College recruiting has always been a changing landscape. As technology and coverage have changed, recruiting has improved throughout its evolution, as has the way college recruiters get in contact with recruits and their parents. It’s a way for the colleges to improve their communication in an effort to land highest-ranked recruits in the nation at a time in which recruits are more essential to a program’s future than ever before.
In our previous column on Trojans Wire, we explored the recruiting landscape at the high school level. Now it’s time to focus on the junior college recruitment process. As was mentioned in the column linked in the previous sentence above, JUCOs have expressed the desire to switch to spring football. How they are going to actually pull that off remains the biggest question of all. While it’s not exactly wise, high school kids are young enough and able enough to potentially play a fall schedule after playing in spring. At the FBS collegiate level, however, that becomes infinity more difficult.
Kyle Murphy played on the offensive line at Arizona State from 1993-1997. In his opinion, the rigors of the game would prevent people from really being able to give their all to what would amount to two seasons in one year. It also doesn’t account for the injury recovery time window that typically accompanies a fall schedule. Someone injured badly in the spring is now going to have a completely different recovery timetable.
“The demands required on the body to play collegiate football are extreme,” Murphy said. “Thus, athletes need time to recover from their previous season and prepare their bodies for the upcoming season. Playing in the spring and fall doesn’t afford those athletes that opportunity. They will be more prone to being hurt and/or being injured. What about athletes injured in the spring? Some won’t have the time to properly heal. Player safety is constantly and consistently touted as the most important aspect of the decision making process but I don’t understand how playing in the spring AND fall accomplishes that.”
Of course, none of this accounts for how coaches will evaluate talent at the JUCO level. Are they going to use tape from high school and their collegiate career? Are they going to rely solely on tape? Will they be going to watch these athletes during their own hectic spring schedule? What if colleges do end up playing in the fall? Will they also have to crank up the recruiting right before National Signing Day while using only film? There are so many questions left to be asked. One thing we know for certain is that nothing is certain right now. Whatever ends up happening is surely going to change the way we process the game for good.