Fourth Factor

#1
Unconditional Surrender

Unconditional Surrender

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#1
I used to think there were three factors in college football success: recruiting elite athletes, player development, and game management/playcalling. It is kind of clear that there is a fourth factor at play now, and that is player evaluations and roster construction. You might argue that falls under recruiting. But what is going on now is more akin to moneyball. Whereas before, you just tried to stockpile bluechip talent, now you need to find bargains. I have heard the Cuban rumors, and maybe things are shifting...but Indiana, as far as I know, is good at playing moneyball. Cignetti looks like Billy Bean and Nick Saban rolled into one.. To our chagrin, Vandy also has the skill (and apparently in multiple sports). The quicker we get a damn smart genius as GM the better.
 
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#4
#4
Special Ed said:
Cuban rumors?
Click to expand...

Unconditional Surrender said:
Mark not Castro.
Click to expand...
www.thedailyhoosier.com

Report: Mark Cuban contributing to IU football transfer portal efforts for second straight year

After previously not donating to IU athletics, Mark Cuban gave the athletic program a large amount last year, clearly intended to help Curt Cignetti’s football operation. Per Front Office Spo…
www.thedailyhoosier.com www.thedailyhoosier.com

Cuban gave IU even MORE money than last year and it shows already...
I've said it before, I will not be surprised if IU wins the Natty this year and wouldn't be surprised to see them go on a Saban at Bama type run of 4 of 5 titles in the next decade.
 
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#7
#7
Unconditional Surrender said:
I used to think there were three factors in college football success: recruiting elite athletes, player development, and game management/playcalling. It is kind of clear that there is a fourth factor at play now, and that is player evaluations and roster construction. You might argue that falls under recruiting. But what is going on now is more akin to moneyball. Whereas before, you just tried to stockpile bluechip talent, now you need to find bargains. I have heard the Cuban rumors, and maybe things are shifting...but Indiana, as far as I know, is good at playing moneyball. Cignetti looks like Billy Bean and Nick Saban rolled into one.. To our chagrin, Vandy also has the skill (and apparently in multiple sports). The quicker we get a damn smart genius as GM the better.
Click to expand...
You gotta do more with less. As you said see Indiana and Vandy, many others. We aren’t doing more with less. Considering we can’t financially keep up with the big NIL programs, that really puts us behind. We have to be able to bring 3/4 stars in here and make them play together and look as if it’s a team of high caliber 5 stars.

Hopefully next year.
 
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#10
#10
Unconditional Surrender said:
That's fine but their roster isn't currently loaded with top end talent.
Click to expand...
Cignetti was Bama’s recruiting coordinator when they built their most dominant teams, from dysfunctional to unstoppable (2007-2011). He learned from Saban an ability to identify and sign talent that no one else seems to have.
 
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#17
#17
Unconditional Surrender said:
I used to think there were three factors in college football success: recruiting elite athletes, player development, and game management/playcalling. It is kind of clear that there is a fourth factor at play now, and that is player evaluations and roster construction. You might argue that falls under recruiting. But what is going on now is more akin to moneyball. Whereas before, you just tried to stockpile bluechip talent, now you need to find bargains. I have heard the Cuban rumors, and maybe things are shifting...but Indiana, as far as I know, is good at playing moneyball. Cignetti looks like Billy Bean and Nick Saban rolled into one.. To our chagrin, Vandy also has the skill (and apparently in multiple sports). The quicker we get a damn smart genius as GM the better.
Click to expand...

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

My biggest concern is the brainpower behind our portal activity. It about makes me ill thinking Vandy seems better at this than we are.

Cignetti & Co may be in a league of their own. Guess we’ll see if they have staying power.
 
#18
#18
IndianaVol said:
www.thedailyhoosier.com

Report: Mark Cuban contributing to IU football transfer portal efforts for second straight year

After previously not donating to IU athletics, Mark Cuban gave the athletic program a large amount last year, clearly intended to help Curt Cignetti’s football operation. Per Front Office Spo…
www.thedailyhoosier.com www.thedailyhoosier.com

Cuban gave IU even MORE money than last year and it shows already...
I've said it before, I will not be surprised if IU wins the Natty this year and wouldn't be surprised to see them go on a Saban at Bama type run of 4 of 5 titles in the next decade.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. Cuban's pretty level headed about managing his money, so I'm sure he's not letting it go to waste. And with programs like Indiana suddenly one good season and one good billionaire donor away from being a major player, the ability to draw and retain talent becomes that much harder. Now that money is the sole competing factor, suddenly every program is a serious competitor to hire away every good player on your roster. Every year. No matter how bad or good they were on the field.

"Tennessee needs a billionaire athletics donor of its own!"

Yeah well it doesn't have one. And a lot of those Yankee and west coast schools do, or have access to an aggregate amount of wealth that outstrips most southern schools. USC, UCLA, Virginia, Texas, Texas A&M, Oregon, Michigan, Notre Dame, and more. So now what?

(And for the record, I don't think folks are gonna like the answer. Not. One. Bit.)
 
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#20
#20
EastTNVol6240 said:
You gotta do less with more. As you said see Indiana and Vandy, many others. We aren’t doing more with less. Considering we can’t financially keep up with the big NIL programs, that really puts us behind. We have to be able to bring 3/4 stars in here and make them play together and look as if it’s a team of high caliber 5 stars.

