So any idea what's going to be going on at this BBQ? Seems like a long way to go for ribs and baked beans. Specially if you don't really plan on going to UF.
They want to have a "family" atmosphere and do a bunch of things like corn hole, etc (like a bbq at your house or something). This is from Spivey's podcast:
Let’s move on. Let’s start talking a little bit about this recruiting event, Nick. Mullen is bringing the cookout to Gainesville this weekend on Saturday. First event, first time for this. Nick, I think you and I might have talked about this last year on a podcast, but we’ll talk about it again. You see these different things. Auburn does their cookout weekend. It’s a lot of different things that they do. It’s a cookout. They play a lot of games throughout the day. They just make it almost like a fun family environment day that they make that weekend. It’s something Florida hasn’t done, and it’s something that I’ve kind of always wondered about. When you have Friday Night Lights and you have all the camps, it’s all football related stuff. You always have a lot of guys on campus. Again, it’s a football deal.
Nick: How much do we hear recruits say it was a family environment? When you’re talking about recruiting and what it comes down to when guys are making that final decision on what school, sure, obviously you’re going to take into account X’s and O’s. If I’m a 6’6” quarterback with a rocket arm and molasses on my feet, I’m not going to play for Scott Frost. It just doesn’t make sense. I don’t fit your offense. It comes down to that, but it’s really about the relationships that you’re building with coaches for two and three and four years before you even step on campus. Why not have an event that isn’t football centered?
Andrew: Exactly. Like I said, it’s a different thing, and I think it’s a good thing. It’s able to show these guys and the staff in a different way. I personally like it. Again, they’re trying to hold back and make it more of an invite-only thing. Of course, that’s not legal to just do invite-only, so they can’t really do that. They’re trying to make it more of guys they just want on campus. That’s what they’re trying to do.
Again, I like it, because if you’re just having 30 kids on campus, and it’s just a situation where they’re eating, playing cornhole, playing basketball, whatever they’re trying to do, it’s a lot different. They don’t have to worry about making sure everyone is happy or making sure they’re talking about football. The coaches aren’t having to worry about also coaching their position, or whatever it may be.
I personally have been in favor of this. I’ve always wondered why Florida didn’t do something like this, just because it’s an event that, like you said, Nick, everyone talks about family. The family environment, getting to know the coaches. Especially with a new coaching staff, where guys don’t know this staff as well as they knew someone like McElwain, who’d been there three years, or someone who’s been at a school for four or five years.
Nick: I’ve talked about it before. I think this staff is in a better position. Obviously, so many guys from Dan Mullen staff at Mississippi State had probably been recruiting some of these guys. Maybe not having the same chance to get them to Starkville that they will now in Gainesville. Obviously, Charlton Warren and Ron English at Tennessee.
Christian Robinson, I had some egg on face. In Miami, I asked Dan Mullen about how they had kind of drawn up the 10 recruiting areas in the state of Florida, because he said they want to recruit every single high school in the state of Florida. I’m like, that’s like 800 schools. How do you do that? That’s like 80 schools per coach. That seems like a lot. I was like, “What about someone like Christian Robinson, who maybe Christian Robinson or Brian Johnson don’t have it?” He goes, “Brian Johnson actually has extensive recruiting history in South Florida.” There was a little egg on my face there.
They’re splitting it up, and these guys are going to hit every single school.
Andrew: I said this before. I don’t think that that’s a bad thing, especially with Mullen. I get that all these guys have coached there, but they haven’t walked in with the Gator logo. They haven’t walked in with the Florida State logo or the Miami logo on there. Scott has. When you walk in with an instate logo on you, you instantly get more respect than an out of state school, 90% of the time. There’s a few schools, a few head coaches, that don’t.
Anyway, it’s good. There’s always a small school that might have that one stud in four years or three years, or whatever it may be. I think it was Mullen talking about Chris Jones when Hevesy walked in. Chris Jones was a guy nobody knew about, and he blew up to be a five-star and one of the first round Draft picks. I like that about that. It’s a situation that I think is going to pay off for them. No stone unturned for them.
Mac had that whole motto of recruit daily or die, whatever it may be. That didn’t pan out. That didn’t pan out for his staff. This staff is showing. It’s paying off. Events like Saturday will show the effects of that kind of stuff.
Nick: Maybe they’ve got some of McElwain’s barbeque sauce that they can keep around.
Andrew: For real. I mean, let me ask you this. Give me your opinion. What do you think about the event?
Nick: I love it. It goes back to what I just said. So much of recruiting is building relationships, and why not have, everything in recruiting doesn’t need to be centered around football. A lot of what these guys talk about is what’s going on in school, what’s going on. They’re involved in these people’s home lives and their friends. There’s so much more that goes into recruiting. Even not just recruiting, once they’re on campus too. It’s so much more about their day to day lives and helping 16, 17, 18, 19-year-old kids grow into men. I think it’s a great start. We’ll see how it runs and how it goes. You’ll have, I’m sure, a ton of updates from the kids on their opinions on it and how the event went.
Andrew: Exactly. Again, it’ll be interesting to see how it works out with if it’s just guys they invited and that kind of stuff. It’s big, because they’re getting some guys in. Chris Steele, a big DB out of California, is going to come on an unofficial this weekend and visit. He’s going to turn around and in a couple weeks or a month, he hasn’t decided on the official date, is going to come back for an official visit. That’s big. They got a tight end in Jaleel Billingsley out of Chicago coming down on an unofficial visit. Both of those are big.
I think that kind of goes with what we talked about, and it shows that they’re getting out and seeing these kids and the relationships are paying off for this staff as they do that. For a guy like Billingsley, for a guy like Steele, who haven’t been on campus yet, I think an event like this is huge, because it’s a barbecue. They’re going to be sitting around, playing games, that kind of stuff. They’re able to get to know the coaches a little bit more. The families are able to get to know the coaches a little bit more. They’re able to sit down and visit with them more. I think it’s more of a get to know you thing.
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