The Leading Authority of the NFL Draft

Alabama head coach Nick Saban speaks to the media and answers questions on the Crimson Tide's 2010 incoming student-athletes.

Opening Statement:

“I think you guys get it just like everybody else. Is there anybody ever in college football that didn’t have a good recruiting class that they didn’t satisfy their needs and they didn’t get somebody that’s going to make an impact on the team next year? I don’t want you to think I’m being glib in the way that I manage this. We are pleased with the kind of football players that we were able to attract to come to our school this year.

There’s a lot that goes into having a successful recruiting class. I think first of all it starts with your assistant coaches and the job that they do, and this was a long process now, at least probably a year or more, in recruiting guys and getting started on recruiting younger and younger players, which makes it even more difficult on the coaches because you’re trying always to find the younger guy and get started on them earlier, earlier and earlier. It makes it more difficult to probably evaluate players and develop the kind of relationships relative to the rules. I thought our coaches did a tremendous job of identifying players, identifying talent and satisfying some needs that we had relative to some areas where we had a significant amount of graduation, establishing relationships with these guys and their families, but also our players do a fantastic job of hosting these players, developing relationships with them and helping us in recruiting, as our administration does.

Dr. Witt has always participated in our recruiting. Mal Moore always participates in our recruiting. The University community here does as fine a job as any place I’ve ever been or ever coached, in terms of John Dever and the academic people here contributing from an academic standpoint, as well as providing informative academic information about majors and spending their time on weekends to visit with players. That’s always a significant part of what we need to do. I think the whole family and whole team here, including our fans and their support and passion that they show whether it’s in support of the A-Day game, the great support that we get when we’re playing on the road as well as when we play here in Bryant-Denny Stadium – all things that have a significant impact on being able to attract quality people in your organization.

There are two things I always talk about: how you bring players to your team and how you develop the players once they get to your team. I think we have a pretty good team of people to do that and I’m pleased with the way were able to bring players to our team this particular year.

You guys know that I’m not really much into the ratings and really don’t even know how we are rated, and really don’t much care how we’re rated. Every year I try to come up with some analogy to sort of put in perspective how you should rate recruiting classes. If we went out to buy a hunting dog and it was a puppy, we would buy it based on its potential, its lineage or whatever you want to call it in terms of breeding, and we would know probably when that dog grew up whether it was a good hunting dog or not. We’d never know until we put him out in the field and saw him actually go hunting, but we would buy it without knowing for sure what that result would be.

I think recruiting is not an exact science and really it takes about two years to really evaluate whether you had a good recruiting class or not. If we really want to figure it out, we should be talking about the 2008 recruiting class right now. How good was the 2008 class? Whether it was Julio Jones, Mark Ingram, Marcell Dareus, Mark Barron, or whoever you want, Dont’a Hightower, whoever you want to talk about in that class now has been out on the field and proven to some degree that they’re good players, and there are many other players in that class that are good players. There are some other players that haven’t had an opportunity to contribute but will contribute in the future as well. There is one thing that I always say to players when we recruit them, and a lot of these players make decisions based on whether they can play next year. The fact of the matter is not a whole lot of players actually play when they’re freshmen. Only a few start and some contribute. We certainly had our share contribute here. I think two years ago we had four newcomers starting and 14 players play. Last year we had a significant number of guys that played as well and made an impact on our team, and we always want to give these players and opportunity to play when they’re freshmen. But, are you going to be a better player when you’re a senior in high school than when you were a freshman? I think if you ask that question to any player they would say they’re a much better player than I was when I was a freshman. I think the same thing can happen when they get to college. They’re going to improve each year. They’re going to get bigger, stronger, they’re going to have better knowledge and experience, and they’re going to be able to participate. That’s why I think that the true rating of recruiting class comes somewhere down the road when you look at how many people in that particular class turned out to be the kind of players that we think they might be.

We’re very pleased because we have a unique circumstance in this class where we have 11 players – seven new players, one junior college transfer, three holdovers from a year ago and a transfer from another school – that are all here at mid-semester who are going to be a part of our team. They’re going to be here for spring practice. They’re going to be here for the off-season program, and that’s going to enhance their development. We feel very fortunate that we have quality players here that may impact our team and have given themselves a better chance to impact our team because they’re going to be here a semester early.  I think that’s going to enhance their development. Kareem Jackson did that when he was a freshman and he actually started as a freshman. We think that’s a real advantage to this class, one of things that maybe gets overlooked a little bit. I think it’s something that could help our team quite a bit next year.”

