Husky Recruiting

I waste too much time thinking, or I should say dwelling, or worrying about recruiting. Case in point, the football team has no commitments and the basketball team has two commitments with room for one more but appear to be gunning for two more (taking from Bob Condotta and his blog on the Seattle Times) and I'm concerned, going over the "what ifs" and checking for news everyday.

The football team is easily explained: not a great year D-1 wise in the state, official recruiting visits seem to happen most often during the season, and Willingham's questionable future. The commitments will come (albeit, probably a weaker class than last year, but, mostly due to the state's class), but still, I have to look each day to see if that first commitment came in.

As for basketball, what does Romar do if two more kids want to commit? Romar has 13 kids on scholarship this season. Of the 13, three are seniors; that means in order to take four, there has to be some kind of shake up with the underclassmen. So, if Romar gets a commitment from, say the two Bellermine kids, where does that extra scholarship come from?

I don't believe Romar when he says these things work themselves out. Because if they don't work themselves out, then he has to deny someone the renewal of their scholarship, essentially kicking them off the team. That's bad for the reputation. Let look at the Joel Smith situation. His departure solved the scholarship issue for this season. However, two months ago he was probably planning on returning thus creating a problem in that there would be 14 scholarship players, one over the limit. My thought is that Smith planned on playing next season because it wasn't guaranteed that all four freshmen would qualify. When they did, Smith's potential playing time took a dive (at least in most people's mind – see Thomas and Suggs – and in Smith's mind if my argument is going to fly). So rather than sit on the bench he took his degree and left. Perhaps Romar did kick him off after the four freshmen qualified. No bad guy image because Smith had his degree, he could still play a year somewhere at D-II, getting a free start on a Masters or go for a teaching certificate. But there was some time between the final freshman qualifying and the announcement Smith was leaving, time for him to evaluate the season and his role. So perhaps this was his decision and a surprise to Romar. Thus Romar had to have another backup plan in case all the freshmen qualified. Maybe Brockman volunteers to go off scholarship (getting the bonus publicity for being such a team player, like that guy from WSU last year). He'd pay in-state tuition and will be playing professionally somewhere next year so the cost wouldn't sting too much.

Or maybe Romar was working with Wolfinger, probably the least Pac-10 ready on the team (excluding some of the freshmen, but I think they have a higher potential) to find him a new home. Which brings me to next year. If Romar takes two more commitments, he's back to 14. What to do? Well, I have the solution and it involves Wolfinger. This will be his fourth year at UW. Like Smith, he used a redshirt. Although eligible for another season, if he kept up on his studies, he will graduate and call it a career. As well as having the degree, Wolfinger has dealt with a lot of injuries, missing an entire season (in addition to the redshirt year) and I believe he is resting his foot right now. All the more reason to call it a career. Or, graduate, take the year of eligibility and enroll in a D-II school with Master's programs, apply for a medical redshirt and there you go – two more years of free education going towards a Master's. The timing is perfect, too perfect, so I'll stick with the injury issues as the most likely scenario. But, in the end, like with Smith, Romar is still the good guy and, importantly, getting kids to graduate on time.

The problem with this route is that leaves only one senior on next season's squad (Pondexter, assuming he doesn't make the mistake of going pro after this season, which would completely mess the above plan up) and thus only one scholarship for the following class. I can't believe Romar only takes on one kid (even if it is Josh Smith). So we are back to the over the limit issue again. Unless, the Pondexter mistake occurs…