plus, signing means nothing now. Kids can break their LOIs faster than they can access online porn.
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Jacob Rodriguez was a three-star (No. 87 in Texas!) who committed to Mendenhall after the Orange Bowl. Itâs like sometimes recruiting rankings donât mean much.
Had he committed to a football power instead, he might have been a 4-star.
Itâs the chicken-or-the-egg argument.
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Iâm not gonna handwring about todayâs class too much because it was baked in before the season, but I am pretty disappointed we didnât flip anybody from the completely dysfunctional programs surrounding us.
I remember a lot of the pro-Elliott camp before the season saying it was an intentionally small class so that they could be opportunistic and get flips from exactly this scenario, so I think it is fair to be a little down that didnât happen.
We were always going to have to portal heavy again next year, because none of the prior classes have been very good either, and it seems like we will have to do so again in 2027 which is unfortunate, but the â27 class looks pretty good so far (even if that is a bit of a mirage ranking wise because so few kids have committed). It should be easier to get good portal guys this year off of this performance and if we can pull out another decent season next year we should hopefully see an uptick on the trail going forward.
This season is great and high school recruiting isnât nearly as important as it used to be, but I kind of reject the idea that you canât be good at both the portal AND HS recruiting. I would like to be competent at both, and I donât necessarily feel like ânot dead lastâ is an unreasonable bar to clear.
I think its probably overall fine for this class to be kind of poor, especially if Chandler gets another season and with the injured tackles potentially coming back to give us a real head start on the portal for next year to keep this train running, but it does create an uphill battle if your high school talent is below the average for your league every single year.
So yeah, not mad just disappointed, not the hugest deal, weâre a portal team for 2 more years, beat Duke, go hoos.
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I just listened to Tonyâs press conference on my flight.
After some of the tweets I had seen, I thought his tone sounded surprisingly pessimistic about Chandler coming back. Kind of brushed it off. Maybe he doesnât want to get into it now for whatever reason.
He said if he had to put a number to it, weâll be 50-50 transfers/HS going forward, but will depend on the year.
For the Feb signing day, he said theyâd look around and see whatâs available after all the upheaval. I didnât get the impression there was much concrete there yet.
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stupid age verification
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Thatâs based on 4 commits. Most schools only have around 3-8 commits so far.
Iâm not going to complain about the good start for that class, but itâs just the start. Weâll see if thereâs 15 more guys of the same caliber joining.
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I wouldnât be surprised if they ignored the 2026 class to some extent after the season started. Seems like thereâs been clear focus on the 2027 class and the early returns are strong, especially if they can land the 4 star WR from Roanoke. Iâm guessing none of those in state guys wouldâve already committed if we didnât have such a good season going so I think the winning is going to help that class a lot (but we need to win again next year too if we want to keep them all). I do think we need to find better balance between portal and high school but is it really worth trying to match Syracuseâs offer in order to flip a guy like Chase Geter or would that money be better spent on a more proven transfer? Debatable but Iâd rather have more to spend on a proven transfer. My hope is that we can keep winning and ideally attract legit 4 star talent, and the occasional in state 5 star, by selling our success on the field, our new facilities and being able to offer relatively competitive NIL money. But I donât think itâs worth it to spend much to upgrade our high school classes from the mid 3 star range to the high 3 star range. That high 3 star range is still pretty much a crapshoot so I think the opportunity cost is too high.
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Was hoping weâd try to flip Cameron Hairston-Taylor from PH-Roanoke. He can play either side of the ball. Unfortunately he signed with Cuse today.
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People on the 247 board say that Cuse spends big on high school guys. If true, makes sense why those committed there in the first place and why we couldnât/wouldnât flip even despite our immense success relative to Cuse this season
https://twitter.com/budelliott3/status/1996420975282532540?s=46
Interesting theory here if multi-year deals become more common, high school recruiting will regain importance
No idea if thatâs actually happening at scale, but in theory a pretty sound idea
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Are there any formally reported examples of these multi year commitments? Or is this just Twitter talk?
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From what Iâve heard, there have been such multi-year commitments, but then they got broken in the offseason anyway. PArrish/ Norlander chatter
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Without a contract, there is no such thing as a multi-year commitment.