On the advantages of early enrollees:

“We have not had that many (11). I think there is a trend right now that more and more players are interested in doing that. It used to be sort of the exception that someone would do that or be in the circumstance academically to do that. I think you see more and more players that are interested in doing that. I think from our perspective, the advantage is that the guy can make an academic, social and athletic transition in a semester that’s not starting right in front of the season. These guys have been here since school started and haven’t had to do much but lift weights, go to school, academically and socially adjust and adapt, learn how to use the academic support center and the services that are available to them. We’re going to start the offseason program in a couple of weeks and we’re going to have spring practice, so they have a much better opportunity to learn and grow at a little slower pace than when they start in the fall. It takes us almost a week to go through three practices in spring practice and we do that in two days in fall camp. It’s a little easier transition for them I think academically, socially and athletically. It is an advantage to their development because they’ll be here in the summer, and when they go through it in fall camp next year it’s not the first time the go through it, it’s the second time they go through it. They do enhance their development.”

On Wilson and Tyler Love having a chance to play together and his relationship with their family:

“My first comment would be that I got to go eat Mrs. Karen (Love’s) cooking twice, not once. She’s a real good cook. The pecan pie was great. I think it’s always a good situation to at least make the offer to, or opportunity for, the family to decide whether he wants to go to school at the same place or not, if that’s the best place for their opportunity. I think that’s the number one thing. In this case these guys don’t play the same position, they won’t be competing against each other, not that matters because more than one can play the same position as long as you’re a lineman and you’re not a quarterback. They’re both fine young men. Tyler’s been a real asset to our organization and is going to be a good player in the future. Even though Wilson is coming off of an injury, we’re hopeful that he’ll rehab and recover and be a good player for us as well.”

On getting players that fill needs on the offensive line:

“We’ve sort of recruiting numbers. When we first came here we were really short on our numbers of offensive linemen, and now I think our numbers are better on the offensive line. I think tackles are more difficult to find. Getting Arie (Kouandjio), who is a real tackle type and a real good player, was probably a real key in making us feel like we satisfied our needs. I think everyone has to look at numbers. Because of the situation we had to recruit more by need in this recruiting class than ever before. Offensive line was not one of the significant needs in this class, relative to numbers required to get players that we have in the program that we recruited in the past. Losing six defensive backs and a seventh going out for the draft made us recruit a whole bunch of defensive backs. We really only recruited 20 guys and I think seven of them were defensive backs. That only left 13 guys for all the other positions and we recruited a kicker and a punter, that’s why I say we only had 20 guys that were position players. We feel well about the way things worked out for us and the guys that we got. Austin Shepherd can play tackle or guard. Chad (Lindsay) is probably just a guard or a center. Arie is probably just a tackle. I think next year we will make a big emphasis to get a tackle type or two in that class.”

On signing a quarterback in every signing class:

“Phillip (Sims) was one of the top guys for us at his position. We were very pleased and happy to get him. I think what he has accomplished as a quarterback is very impressive and hopefully he can develop and improve and have that same kind of career here in terms of his performance and production. We did look at some other quarterbacks. We have four on scholarship now and hopefully all four of them will continue to grow and develop and be in the program. And we will definitely be looking to recruit other outstanding players in the future, but I didn’t feel a need to take another guy, just to take another guy. If we could have gotten the right guy we may have considered it, but we didn’t feel the need to do that.”

On taking junior college transfer DeQuan Menzie:

“We’ve been pretty fortunate in that we don’t recruit a lot of junior college guys. If we place them, then we’re interested in taking them back as long as they’ve done what they need to do personally and academically. With Cody two years ago, he served a need with us and worked out very well. James Carpenter worked out very well for us last year. We needed a left tackle with Andre (Smith) going out early for the draft, and he certainly did a great job for us all year long. DeQuan is a guy that we feel like has a lot of ability. We looked at him in high school and we knew him. We feel like he has a real maturity to him and he has played some good football where he is right now. It’s a little bit of a disadvantage that he won’t get here until June and I think it’s imperative that he get here in June so he can use the summer to learn and grow and sort of get in the groove. I do feel that he will have a very good opportunity to contribute to our team next year, if he can learn and develop.”

On the early enrollee process:

“I think it is up to every guy. It is my opinion that if players ask me, I tell them ‘It’s your choice, you have to make a decision. You only have one senior year. Are you playing another sport? Do you want to be involved the rest of your senior year? Or are you in a position to where you’re looking ahead to sort of taking the next step of developing your career, in terms of graduating from school and developing a career off the field. Doing the same thing with your athletic career in college and it is strictly up to you and your family. I don’t encourage it or discourage it. It is an advantage to us if they do it, but I really don’t encourage them to do it. I feel like each guy should make that decision, make a commitment to it and be happy with it. I wouldn’t want to talk somebody into doing it and then getting here and then regret not finishing their senior year and playing basketball or some other sport that they were involved in like baseball. We don’t encourage it or discourage it. We manage it if guys want to do it, the best we can. There are advantages to it, if guys want to do it.”

