Shrmdougluvr
Give it all to me fool!
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
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I don't know a lot about the early recruiting that occurred in the 2010s (i.e., how it came to be) but objectively, I cannot believe that it was not immediately recognized as a terrible, terrible concept.
If you watch something like the little league world series, you'll see some kid, who's a really good young player, pitch a baseball 68 mph. That translates to like a 90 mph fastball. I played with 2 or 3 kids, including yours truly, who could throw that hard at age 12. None of us hit 90 on a gun as a teenage.
While that's not a perfect comparison point, it simple illustrates that being talented and athletic at 12-13, doesnt necessarily translate to being talented and athletic at 17-18. And that doesnt even take into account all of the "environmental" reasons why an 8th or 9th grader might not be similarly positioned as a junior or senior.
So you had all these programs picking the best 13-14 years olds when really, their evolution was not projectable. It's not a coincidence that Syracuse and JHU, two schools probably best positioned to load up on the best 13-14 year olds, saw their programs decline from a talent standpoint. At the same time, they probably assumed they were "winning" the early recruiting game, so they were all for it.
Truly weird stuff.
If you watch something like the little league world series, you'll see some kid, who's a really good young player, pitch a baseball 68 mph. That translates to like a 90 mph fastball. I played with 2 or 3 kids, including yours truly, who could throw that hard at age 12. None of us hit 90 on a gun as a teenage.
While that's not a perfect comparison point, it simple illustrates that being talented and athletic at 12-13, doesnt necessarily translate to being talented and athletic at 17-18. And that doesnt even take into account all of the "environmental" reasons why an 8th or 9th grader might not be similarly positioned as a junior or senior.
So you had all these programs picking the best 13-14 years olds when really, their evolution was not projectable. It's not a coincidence that Syracuse and JHU, two schools probably best positioned to load up on the best 13-14 year olds, saw their programs decline from a talent standpoint. At the same time, they probably assumed they were "winning" the early recruiting game, so they were all for it.
Truly weird stuff.