Spartan Football News and Notes February 15, 2009 Edition

Spartan Football News and Notes February 15, 2009 Edition  Recruiting was something once talked about for one or two days in February. It now has taken on

Spartan Football News and Notes February 15, 2009 Edition

 

With Dan Enos leaving to be the Head Coach at CMU, don’t believe the Spartans will be hindered in Detroit. Far from it

Recruiting was something once talked about for one or two days in February. It now has taken on a life of its own and has moved into a 365 days per year endeavor.

 

Here is what the Spartans have going with the 2011 class underway.

 

The Dan Enos affect… 

 

With all due respect to Dan, who is a fine recruiter, this is so overblown that is has taken to the realm of ridiculous. Dan Enos was at MSU when JLS was and the Spartans still failed to secure big recruits from the area.

 

Once Mark Dantonio took over he made a conscientious effort to lock down Detroit. I have shared many times how when Coach Dantonio was asked to come to Detroit to address the high school coaches, he not only showed up, he brought his entire staff.

 

It was Dantonio that sent every one of his staff members to the city, and although it may have been Enos’s primary area, any implications that he was at it alone are ludicrous and silly. Detroit was too important for one man to go after, and that is why Dantonio led the repair of the relationship and the attention given to the D.

 

Coach Enos has great relationships there no doubt, but so does Coach Dantonio. People acting like MSU lost a link to the city are badly informed. The Spartans’ resurgence in the southeast corridor of the State is directly attributed to Dantonio and him only.

 

So while others are trying to make you worry, relax. Coach Dantonio was well aware of Enos’s desire to move up the coaching ladder and he was smart to spread out the responsibilities. Mark Dantonio is a lot of things and stupid isn’t one of them.

 

Take heart Spartan Nation, it was Dantonio that put the emphasis back on Detroit. It was Dantonio that assigned his entire staff to the city, and it was Dantonio that made healing the once broken relationships between MSU and Detroit priority.

 

I wish Dan Enos well. He is a good man, but his departure will not hurt MSU in Detroit. The Spartans will continue to do well in the city thanks to the respect Mark Dantonio has and the commitment to the city he holds. Unless he leaves, losing the new resurgence in the city isn’t going anywhere.

 

Reinstated…

 

There has been a call from some in the media for Mark Dantonio to clarify if the players involved with Rather Hall are reinstated. He said they weren’t so I see no reason for him to clarify anything. He has said when all the cases are over he will address it.  With sentencing and even hearings for many still in the future what does he need to do? Nothing. The players are not nor have ever been reinstated (a fact continually reported from Spartan Nation), so he needs to say nothing until all issues are resolved. Just like he said he would.

 

New RB Coach…

 

Mark Dantonio will take his time to hire the man he thinks best fits his goals, morals and philosophy. I am aware of a few men in the process and I can tell you that he was in no rush. He made the right call.

 

He wanted to get the recruiting season over and will now look for the right fit and not just any fit. He has preached about the continuity of staff and when he hires people they rarely go. In fact, he has hired Dan Enos twice and he is the one who has left both times.

 

Coach Dantonio isn’t thinking about using MSU as a stepping-stone that is why he didn’t use as many true freshmen last year as he could have to help the team. He red-shirted them and plans on being here to coach them. The same with a staff hire. Dantonio is looking for someone who will fit and be at MSU.

 

He will look for a balance of experience and savvy, but most of all he will look for a coach who will love this program and these players like he does. With so many asking when he will fill the spot, like the program is falling apart because they are in the middle of winter workouts and they are without a position coach, relax. I expect the hire sooner rather than later, but at the end of the day whoever he picks will be the right person for him. 

 

Fast Finishes…

 

I get a lot of comments how people perceive that this staff doesn’t finish strong in recruiting. Losing Gaston to Purdue was without a doubt the biggest disappointment for 2010, but I certainly don’t understand how you can equate that with a lack of fast/strong finishes.

 

This staff does things entirely different than most. They use their camps and visits to develop relationships. They take that relationship approach to recruiting and with that philosophy you see, like Dantonio mentioned on signing day, “Not one of our recruits decommitted or took a visit after committing.”

 

People point to Christian Bryant, who Spartan Nation said going back as far as last summer was a strong OSU lean, as not closing the deal. Bryant was set to go to OSU and the Spartans were next in line only if OSU decided not to take him. Signing him wasn’t expected so how could that be a loss. Again, the only true loss or failure to close at the end was Gaston to Purdue. Coach Hope did a great job of recruiting, and MSU’s depth chart full of young talent made the choice clear to him.

 

As long as Dantonio is here, I don’t expect them to do what some call “strong finishes” by pulling rabbits out of their hat. I do expect them to continue the relationship approach, which brings more commits over the summer and early fall than late January and early February.

 

When players do delay they still are building relationships with those young men. Countless times recruits have credited this staff with not pressuring them.

 

They certainly have added players such as Denzel Drone (last year)and Jairus Jones from Florida (last year), and Darqueze Dennard from Georgia (this year) late in the process, so it isn’t as if they stop when the New Year arrives. They don’t just make a lot of offers at the last minute to young men they haven’t had the time to evaluate.

 

I realize with today’s 24/7 365 days-per-year obsession with recruiting that doesn’t make for a lot of last second excitement, but it does add to stability. Lane Kiffin, the new coach at USC, called this year’s highly rated K/P commit Mike Sadler and offered him the last night before signing day. Sadler laughed them off, but I am glad that Coach Dantonio doesn’t take that approach.