On recruiting progressive moving up earlier and earlier each year:

“I think that guys start their recruiting process themselves. They are looking at schools and coming to junior days when they are sophomores. We use to use camp to get most of the juniors to come to camp and then make decisions on them after that. Now they don’t want to come to camp anymore. They want to know before they go to camp whether you want them or not. Everything has gotten accelerated.”

On student-athletes committing early in their recruitment and making sure they stay true to their commitment:

“When a guy commits early to us, to me then we just become the target. Every other school keeps recruiting them and they know the kid wants to come to Alabama, so now they’re bashing Alabama every day. Whether it is taking our depth chart out and saying we have too many players at that position. I don’t know how all these other schools know about our team, because I know nothing about third team and they know more about our team than I know about our team. They get the depth chart out and they know how good players are that haven’t even played before, haven’t even been on the field, haven’t lettered, haven’t done anything. It’s amazing to me. I’m talking about convincing, being an expert. We don’t do that. We do not negative recruit in what we do. We have a good product to sell and we try to sell it in a positive way. I feel like you just become the target for other schools when guys early commit to you. You have to keep recruiting them and sort of manage them. I’m old fashioned. I think a commitment is a commitment. We tell guys when they commit that we want the recruiting to be over or we really don’t want them to commit. If you’re not really ready to stop recruiting then you aren’t really ready to commit, because committing means that you are coming to that school. I would rather you go visit other schools until you’re sure that this is what you want to do rather than making a commitment and then not feeling comfortable and wanting to go explore other opportunities. There is an old saying ‘if you’re shopping, then we should shop.’ It shouldn’t be that way, but when guys make commitments and don’t stick up for them, then you kind of get stuck a little bit, because there may be other guys that you didn’t recruit, that you could have recruited, that could have actually taken their place. I wish there was a better way, but there is not. We’ll just have to manage it and keep recruiting guys and do the best we can with them.”

*The All Access Football ninth annual 2010 NFL Draft Bible Package Is Now Available! Click Here To Learn More…

Photo Courtesy of Dennis Hubbard

BERKELEY - California head coach Jeff Tedford met with the media to discuss the 2010 signing class during a National Signing Day press conference on Wednesday, Feb. 3, in the Hall of Fame Room at Memorial Stadium. Following are selected comments of what he had to say.

General Statement:

“I’m really excited. Every year you go in thinking it’s a great class. I would have to tell you, though, this class to me is one that from top to bottom is as solid as any class we’ve ever had here. There was a lot of focus put on the linebacking corps and the wide receivers, and that was part of it, but I really feel like they’re great kids. They have a lot potential, a lot of them, to contribute right away to the program. Our coaches worked very, very hard, and I want to give our coaches a lot of credit for landing this class and then also our players, because I think your players, ultimately, when prospects come on campus, they’re the ones who really end up creating the environment for the kids to feel comfortable. Our players and our coaches did a phenomenal job with recruiting these players.”

On how current players affect the recruiting process.

“They’re such a part of it and I make big emphasis on that with them, that, ‘Hey, we’re having recruits in, we need you guys to step up and create the atmosphere that these guys can look at to see if this is the right fit for them.’ So, when it comes to signing day, they’re always very eager to see what happened. Just walking through the hall, seeing the all the guys … it provides a boost for the program to know that, whatever we’re ranked in the class … that’s pretty impressive and the kids take a great deal of pride in that as well, and are looking forward to welcoming these guys into our program.”

On how significant the relatively late additions of players like DE Gabe King and WR/S Keenan Allen are to the overall strength of this recruiting class.

“Even though it’s a great class from top to bottom, I think it strengthens that class. Gabe King I think all along was a possibility of coming from the get go, but Keenan I think, as some things unfolded over the last couple of weeks, it became a reality that Keenan could be here. He’s a great football player and a great kid, and highly, highly competitive. There’s no doubt that those guys, they’re one of the top guys at their position, so yeah, I think that gives the class a little boost.”

On when he became aware that WR/S Keenan Allen would be coming to Cal.

“Two days ago. They were here last weekend on their official visit, then I think they called back on Monday and said that this was the place for him and felt good about it. But you never really quite know until the paper comes across the fax. They had given us their word that they were coming. They felt great about being here. [I] felt pretty good about it.”

