RunningJacket

Kirby took the bagman system to another level after learning the system in Tuscaloosa. Let’s compare those numbers to the NIL era where everyone can buy the best high school players. Something tells me it won’t be close.

This is what has been wrong with the NCAA for decades and why many fans want them to die (which they are). You slam a Fordham but NEVER go against a big school. They are a joke and I hope schools create their own organization.

The players have not changed. This is how they have always been. The ones who turned this into a fire are the coaches who kept upping the game in recruiting. Coaches went from contacting a kid via official letterhead to going to games on Friday nights in person to really show their interest, to then going to their houses to hug mama and offer Benjamin’s, to then flying helicopters to a high school on a random Tuesday, the Porsches, Chargers, jobs for family, etc.

And the players keep asking for more and the coaches have kept giving it to them.

The coaches can stop all this if they simply stopped recruiting idiots to beat their buddies idiots. But they won’t and the players won’t stop asking. I find it fascinating and love all of it.

The smart schools stopped bending over for these players decades ago even while the losses stacked up.

Now, teams can’t stop because they have head coaches making 8plus million per year. Kirby is being paid 13million a year and his staff is closer to 20 million a year in total. They can’t stop pandering to these players because of that.

It’s not just about the money now that we see how it ended. He obviously wanted to get closer to home and play with his brother so he asked for the moon from Tenn and was told no. He probably expected them to say no.

As an Atlanta guy, I’ve seen this happen a lot. GT has gotten a lot of players under the portal who wanted to get back to the metro area for a variety of reasons. Granted these may not be the stars getting huge bucks but after a year of having family traveling a lot to see you play, etc, suddenly all the garbage spewed in the recruiting process goes away. Then you realize it’s all just noise and overblown so players transfer.

And Nico transferred to a major media market. It’s not like he went to some no where school. He went somewhere where eyeballs will be on him.

Typical whining. The sport is not dead for the common man. The common man who is a UCLA fan is happy that they upgraded from a nobody QB to a QB who was a top recruit and led a team to the playoffs last season. For every transaction there is a winner and loser.

You guys never seemed to say the sport was dying when 10 teams signed 70% of the top 100 national players. Now that other teams can recruit the same player pool suddenly the sport is dying because you are not fan enough to watch a 7 or 8 win program instead of a 10-11 win program. Most college fans have been watching and supporting 7 or 8 win programs for decades. Welcome to the club. If you bail, you bail and we will have no problem mailing fun of a half empty Neyland like you guys have been making fun of the rest of us.

I agree the ACC is a joke. I just find it funny how you guys seem to think a QB that led you to a playoff berth is just gonna suck at UCLA. He’s a year older. And now you sign UCLA’s QB so I assume that guy sucks if he played for UCLA where we all know they don’t play real football.

Saban did NOT leave Bama in good shape. He left them with a roster built for the bagman system not this new era. That's why he quit. He knew he couldn’t keep his own house in order under NIL and the portal.

Deboer is in a no win situation as is Kirby. Kings of the old are often not Kings of the new. Those 2 fanbases will not take kindly to 2-4 losses when they are use to being undefeated and automatically being placed in the Final Four. Look at UGA last season. They had a solid season but their fanbase is less than thrilled. Another 2 seasons like that and they’ll start getting loud about it. Sure, they both signed top recruiting classes. They better use them now because half will be gone to the portal soon when they sit the pine for the first time since they were 5.

You guys are funny. The QB that led your team to the playoffs transferred to a school in a better conference and yet y’all act like your team is better than the team he went to. I guess we’ll see. Neither Tenn or UCLA will be in any conversations for anything this year so we’ll see which does better. And wins and losses are all that count. But I’m sure Tenn will claim to be the best 7-5 team ever.

Yes, but they offered late. GT was on him in 9th grade when the big boys were saying he was too small and didn’t fit the mold they were looking for. Gibbs remembered that and when they all showed up his senior year when he turned into a freak he stayed loyal. Recruiting is a long game a lot of times but I fully acknowledge that today it’s all about the cash.

Usually teams like Bama and UGA can show up late and the offer is accepted quickly which is what the casual fan sees or reads about. Take Calvin Johnson for instance. He was barely recruited because he and his parents both said he’s going to GT from the jump so here was a Hall of Famer that was barely recruited at all. Gailey had locked him down in 10th grade.

Yeah, we agree. The minute the king of the bagman system realized everyone could buy players he quit. It was perfect for timing for him due to age anyway. I can see a guy like Kiffen tearing up this new era because he hasn’t been ripping on players for leaving and knows the bagman system sales pitch which will help in this new meat market.

I hope it stays like this because the minute a cap is introduced we will be right back to back door dark money deals. This is actually a perfect system once fans get over their need to pretend they care about following a player from year to year. They are all essentially 6 month contracts with portal periods in December and April.

My team signed our first ever 5 star last cycle all because we could offer him a bag. 3 years ago he’d be at Clemson or UGA right now. Today we signed the highest rates DB in the portal from Penn State due to a legal bag. That’s 2 high end players we would never have had even if they both portal out in December. I’m perfectly fine with e watching different players every fall because under the old system I could watch a player for 4 years and we’d still lose. That’s not fun. I’d much rather lose with a core of players who are loyal and a handful of high level mercenaries.

But I’m sure they’ll mess this opportunity up too and create a system that will once again benefit cheaters and the next generation of fans will eat it up like the past generation believes their wins are in the level.