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Well the Wisconsin transfer last year that wanted to go to Miami and they wouldnât release him into the portal was because he was on a multi-year deal, but it didnât matter and he just unenrolled and re-enrolled elsewhere.
Bud Elliott is usually pretty well sourced but always seems to have some sort of an agenda.
I do believe a lot of these guys are signing multi years now but whether theyre enforceable who knows. Theyâre supposed to be under the new rules, but so is the cap and everyone is openly flaunting that now in these new coaching hires/retentions.
Everything in college sports right now seems to be governed by whether the House settlement is going to be enforced or not and it seems like universities are universally acting like it wonât be.
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For our amateur scouts out there⌠how we ranking our young QBs Jurgenson, Geer, and Hamrick for likelihood to be a UVA starter one day?
Big time get. 27 class looking really nice
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I hope we can really pour it on in â27 now. Make the playoff and then maybe even do some bigger game hunting. Looks like we are still in the running for a couple of top 10 4-star VA kids for â27
Weâre up against Franklin now, but at least he has the same conference patch as us now and Locksley and Belichick in our region will be in the same predicament Elliott was in this past year.
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Onto the offensive line primer! (Click back through the quotes for WR/TE and then QB/RB before it.)
Offensive Line
Gone:
- Brady Wilson
- Wallace Unamba
- Kevin Wigenton
Eligible to Return:
- McKale Boley - Bonus Sr (Tragedy Waiver)
- Jack Witmer - Bonus Sr (Tragedy Waiver)
- Noah Josey - Bonus Sr (Tragedy Waiver)
- Drake Metcalf - Bonus Sr (Injury Waiver)
- Ethan Sipe - Bonus Sr (Injury Waiver)
- Noah Hartsoe - RS Sr
- Monroe Mills - Bonus Sr (Injury Waiver)
- Makilan Thomas - RS Sr (Injury Waiver)
- Tyshawn Wyatt - RS Sr (Injury Waiver)
- Cole Surber - RS Jr
- David Wohlabaugh - RS Jr (Injury Waiver)
- Grant Ellinger - RS So
- Ben York - RS So
- Dane Wlekinski - RS So
- Jon Adair - RS Fr
- Jim Harris - RS Fr
- Grayson Reid - RS Fr
Incoming:
- Dylan Biehl - Fr
- Luke Hatfield - Fr
- Michael Gildea - Fr
Needs: Obviously a ton depends upon what weâre getting back out of a large group of seniors who COULD return but have questions. For Boley/Witmer/Josey, who were all around for the 2022 season whose end was cancelled, theyâre eligible to run it back, but will they or might they want to move on? Same goes for Sipe and Metcalf who would be 7th years. Boley ended the year with an injury as well, whatâs his recovery look like? Might we see injury bounce-backs from Mills, Thomas, Wyatt, or Wohlabaugh, or will they move on, or have their injuries left them unable to compete at the P4 level next year? By my count thatâs 9 old guys who COULD return but are maybe 50/50 to do so and contribute.
Some of the young guys do show promise, York having exploded into the lineup this year, Hartsoe and Ellinger getting reps in all 12 games and ending the year 2nd on the depth chart at Center and LG respectively. Time will tell if the staff feels any of the other underclassmen are ready to step up into the 2-deep. So if three or four of the old guys come back and blend well with an improving next generation of guys, we can probably get by with just a couple Portal targets, a year after having to take seven O-linemen in the Portal just to have two of them able to play the season (Wilson and Wigenton). But potential to need upwards of 3 or 4 (still less than last yearâs haul) if most of those vets end up not on next yearâs depth chart.
Latest updates provided on the đ 2025/2026 Football Offseason Roster Wiki
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Not sure how but I think I remember seeing that Metcalf has another year of eligibility as well.
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He has three full seasons played: 2021, 2023, and 2025.
We know 2024 was an injury season, so it depends on the nature of his 2022 season where he played only 3 games. Hard to find any receipts on that publicly available.
Add: upon reevaluation, you may indeed be right, as that would be his âelectiveâ RS year and then 2024 would be his bonus waivered year. Iâll move him above.
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