On whether Allen will play offense or defense.

“He’s going to play receiver and play some defensive back in nickel situations … He’s equally as effective on both sides of the football [but] he’s primarily a receiver here.”

On whether WR Coleman Edmond might also feature as a punt or kick returner.

“Absolutely. When we were making the video for you guys to watch [with signees’ highlights], our video guy said, ‘Who’s going to return kicks next year?’ I said, ‘It’s a nice problem to have,’ because all these guys are very explosive with the ball in their hands. Coupled with the guys we already have here, there’s some speed on the field. We’ll have to find out as we get into practice who’s going to do that.”

On whether LB Chris McCain will grayshirt.

“We’ll see. Most likely, he will grayshirt. He’s got a little bit to do yet academically and so the plan was that he would sign and if he makes it, okay, great, but most likely it’s going to be next January.”

On other elements that contributed to Allen’s signing with Cal.

“Really it came down to Zach Maynard, his brother, is transferring from Buffalo, and he was here a couple of years ago at our camp and really enjoyed his experience here and learned a lot about playing quarterback, so this was a place, when the coaching change happened at Buffalo, he was looking to relocate…He looked into what our quarterback situation was and contacted us, and once he got his release and said he’d be interested in transferring here. Well, when that happened, those guys wanted to play together, wherever he went, and they both had very good experiences here and that kind of how it all unfolded that Keenan got back into the mix mainly because of his brother.”

On whether QB Zach Maynard could develop into an option in the wildcat formation with his running and passing skills.

“Absolutely. That’s one of the things that Zach brings to the table, is the ability to use his legs. Not only is he a productive passer, highly competitive guy, but he’s elusive and has very good speed, so yeah, he brings a dimension to the offense of being able to run with the ball.”

On the job his coaching staff did to result in this signing class.

“All the coaches did a phenomenal job. Each coach, we typically go out by area and then we kind of narrow it down to position. The position coach gets a little bit more involved and the area coach, and so all of the guys really did a good job…all the guys really did…it was a group effort. No one ever does it alone in recruiting. Everyone worked very, very hard.”

On whether the continued commitment to a 3-4 defense played a part in the focus on recruiting a strong and plentiful group of linebackers.

“There’s no doubt. You have to recruit to the 3-4. When you’re a 4-3 and you make the transition to the 3-4, it’s going to take a minute to get the numbers right, and so, now that this is our second year in that, we recruited to the 3-4, which linebackers were a focus obviously if you look at it. That’s what we went after and we feel great about the ones who’ve decided to join our program. We feel that they’re all impact players. We couldn’t be happier with the group of linebackers we have.”

On whether players who arrive together from a specific area present any concern that they could isolate themselves.

“No, not at all. These guys are awesome young guys…They’ve all been away, so they know how to interact with other people.”

On whether CB Adrian Lee will need some development considering how much time he spent as a tailback in high school.

“He’s one that we’re going to have to continue to develop because a lot of his playing days have been at tailback, carrying the football, but he has tremendous speed and he’s very physical. So just to get him here and kind of shape some of his skills and fundamentals in the secondary is going to be key. But when you talk about raw talent… who can run like he can run and has the skills with the football that he has, he brings a lot to the table. He’s going to continue to develop as a defensive player.”

On whether any of the new linebackers have a chance to get playing time right away.

“I think all of them do. When you take a look at Cecil Whiteside and [David] Wilkerson, [Nick] Forbes, [Chris] Martin, all those guys – you know, Martin is coming as that guy who’s kind of the Zack Follett guy coming off the edge. The two outside guys are Martin and Whiteside, and at some point will be McCain, and then the two inside guys will be Forbes and Wilkerson. Every one of those guys is physical enough to make a strong contribution right away.”

On whether these linebackers were identified in part to get more pressure on opposing quarterbacks.

“Absolutely. That’s a focus, get guys we feel good about cutting it loose with and go get them and be a little bit more aggressive on defense as far as philosophy’s concerned, but also have the guys that can get after it.”

On how essential defensive pressure on the quarterback is in today’s game.

“I think you have to have it. As we define our season last year, I think we’d all be in agreement we didn’t put enough pressure on the quarterback. Putting pressure on the quarterback does not necessarily mean sacking the quarterback all the time, it just means disrupt the timing of what’s going on with him…We have to disrupt the timing of the quarterback more.”

On WR Terrance Montgomery.

“He’s one of the more underrated guys that we have in our class. When you take a look at him and see what he can do, his natural ability to catch the football, his ball skills…He has great instincts to catch a football, great hands. You’ll see on tape what he does with the ball after he has it in his hands. He’s electric with the ball in his hands as far as a returner and a receiver.

