there has been some discussion on the actual mechanics seble has proposed - but not really a focused one, its more of some comments on mechanics interleaved with a far greater number of comments about generally if this is great, terrible, too big in scope, etc... i would personally really enjoy a discussion that is only about the actual mechanics itself, what we think about them... what is even being proposed (not always clear), how we'd like to see some of it implemented, etc...
a few thoughts:
- the creation of a recruit preference for playing time is one of the things i really like. im assuming this would be tied to promises, not some BS like looking at last season's setup and crap like that. i think this could really help level the playing field, while also adding realism. i'm hopeful seble makes this a real factor - not a 5% meaningless factor like some of the stuff he's put in place - maybe like 20-30% factor. but, i also am a little skeptical. it seems to me folks would just promise a great player to get him, no matter what, and just take the in-season hit if need be, swapping for the NT. for good players, not great ones, i could see top teams being unwilling to do this. but i don't see anyone being unwilling to promise an absolute stud a start and minutes to stay in the game, regardless of the impact on the season. any way to make this better? could hold the promise to the post season as well? i suppose also if you start signing 3-4 guys with starts, its going to hurt you quite a bit... but presumably, only some % of players are going to require these promises and stuff, probably not enough to force big schools to be starting half freshman and stuff like that.
actually, that makes me think - its got to carry forward, to be real. if you can bench a sophmore, who was a freshman starter, and play him like, zero, for manipulation - thats just not realistic. should promises be enhanced - to make "freshman only" promises, and then, "career long" promises, where you are basically guaranteeing that initial promise level to players for their entire career, at a minimum? that could actually work... i like that a lot better than the post season enforcement of promises (which generally i am against on principle anyway - at least unless freshman studs start getting generated with decent IQ like real life).
- the splitting of the scouting budget from recruiting budget seems horrible to me. i LOVE the tradeoff in recruiting between battling for great players, and finding great players. last season, i spent in the 30Ks at a low d1 team "scouting". i know there are others who in some cases, scout excessively, its a way to diversify... and i think this needs to be beefed up - not pared down. i think recruiting and scouting budgets HAVE to interact in some way. i understand there is basically going to be no recruiting budget at all? so maybe scouting money can be used to "purchase" attention points or something along those lines (with the cap on "attention points" removed, assuming it would follow from the phone calls it is related to now). i really hope seble will expand on attention points and how they relate to contacting players for dropdowns/pulldowns... if that even is a thing anymore... because its hard to wrap my head around having no clue how that entire part of the game, which is in essence the core of d2/d3 recruiting, will work.
- i have a million more but i've already gotten up there in length, so ill stop with this last one. there are some "preferences" seble has proposed on recruits for various things. first, whats the deal - will we know these? nobody here can answer... but should we know these? if so, how? if not, are we just blindly hoping random guys care about random **** that we can offer? that seems... not good :) but anyway, the point i wanted to hit on, is seble has proposed some preferences that relate to how your team actually played last year - like the tempo you played (with an uptempo or whatever preference for the recruit) - the offense/defense you run - the type of scoring (per / lp). i think these are all bad ideas. generally speaking, i see the real life correlation. what i don't see is this being fun for coaches. oh, crap, i can't get that guy because last year i was 8 deep and had to run slowdown, and he likes uptempo... or maybe these are half meaningless, 5% type preferences. in which case they barely matter - so why have them - complexity for complexity sake is bad. i think any of these kinds of preferences seble proposes, should be meaningful, and if its not right to have them be so meaningful, to omit them completely. i am totally against the tempo and type of scoring - coaches should be coaching their team to their team - not to the recruits they've scouted early in the season's "preferences". that is, assuming we can see them at all... im going to assume that's the case until seble says otherwise... because i think it would be incredibly frustrating to have all these invisible factors running the show.
anyway, the only one i could see, maybe getting behind, is the off/def set. this is not something you can tamper with in-season to target recruits next season. also, it would help foster the sets that people think suck... it would be a natural balancing effect. example, in high d1, where its all man, and some press, zone might actually get a much-needed boost. anyway, do you guys think having recruit preferences like tempo should exist, do you think its inherently bad to have preferences exist that would entice coaches to "tailor" their in-season performance to?