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Ready or not, here comes the first Early Signing Period.
We’re likely in for a heavy dose of signing day videos, wild announcements and coach press conferences indicating that they “couldn’t be happier” with the class they just locked in.
Getting that 6 weeks earlier than normal will create a different dynamic. Having the Early Signing Period prolonged over the course of 3 days will be strange, too. And that’s just for us on the media side. For the players, coaches and fans, this thing is going to be different than anything we’ve seen on the first Wednesday of February.
So what do I want to see? These 8 things:
1. Some sort of organization
As I write this, I still don’t have much of a sense for what the vast majority of programs are doing to welcome in their new classes. My question is whether we’ll see most programs addressing their signees as a whole on Wednesday.
I think the reason so many schools delayed announcing their plans is because they’re not entirely sure when their recruits are signing. Remember that if some recruits plan on signing on Thursday, coaches can’t address them by name in a Wednesday afternoon press conference. Surely every compliance department in America is harping the importance of that in the first year of this thing.
In a perfect world, everyone who planned on signing in December would just get it out of the way on Wednesday. Coaches would love that, too. For all we know, that’s what will happen. The 247sports commitment announcement tracker doesn’t have any recruits rated 4 stars or better signing on Thursday, and only 3 are scheduled for Friday (none of which are expected to end up in the SEC).
Hopefully that prevents these 72 hours from being a complete mess.
2. No strip tease commitments, please
I’m all for a kid being an individual and enjoying the biggest moment of his young life. You want to put together a crazy announcement video? Be my guest. You want to make a Twitter announcement with some long message you put together? Have at it.
But don’t, under any circumstances, follow the Levi Jones plan.
Levi Jones with the T-shirt tease: pic.twitter.com/jSk3ghONZC
— Joey Kaufman (@joeyrkaufman) February 1, 2017
That’s just trolling. And while I don’t ever advocate fans for tweeting recruits, I could understand the outrage from a fanbase that gets trolled in a live TV announcement like that.
Misdirection plays are great in college football. But on signing day, that type of misdirection isn’t helping anyone.
3. Alabama acceptance
We knew coming into this year that with limited scholarships available, Alabama’s streak of No. 1 recruiting classes would likely come to an end. And even though the Tide made an impressive jump up to No. 7 ahead of the Early Signing Period, it looks as if Nick Saban won’t boast America’s best class for the first time since 2010.
Yes, there’s still the February signing day. That’s another reason any Alabama hot takes after this week are foolish.
I don’t want to see any headlines reading “Alabama’s dynasty is dead” or “Why Nick Saban is falling behind in the recruiting world.” I get it. It’s an easy thing for some to do when they’re searching for stories to write about recruits that they haven’t paid a whole lot of attention to.
But just don’t.
And for Alabama fans who have similar concerns, save it for the first year in which Alabama misses the College Football Playoff.
4. How Georgia finishes out
Welcome to 2017, where Georgia could own an SEC Championship and the conference’s top-ranked class. The Dawgs are at No. 3 behind Ohio State and Texas, but the feeling is that they could make a legitimate push for No. 1.
The 247sports crystal ball projects Georgia to wind up with commitments from 5-star guard Jamaree Salyer (No. 10 overall) and 5-star defensive end Brenton Cox (No. 22 overall). The Dawgs are also significant favorites to pick up commitments from U.S. Army All-Americans Luke Ford and Channing Tindal (unknown announcement date). If they can get a late surprise from someone like 5-star offensive tackle Cade Mays, No. 1 is certainly not out of the realm of possibility.
Even without Mays, Georgia could have 8 top-50 recruits signed by Wednesday afternoon. That would already be more than Alabama had in its top-ranked 2017 class.
Smart has all sorts of momentum in Athens, which has been evident with how much his 2018 class ramped up in the past couple months.
5. Any Justin Fields drama?
Speaking of Georgia, all signs point to the nation’s top dual-threat quarterback signing with the Dawgs and beginning one of the more intriguing quarterback battles we’ve ever seen in the SEC. I’m curious if there’s any — and I mean any — whiff that Jimbo Fisher or Dan Mullen made another late push to land Fields.
His announcement of his Wednesday signing all but put that possibility to bed, but you know how these things work. Nothing is a done deal until that piece of paper is signed. There will still be plenty of nervous Georgia fans — and coaches — until Fields signs on the dotted line.
But in all likelihood, nothing substantial will happen in the hours leading up to Fields’ announcement.
6. The Cade Mays announcement
The aforementioned Mays has had quite the recruiting story. The Knoxville native and Tennessee legacy opened up his longtime commitment from the Vols in November, and is down to Clemson, Georgia and Ohio State, though Clemson and Georgia are believed to be the favorites.
His announcement will be at 2:30 p.m. ET Wednesday on ESPNU. That announcement news came after the 5-star offensive tackle took an official visit to Athens over the weekend. Still, the 247sports crystal ball projects Mays to end up at Clemson. It wouldn’t be the first time Dabo Swinney crossed into SEC territory to land a big-time recruit. Something tells me this won’t be the last time that Swinney and Smart battle to the end for a 5-star recruit.
7. How the SEC’s new coaches fare
I’ve been curious for months how in the world these new SEC coaches were going to sign the majority of their recruiting classes in 2-3 weeks. The February signing day was tough enough. Asking new coaches to assemble an entire staff and almost an entire recruiting class seems nearly impossible.
For Arkansas, Florida, Mississippi State, Tennessee and Texas A&M, that was reality. As it stands, Jimbo Fisher is the only one of that group who boasts a top-20 class. Only time will tell if he can hold onto it. I’m also interested in seeing how Joe Moorhead, who came to MSU without any background in the Southeast, does with the Early Signing Period.
Moorhead has the benefit of the timing of Ole Miss’ NCAA sanctions, but Dan Mullen certainly has some big-time in-state competition. Mark Richt rolling at Miami with what looks like a lock to be a top-10 class. Mullen is fortunate that at least Florida State is dealing with a coaching change of its own. Can Mullen sign a quarterback after losing Matt Corral to Ole Miss? And will Florida get back any of the half dozen 4-star recruits it lost in the past month?
Then there’s poor Chad Morris and Jeremy Pruitt, who basically had to start from scratch. Can either pull off a late run and wind up with a top-30 class? Or will this just be another painful reminder that the Early Signing Period puts new coaches at an extreme disadvantage?
I’m betting on the latter.
8. All the overreactons
Early Signing Day is going to be the greatest thing since the invention of the forward pass or it’s going to be the worst thing since the NFL catch rule. Either way, everyone will have takes on whether this experiment was good or bad for the sport.
If it lacks organization, it’s going to be deemed a massive failure. If 90 percent of recruits are committed by Wednesday night, it’ll be considered a great success. There won’t be much in between.
I actually feel like I’ll be in the middle of that argument. While there are certainly some big-time negatives (kids getting less time to make a huge decision, new coaches getting the short end of the stick), there could be some big-time positives. We could limit the recruiting feeding frenzy that usually occurs every January. We could also get away from the notion that National Signing Day in February is supposed to be this big spectacle. I’m all for that.
In all likelihood, the Early Signing Period will be far from perfect. Is anything in its first year? There were will probably be more complaints than praise because after all, it’s something new. I look forward to seeing conclusions drawn by the time this thing wraps up on Friday.
Who am I kidding? The takes will be firing away by mid-Wednesday morning.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
