No, it's a death sentence. PJ's lack of interest in recruiting doesn't explain it away. We were never worth a crap on D under PJ's TO either. Fact is, kids just don't want to play in it. QBs who can throw and WRs who can catch - why have any interest in it? OL absolutely DO NOT WANT TO PLAY IN THE TO. From the large # of kids suddenly wanting to transfer to GT to play defense post-PJ, it's clear that Defensive players DO NOT WANT TO PLAY IN A TO PROGRAM.
It's human nature to want to remember the good over the bad. Ultimately, the TO was bad for our football program and it was time to take that horse behind the barn and shoot it. Doesn't mean it wasn't fun to ride a few times.
It's human nature to remember what you want to remember. I don't consider Multiple ACC championship games, an orange bowl win, several winning seasons, and a couple thriller victories over ugag teams that were carrying top 10 recruiting squads and preseason championship rankings a death sentence for GT football.
As already said, PJ was a terrible recruiter. However, he was an offensive genius. He needed help with D coaching and recruiting, if he had managed to make that happen, he would still be here and we would probably have an eye on Monken to replace him at retirement.
Kids will play wherever they feel they can have the best chance to accomplish their goals be it NFL or otherwise. Every school in the country is fighting over the top 100 athletes. Sometimes you have to pick a few diamonds in the rough and that's what good recruiting is really about. Factories and dynasties propagate themselves because of the nature of money. We are neither of those so we take the good with the bad.