It’s nice but hard to take seriously. With football season over. The BCS hashed, rehashed and playoffs pumped then torn down. The head coaching carousel done. Recruiting stuff has already gotten tiresome for many — or they don’t want to sully their hands with the discussion. That leaves precious little to write. That means it is time for sports writers to predict 2008 polls.
Dennis Dodd at CBS Sports puts Pitt at #22.
Stewart Mandel at SI.com has Pitt at #25.
Yeah, it has little meaning. On the other hand, Pitt has been absent from even the discussion since the 2004 season. So, there is the fact that Pitt is still somewhere in sportswriters’ minds.
Being pre-season ranked in the 40s, 50s, 60s seals your fate before the season even starts.
A.J. Alexander 4.4
Jonathin Baldwin 4.4.
Chris Burns 4.44
Antuan Reed 4.4
Shariff Harris 4.4
Aundre Wright 4.4
Lesean McCoy 4.4
Anthony Jackson 4.4
Rick Gary 4.4
Lowell Robinson 4.4
Aaron Smith 4.49
Aaron Berry 4.49
Maurice Williams 4.47
Jared Holley 4.48
Ronald Hobby 4.45
Kevin Collier 4.5
Dorin Dickerson 4.5
Elijah Fields 4.55
Sherod Murdock 4.5
Greg Williams 4.5
Greg Cross 4.55
Shayne Hale 4.5
Manny Williams 4.55
Let’s hope the Panthers do soemthing with this!
College football is not alone, as there are inherent competitive disadvantages in other sports too:
Baseball-the salaries put any small market teams with no chance at winning starting in spring training (pirates, royals, etc.)
Basketball-the guranteed contracts coupled with team salary caps makes it impossible to improve from one year to the next-even if you get a high draft pick-it usually takes 4 years (sixers) or a magical trade (celtics) with a dumb trade partner (Mchale).
I agree that rankings dont mean anything else, but a five star or four star player is going to look at that ranking favorably.
1. They want to be a part of PITT’s future, and
2. They felt great in the recruiting process with DW and want to play football for him.
I’ll be shocked if any of these recruits decommit over the next four weeks.
