quote:
Deboer is a very good coach.

What Deboer has not proven is the ability to bring in recruits. He switches jobs too frequently to have proven that yet.

Perhaps he'll shine at it. But Oregon finished 3rd in the nation in recruiting under Lanning at OREGON. This is his second full class (his first finished 9th in the nation).

Deboer can obviously 'coach up' guys recruited by the prior coach. I think Bama will be very good the next couple of years because of that. But Washington was outside the top 25 recruiting with him at the helm. Given time, recruiting overtakes coaching nearly 100% of the time.

As Terry Bowden said, "You can take the X's and the O's. Give me the Jimmies and the Joes."

In the long run, a coach that can recruit like Lanning (or Smart, or Saban or Ryan Day) will bring in more success than a poor recruiting coach who is great at the coaching side of being a coach.

That's why I fear Lanning as an opposing coach at a top school (which Oregon isn't) more than anyone else. At a school like Alabama or Florida (or UGA) I can't see him ever being outside the top 5 in recruiting. Mostly top 3. That is going to bring success to any program.

I hope Lanning stays at Oregon a long time. He's no threat there.

We'll see how he does with recruiting. I have no idea how well he will do, but he went from being an unknown coach to being well known and having a good recruiting support system. If he can't recruit decently at Alabama, then he won't be able to do it anywhere.

I think this is likely the area having Saban around will help him in the most.

But I think you are wrong about Oregon. They are pretty well funded by Nike. They have been a top10 team in recruiting and on the field for quite a while, at least a decade and have made the playoffs.