On any comparisons he draws between this year’s signees on film and previous classes.

“This class right now, I remember years ago when Lavelle [Hawkins] and DeSean [Jackson] and those guys came in the class, and you look at the back-to-back highlight reels of these guys, it’s very similar to that. That’s the type of talent that they have with the ball in their hands. They’re very elusive and one of our focuses this year was run after the catch. We wanted to go out and recruit some guys that can do something with the ball in their hands after they catch it, and we feel like we’ve done that.”

On WR Tevin Carter.

“He’s very rangy. He’s 6-3, can really run, has great hands, but all these guys can really run. All these guys are 10.6 [in the 100-yard dash] or under. They’re all fast guys and very elusive and not many long, long striders. Tevin is a guy who has range but great speed to go with it.”

On TE Jacob Werk and his similarities to Craig Stevens.

He does remind us of Craig Stevens. He’s a big, physical guy who plays with great pad level. Sometimes it’s hard to find those tight ends in high school these days that have the combination of being able to play at the line of scrimmage and come off a low pad level and still be able to get down the field and hone their receiver skills. He’s the guy that can do that…Natural hands, and after he catches it, he’s very violent when he runs with it. We feel like he’s a guy that we were very, very happy to find and he does remind us of Craig.”

On QB Austin Hinder and whether there will be a logjam at quarterback.

“He’s 6-foot-5, he can do it all. He’s a guy who can throw all the balls on the field. He’s got very good arm strength, he can throw the deep ball, he throws on the run. When he pulls it down, he can make a lot happen with his legs. He’s a guy who needs to develop more physically. Even though he’s 6-foot-5 he’s still very thin…But he’s highly competitive, comes from great blood lines, he’s Jim Hanifan’s grandson, so he’s been around football his whole life…But you’re going to see, he’s a guy who can roll left and make some great throws, he can pull the ball down and run 60, 70 yards with the ball. He’s a very talented guy. You always have five quarterbacks. We always try to have five quarterbacks on scholarship. Your hope to always have those guys and strong competition, quality competition, and we do, we have that. And we feel that as these guys grow and develop, the cream will rise to the top and someone will take it over at some point…Typically, a true freshman doesn’t come on and compete right away…We have quality guys at that position.”

On which signed offensive linemen might develop into a center.

“Alex [Crosthwaite] could probably play center, or [Chris] Adcock. Adcock would probably be the one if I had to pick one that could do it. Chris is a guy who plays pretty low to the ground. The other guys are a little bit bigger.”

On what getting LB Chris Martin does for the program.

“Anytime you get a guy that is that recognizable nationally for who he is…he’s an impact player. When other kids see that they can be a part of that…to put together something very, very special, yes, I think it makes a difference.”

On whether TB Trajuan Briggs is the only signee who will play spring ball.

“Yes. He’s the only mid-year transfer.”

On whether anyone else has a chance to play right away.

“I think they all do. It just depends on how they make the transition in here and what they can handle, the mental, physical and emotional state in which they come in and how they mature and how they progress day to day through camp is going to say whether they can, but most of these guys are physical enough to do it.”

On how the new signees will affect intrasquad competition.

“That always helps. Every day when you go out and practice against great competition, it’s going to pick your game up a little bit, and so with these young guys coming in, it’s absolutely there. There’s a lot of competition there in all those positions.”

On regional vs. national recruiting.

“[Contrary to] the whole national flavor, we still spend most of the resources in the western region recruiting. When people recognize us [nationally] and we get attention and they’re interested in our program, then we will recruit them.”

On whether active construction of the Student-Athlete High Performance Center has been a positive influence on recruiting.

“The construction probably helps a little bit. I don’t think we’re going to really realize the effect that it has on recruiting until they’re able to walk through the building and take a look at it. At least it’s not just a cardboard deal that says this is what we’re going to do. Seeing retaining walls and foundations and things like that I think is meaningful, but I don’t know that we have really tapped into how that’s going to benefit us yet completely in recruiting.”

On whether this class is evidence of a new emphasis on a more focused defensive identity.

“It’s 12 offense and eight defensive guys, so it’s not overwhelming…Linebackers were a big focus but if you look at the numbers it’s skewed the other way, toward the offense. There was no one-sidedness to this at all…We lose five linebackers next year to graduation, so you have to look ahead a little bit as well…We want to get better at every position, not just one position or one side of the ball.”

On how accurate he feels the recruit services’ ratings are compared to his evaluations.

