Mike Gundy Has a Prediction for the Future of Power Five Football Recruiting

STILLWATER – Recruiting has become a huge topic in Stillwater for Oklahoma State football fans and for the head coach as well. With all the injuries and the water down impact those injuries have had on an Oklahoma State football team that in October looked like the primary challenger to current unbeaten and CFP favorite from the Big 12 in TCU to a team that has lost three of their last four games and two losses allowed teams to get bowl eligible. The Cowboys at one-time were ranked No. 8 in the polls and were 6-1 with the only loss being in double overtime at TCU. All those injuries; 40 in all, 14 have been season ending to starters or back-ups; have ramped up the recruiting interest and efforts. Today Florida offensive lineman Josh Braun announced on Twitter he has an OSU offer. Braun is not even in the portal yet. The portal hasn’t opened yet.

Pat Kinnison - Chief Photographer

Offensive line is a major need.

The Cowboys need offensive linemen. They need defensive backs. They are looking for a few more wide receivers. As always, they’ll take any potential difference makers. It’s hard. The NCAA limits how many opportunities that coaches go out and see players. Forget just watching them play. It is critical to get to know them. Will they be a fit for Stillwater, for the Cowboy culture?

With social media and everybody finding out what anybody says about them. Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy said there is pressure on coaches to sell their players to college coaches. No negatives, just all the good they can pile on about their play and what kind of people they are.

“I gotta have good, quality information,” Gundy said during his Monday news conference on Nov. 21. “So we want to be able to go out and recruit the men that fit in this culture, but we need good, quality information. It’s difficult to find that information nowadays, because of counselors, teachers, principals, coaches fear of somebody in the local neighborhood might find out I said something that might not be as appealing about a young man, and instead of just promoting and selling him, that’s just a fact.”

Now, Gundy and other schools have recruiting staffs, analysts that have either been coaches or worked in programs and know how to identify players, both in talent and in personality. Oklahoma State has veteran coach Todd Bradford that heads up that group as the Director of Football Recruiting.

Robert Allen - Pokes Report

Todd Bradford heads up the recruiting.

On the staff are veteran coach and former NEO A&M Junior College head coach Zach Allen (offensive line), veteran coach Beni Tonga (Player Development and Cowboy Backs), Assistant Director of Recruiting for Offense Josh Gonzales (wide receivers), assistant Eddie Simpkins (quarterbacks), veteran coach Cameron O’Neal (running backs), D.J. Linton (defensive line), Justin Gordon (linebackers), and former Division I basketball standout Mariah Turner (Manager of On-Campus Recruiting).

We have to do a better job recruiting, digging into the details, but I was giving the example with Spencer (Sanders),Gundy said of the Denton Ryan coaches when Sanders was recruited. “When the coaches told me he wanted to play free safety and quarterback, that gave me a pretty good indication he’s a tough guy.”

Now, Gundy went into full revalation mode. Gundy grabbed his crystal ball and made a prediction. To be fair, this has been rumored to be coming down the pike for about six months.

“You want me to give you another Mike Gundy prediction that will come true,” the head coach said with a big smile. “I hit them (predictions) all the time. College football is going to turn into the NFL, you’re going to have a scouting service just like they do in the NFL. So our group, Todd Bradford, and all of our people that work for him, are going to be like the NFL somebody where they’re on the road and watching games live. They can go watch a young man five times. That’s where you learn about him, right? You don’t learn about him — we got all the video in the world. I can pull up every game that was played last Friday.

“So the NFL does that. They invest millions and millions and millions of dollars into a young man and they still miss sometimes. But they’re here all the time watching games live. I don’t know if the fans know that. But NFL scouts go watch college games live and then they watch them practice. So they try to get a good idea before they invest $25 million into a kid.

“Eventually college staffs are going to have a recruiting staff that goes out and watches guys play in my opinion, then it will also allow the assistant coaches to be with the current team that they’re coaching and helping tutor academically and athletically during the season, which is where they should be instead of out on the road recruiting on Thursday and Friday nights. Because these are like our own kids and we should be with them all the time, not leaving them at home. So eventually that’s going to happen and then you guys can say I told you that in three or four years, but they’ll have it eventually. Because we’re already paying these recruiting staffs now, what’s the difference? And they’re unlimited, right? There’s some SEC schools that have 20 to 25 guys on the recruiting staff.”

Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

No surprise Greg Sankey is in the middle of the transformation.

Division I football coaching staffs are limited to one head coach and 10 assistants who can work with players in hands-on roles and can also go out on the road during the contact periods and recruit off-campus. Lifting the restriction or extending the number of coaches would open the door for an unlimited number of coaches to work with players and roam the sidelines in different roles. It would allow, as Gundy would like for the coaches to stay with players and coach all the time and then let others on the road to recruit full-time.

The NCAA Transformation Committee’s concept to remove the policy limiting the number of coaches on a football staff wias tabled in August, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey and Ohio director of athletics Julie Cromer are the co-chairs of that committee.

Cromer says the staff limitation concept is connected to the committee’s ongoing study of the year-round recruiting calendar. 

“The two will be done together,” Cromer says.

“We have issues that have lingered for decades,” Sankey says. “It would have been unwise to just flip a switch on some issues in August when you’ were going into a competitive season.”

Gundy is promising and I agree, the switch will be flipped on all this and I think it will happen much quicker than many of you might think.