goldmember
Damn Good Rat
- Joined
- Aug 20, 2002
- Messages
- 1,423
Up until last year, Johnson said, he was permitted to have 20 percent of the signees fall below the school’s admissions standards so long as they met NCAA qualifying standards, signees termed by the program as exceptions.
“(Peterson) said, with the success we’ve had, he would give me more leeway if I thought guys could make it through,” Johnson said.
Johnson said that Peterson removed the 20 percent cap and gave him autonomy to offer scholarships to prospective players as long as they were NCAA qualifiers, which are a lower standard than Tech’s.
It is not a privilege that Johnson said he intends to abuse, if for no other reason than practicality.
“It would be really stupid for me to go sign 20 guys and they’re miserable because they can’t do the schoolwork, then they make you miserable and everybody around them miserable,” he said.
But the liberty has been freeing. Johnson and his staff believe they can gauge whether a high school player will have the drive to make it through Tech, regardless of his transcript and standardized test score. In the past, when those candidates fell below Tech’s admissions standards, it often meant they had to give up recruiting them.
“What happened was, you’d get the recruiting board and you would have them — exception, non-exception,” he said. “And you would have to make a choice on who you were recruiting. Because if you were going to take five (exceptions), well, as soon as you hit the five, (you couldn’t recruit any more) and now we don’t have to do that.”
“It would be really stupid for me to go sign 20 guys and they’re miserable because they can’t do the schoolwork, then they make you miserable and everybody around them miserable,” he said.
But the liberty has been freeing. Johnson and his staff believe they can gauge whether a high school player will have the drive to make it through Tech, regardless of his transcript and standardized test score. In the past, when those candidates fell below Tech’s admissions standards, it often meant they had to give up recruiting them.
Well it's over finally. All those "The Hill" threads are nulled.
(until the next thread whining about lack of majors)
THIS
IS
HUGE
We are committed! This was the right move to make. Handcuffs are off, NO MORE HILL EXCUSES
(until the next thread whining about lack of majors)
“I’m excited about this team,” Johnson said. “I think we’ve got guys who want to do what we’re going to do, which is important. We’re going to look at some different stuff, some changes, and we’ll see how it goes.”
Johnson declined to explain further — “Not right now,” he said — but added they will be evident to observers.
“Oh, yeah,” he said. “They’ll notice ’em.”
My degree just lost 10 points in the value market.
[/sarcasm]
On another note. I am curious as to what "Changes" CPJ is referring to:
On signing day Feb. 5, Johnson said he didn’t know if he would make staff changes and that “you’re always evaluating.” Johnson said he does so annually and eventually decided that he didn’t feel changes were necessary.
However, Johnson had said on multiple occasions last season that the offensive line needed to be coached better. With three fifth-year seniors who had started a total of 83 games going into the season, the line was expected to be Tech’s best. However, the line underachieved, in part due to injuries.
Asked about the coaching – Mike Sewak is the offensive line coach – Johnson said that there were issues on the offensive line.
“I think they’ll be taken care of,” he said, but declined to elaborate. “It doesn’t do any good to elaborate.”
Blocking on the perimeter was a factor in one of the most anticipated elements of last season — the introduction of the diamond formation — being largely scrapped. The Jackets exploited it to great effect when it was first used in a 38-14 win over Duke. But, he said: “After that, the more we did it, the less effective it became.”
We're gonna move the a-backs out towards the sidelines a couple of inches
This is amazing.After all those stories about PJ only having 2 exceptions now this comes out.
My degree just lost 10 points in the value market.
[/sarcasm]
Only took 11 posts for someone to make the lame tired joke we all knew was coming.
Well I like this story for the defense...this should open the talent pool on that side of the ball. But on the offensive side of the ball we still have the hurdles of kids wanting to play in this offense. But hey, maybe turning out top ranked defenses is all we need.