“Some are and some aren’t. Some of these receivers, like Kaelin Clay and Terrance Montgomery, I don’t know if anybody ever watched them on tape because if you watch them on tape I don’t see how in the world you could say that they were a two-star at some point. For Trajuan Briggs to be, I think, a three-star, maybe it was because he didn’t play his senior year because he was injured, but you watch him on tape and he’s as good as any back in the country.”

*The All Access Football ninth annual 2010 NFL Draft Bible Package Is Now Available! Click Here To Learn More…

Joker Philips speaks to the media and answers questions about signing day.

Opening Statement:

“First of all, thank you guys for being here. Second, we need to add a name. We always add a name at the last hour, well this is at the last minute. Mychal Bailey’s LOI just came over the fax, so you guys can add him to the list of the 2010 class.

“When introduced as head coach, we talked about how important recruiting would be in the next month that we have. I also introduced Operation Win. The first phase is recruiting, and we just finished up a strong 2010 class. A lot of things have happened in the last 24-48 hours, even things that Jeff Drummond didn’t find out. We feel good about the class and how it ended up. Our staff was relentless in the last two or three weeks. We feel like we fulfilled not only the things we were looking for, but we added size, speed, and athleticism. This is what, when we first came here in 2003 we wanted to build on, is size, speed and athleticism. I feel that we have added to the overall team speed and size.

“When you look at this class, it is heavy in the defensive line position. We feel like to be successful in this league, you must have depth up front. We added a lot of linebackers and tight end-type bodies, which you can never get enough of. At the running back position, we will make the announcement today that Dakotah Tyler has approached us about a position change, and will play one of the safety spots in the spring.  You can never get enough of those types of bodies, because they can always play something else. With that, we were able to add three running backs in this class. We think it helps our overall team speed and team needs with this class. We are excited about it. It is a class that is long. When I talk about UK basketball, I always talk about how long they are, how athletic they are, and the last thing I talk about is how tough they are. And that’s what we have. We have a long, athletic team, and now we have to build toughness in this class. Questions?”

Can you talk about Tim Patterson?

“He made his decision at 10:30. He was one of those guys that we have been recruiting for a number of years, three years to be exact. He was one of the guys that when we were recruiting Corey Peters, he was a young guy on the rise that the coaches had talked about. We felt like we were in good position, but you never know. He didn’t give us any indication until this morning that he was coming to Kentucky. His teacher called me and said ‘I am sure you already know.’ But no, I did not know. She told me. He kept it under wraps pretty well. Last night he told me ‘My headaches are over, now it is time for your headaches to begin.’ We are happy to have him, he is another one of those long, tall, athletic guys that we have to instill the toughness. He has a lot of toughness with where he is coming from, but we have to instill that SEC toughness in him.”

What about the importance of recruiting in the Louisville area, especially with that Central connection?

“We always talk about how the heart and soul of our program has to be in the state of Kentucky. The biggest population in the state of Kentucky is the city of Louisville.  We have to be successful in Louisville, and we feel like we have. If you look at our past rosters, we have done well in Louisville, and Tim just adds to that number.”

Could you talk about the recruitment of Brandon Gainer?

“It helps to have his high school coach down there, who is a buddy of mine, but I have been able to watch him since the spring. He is a quality back, had a lot of good offers, and we continued to stay on him and landed him, which gives us another quality back. We haven’t had success in getting big backs, but we think he is a big, physical back that can hold up in this league for 12 or 13 games.”

Obviously it is a long process, but the last 24 hours seemed to change your class dramatically. How tense were the last 24 hours?

“Very tense. It was a lot of staying on the phone, telling the kids to be strong, pray about it, and if this is really what you want to do, just be strong with it. There are a lot of people tugging. These last five or six guys that we signed were just us staying on the phone and being relentless. One of the things I think is that they feel our love. They feel what we have here. They feel it from our players, our administration, and our fans. We just continue to reassure them that what they saw when they were here on their visit, it is still here. It hasn’t gone anywhere. And I think that was the difference as far as getting their faxes to come through this morning.”

Can you talk about Alex Smith and what he can maybe do, and how soon he can do it?

“If you guys see him walking around here, he has a great presence about him. His mom and family have lived here in Kentucky, and when I left the press conference here the last time I was here, that was one of the spots I went to that same night. When you get to a kid’s home and he starts bringing out his Kentucky gear that he has had since he was a little kid and wants you to sign it, the first thing I could think of is that he has always wanted to come to Kentucky, his dream was to play either basketball or football at Kentucky. My signature said to live out your dream – I am! At that point I thought we had a chance. We continued to stay on him; he is the type of guy that is a Kentucky type of guy. We need kids like him, who have the passion, and want to be here. He is one of those guys that we felt we needed to bring it out in him. We brought it out in the last hour, and he stayed strong also. He had people tugging against him, and that’s what we want. This is a game within a game, as far as recruiting. We have to win this game of recruiting. And that is what we are starting to do.”