Hopefully next year.
Click to expand...
Talk about doing More with Less; look at Army and Navy! A bunch of smart 2 star kids who play like a team and have good coaching! None of those kids would be given a second look at SEC schools and look how they perform.
 
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#21
#21
The influence of outside subsidy money is just like Bidenomics, it’s inflationary.

When the system is not constrained by typical business standards like you can’t spend more than the revenue you generate, $10M coaching salaries, $4M QBs, $2M WR/RB, and no financial parity (have or have not)) is what is to be expected,
 
#22
#22
Unconditional Surrender said:
I used to think there were three factors in college football success: recruiting elite athletes, player development, and game management/playcalling. It is kind of clear that there is a fourth factor at play now, and that is player evaluations and roster construction. You might argue that falls under recruiting. But what is going on now is more akin to moneyball. Whereas before, you just tried to stockpile bluechip talent, now you need to find bargains. I have heard the Cuban rumors, and maybe things are shifting...but Indiana, as far as I know, is good at playing moneyball. Cignetti looks like Billy Bean and Nick Saban rolled into one.. To our chagrin, Vandy also has the skill (and apparently in multiple sports). The quicker we get a damn smart genius as GM the better.
Click to expand...
I think the portal might be a fourth area, different from recruiting? Both to me, are player evaluation.

Also, for me, its all about player evaluation and player development. Indiana recruiting from 2020 has been 58th, 54th, 25th, 69th, 65th and 46th last year, nationally. Not a lot in the Pantry to make even a decent soup!
But they added a lot from the portal, and that isn't picking random joes...to me, that's high quality evaluation! They are crushing it!

The evaluations, along with great coaching/development! Getting the entire team to prepare, practice and play like Indiana is right now. Impressive.
I would like to see the Vols hit more in recruiting/portal. Kinda fell into Joey, but its worked out!

For the record, I wanted to name my youngest son Ulysses. We settled on Lincoln! :D
 
#23
#23
Voltopia said:
Absolutely. Cuban's pretty level headed about managing his money, so I'm sure he's not letting it go to waste. And with programs like Indiana suddenly one good season and one good billionaire donor away from being a major player, the ability to draw and retain talent becomes that much harder. Now that money is the sole competing factor, suddenly every program is a serious competitor to hire away every good player on your roster. Every year. No matter how bad or good they were on the field.

"Tennessee needs a billionaire athletics donor of its own!"

Yeah well it doesn't have one. And a lot of those Yankee and west coast schools do, or have access to an aggregate amount of wealth that outstrips most southern schools. USC, UCLA, Virginia, Texas, Texas A&M, Oregon, Michigan, Notre Dame, and more. So now what?

(And for the record, I don't think folks are gonna like the answer. Not. One. Bit.)
Click to expand...
Precisely - look at Cuban's time with the Mavericks.
He paid to win, and win they did...now he wants his school to win and they are winning.
Cuban gets it too that pump money into the program and make it a winner and it attracts talent, it attracts coaches, it attracts fans (fyi - IU sold out every single home game by a mile for the first time since the 60s), and it attracts MONEY !!!

To answer your "So now what?" - the answer no one likes is Tennessee is and will remain a middle of the pack SEC team that will go to the CFP every few years, but mostly be relegated to the Gator, Citrus, or Music City bowl with a 8 to 10 win season.
 
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#25
#25
IndianaVol said:
Precisely - look at Cuban's time with the Mavericks.
He paid to win, and win they did...now he wants his school to win and they are winning.
Cuban gets it too that pump money into the program and make it a winner and it attracts talent, it attracts coaches, it attracts fans (fyi - IU sold out every single home game by a mile for the first time since the 60s), and it attracts MONEY !!!

To answer your "So now what?" - the answer no one likes is Tennessee is and will remain a middle of the pack SEC team that will go to the CFP every few years, but mostly be relegated to the Gator, Citrus, or Music City bowl with a 8 to 10 win season.
Click to expand...

Bingo. Which is why I vented for years and years about "buyer beware" with the money and portal business. The SEC had BEATEN college football. We had won. Bringing parity to the sport could never end with the SEC or Tennessee being more dominant than they already were. All this NIL money era has done has put the SEC schools back on near-equal footing with 40-60 other schools who can play the money game just as well as the SEC schools can - and some can and will play it better. It never made sense to me. By alumni base, by total alumni income, there's too many schools and too much money for anyone to dominate anything now. It's just like the NFL. 8-4 many years. Some years 10-4. On very rare occasions, 13-2 or whatever. You can tell the talking heads in media know this too, because there's been a constant commentary of "SEC fans will have to get used to being 8-4 most years" from everyone, from local Knoxville media to national sports broadcasters. "Tennessee fans will need to adjust their expectations." Are you kidding me? But nope. That's the narrative now. Adjust our expectations.

In the old format, Tennessee absolutely could have clawed its way back to the top. Now? I'm not sure I'll ever see Tennessee win a title under the current wild west format. Yes, we were in a pit in the 2010s, but with the right coach and structure we could have worked our way out of that hole. Now? Nothing is guaranteed more than the next year or the next dollar.
 
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