You have seven guys from Georgia, five from South Carolina, you have been both places before. Talk about the amount of talent from those states that you continue to get in there and get better players.

“If you look at our seven states that we try to target, which is our priorities, are Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Ohio, Alabama, South Carolina, Florida. Those are the states that we feel like we have a huge presence in. We have had success in all the states that we feel like we have to have success in. Georgia and South Carolina are just two of those that we feel like we have a strong presence on our team now, and we can sell to those kids that we are taking them home every other year, and we are able to get those faxes in because of that .”

Coach can you talk about how the recruits can expect to come to Kentucky and win?

“When you go to four straight bowl games, I saw a list of kids by the SEC that are in the combine, we have five. We had more than Georgia, South Carolina, etc. I think that is what has given us a chance to win some of the battles that we win in recruiting. Not only are we winning games, but we are graduating our players and they are players of character. When they get around the kids coming in, they feel the love that we have here. We are not only winning games and graduating players and putting players in the NFL, but now with the TV package also, they will be able to get themselves on the TV screen every week. We feel like that has given us a chance to win some of the battles we are fighting now.”

Donte Rumph has signed again, what is his situation?

“This is our third time signing Donte, and we feel like he will be here in May. We have to get him here as soon as possible, because we have to get him in shape and get him ready. He is a little bit older than these other high school kids, and we need to get him in here as soon as we possibly can and get him into the mix, because we think he can help us.”

What does that say about his ability, that you stuck with him?

“It says a lot. If we didn’t feel like he could help us, we would have moved on a long time ago. We feel like he is a good enough kid that we have to continue to stay with him, and we promised him when we signed him we would stay with him, as long as he continues to try which he has, so we signed him again last year.”

Can you talk a little bit more about the big addition of Mychal Bailey?

“He is at a junior college in Southwest Mississippi. We signed him three years ago. He sat out a year, then he went to junior college and he will get out in May, maybe even the summer. We feel good about him. The main thing we don’t want to do is to sign players we feel like don’t have a chance. One of the things they limit us from doing is signing over 28. So you have to sign players that you think have a chance to be on your roster in August. Mychal Bailey has a chance to be on our roster in August.”

What does he play like?

“He runs and hits, like every LaGrange player we have had here.  They all run, hit, and they love playing football.”

He is a guy that can help you next year?

“He is. He is a guy that we will start out at safety. He also returns kicks. We feel like he could have a huge presence on this football team next year.”

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Head Coach Bob Toledo:

Opening Statement-
Today is the culmination of a year of hard work.  It is a year-round process.  It doesn’t just happen, so today is the fruits of all of our labor, so to speak.  We are pleased with the results of our class, we really are.  Everybody talks about classes, I’m sure everybody in the country is pleased right now.  We are excited about who we got, what we needed, and those types of things.

Our goal was to create quality depth, and particularly special teams.  We signed a punter, a kicker, and then several guys that can return kicks as well.  We also signed 10 linebacker/defensive back types of players that can help us on special teams.  I have said all along that athleticism is what creates special teams.  When you don’t have good athletes, you’re not good on special teams.  When you have better athletes, better athletes look good in space; bad athletes look bad in space.  So we wanted to update our athleticism.  Also, Doug Lichtenberger is going to be our special team’s coordinator.  He will do a great job.   

We have nine players from the state of Louisiana and the last three years we signed 35 players from the state.  This is something I want to continue to do.  I want to get more players if we can.  Obviously, there are some players who want to leave, some players don’t qualify academically and some players maybe don’t fit our needs.  We might sign only one guy at one position and there might be three or four guys, so there are reasons why we don’t get as many as we would like some times.

We signed five players out of Texas, four from Florida and then one each out of Georgia, Illinois, Tennessee, New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.  We signed right players from our summer camp this year.  I think that’s about 30 guys now that we have signed that have participated in those satellite camps that we have in the summer.  So that’s been really helpful.  Offensively, we signed 10 players.  We had one quarterback, two running backs, a tight end, one wide receiver and five offensive linemen.  Defensively, we signed 12 players, two defensive linemen, six linebackers, which was a real need, and then four defensive backs, and again the two specialists: one punter and one kicker.

I think we signed seven three star guys.  But, I don’t get too hung up on that.  I don’t know how many stars Matt Forte was but I’ll take a whole bunch of guys like Matt Forte any day.  I really believe that when it is all done, four or five years from now, some of these guys that we signed today will be on NFL rosters. I think it is a good class.  We are excited about it and we can’t wait for them to get here.  Now it’s over, now we have to start on next year.

Questions:

On recruiting instate
When I got the job, I always believed you have to take care of home first, so that was one of my emphases.  I told our coaches we have to find every good football player in the state and then we have to hopefully recruit them.  There are reasons why we haven’t recruited some at all, as I mentioned earlier, but I think it’s important to recruit guys from the state.   They have friends, they have family, they have people that will come watch the games, it is closer to home and there are fewer problems when you are not too far from home.  So, it has always been an emphasis of mine wherever I have been.

We offered a bunch of guys and some of them decided they wanted to go elsewhere and then when it got down to the point where we got commitments from other people I took them, and then all of a sudden these other guys are out.  But I think they have to start to realize that’s their future.  There are only so many scholarships you have, there are only so many guys for each position and we are very honest with them.  We tell the players and the coaches that we only have one scholarship for a receiver for an example.  And we’ll take the first one, and some of them want to wait.  If they want to wait that’s fine, but we’re not going to wait too long.  I prefer to get in state but I am not going to wait.

On the need for playing a lot of freshman this upcoming year
No, I don’t believe so.  As we go through the process here, this is really our third full year of recruiting.  My first year we honored commitments (from the previous staff), we were only here a couple of weeks, so this is really our third year.  I think as you go through the process you shouldn’t have to play as many freshmen, and I honestly believe that we will play less freshman next year than we did this past year.  But there are some key positions that will have to help us next year like on defense and primarily linebacker.

On L.J. Parker and Steven Funderburk
We’re looking for speed, athleticism, and size.  Funderburk has size, but we’re looking for athlete because we play so much nickel. Last year, Shakiel Smith, for example, played the nickel, and what’s tough is that you have a 180 pound linebacker basically, and you line up against someone like LSU and they pound you.  We just didn’t have the people to line up.  So, now were going to put him back in free safety and hopefully he won’t have to play nickel and we’ll have some linebackers and some other people who can play that position.

On linebackers
We have four guys returning and Trent Mackey, who is one of them, we redshirted last year, and I think is going to be a heck of a football player.  And then we have three others. One is a walk on right now.  Then we have the six coming in, plus one of those safeties can also be what we call our Sam (Strong-side) linebacker which is also a nickel position, that’s what Shakiel played last year.  In our league, most of the time you play a 4-2 with five defensive backs, as opposed to a 4-3.

On the incoming players graduating early
None of them will graduate early, but we’re going to bring them all in for the July summer session like we did last year.

On the local player: Kenny Welcome
Kenny Welcome is a guy we targeted a long time ago, and he committed a long time ago to us.  He wanted to stay home, his mom wanted him here and he’s a big strong physical guy.  We watched him the last couple of years, so we are pleased to have him.  He’s a guy, if any, he would have a chance to play right away, because of the position that he plays.  He is physical and he’s capable of holding up against some of the people we will play against, and he’s athletic.

On beating out some of the big schools
We recruit guys that are being recruited by bigger schools, but the other thing that you have to realize is that we got some commitments from kids early and people tried to come back on, but, they hung tough.  Obviously, you lose some, that’s why until you sign them on signing day nothing is for sure.

On recruiting
This year is pretty good.  If you are playing baseball and you’re 24 out of 25, that’s pretty good.  We did well.  When you start looking at things, you look at the NCAA rules, they allow 56 players to come on campus.  We brought 28 players and really we lost two of them that went to other schools.  One of them we had to turn down because we got another position and the other one we’re thinking of possibly gray shirting, and he’s willing to do that.  So from a percentage stand point we did pretty good, we got the pool of guys that we wanted, and we stayed on them and we did a great job of recruiting them I think.

On the weekend of bringing them in (for official visits)
It was big.  We brought in 19 guys that first weekend and we took them out on the boat and we had dinner out there and all the families.  The big thing about us is that we bring parents too.  We want their mom and dad to see our place.  And when they see, they always leave on Sunday saying it was even better than they thought it was going to be.  And that trip helped because the parents got to know each other, the players bonded, they started texting each other and getting involved.  The moms want to start a booster club.  So it was huge, it was a big weekend for us.  We got everyone of those guys, so it was good.

On leaders in the class
There were more guys that got involved that way.  More guys started texting each other.  It wasn’t one or two guys that took the lead.  There were several players that became good friends.