This is my first year playing in D1 (and we haven't even started recruiting yet so not really sure how it is with the big boys), but one thing that frustrated me at my D2 level was the lack of discernment from recruits. I wish I could talk to some of these recruits and tell the PG I'm recruiting "look, I have only a senior PG on my roster, you're guaranteed minutes and will definitely be starting next year! Are you really going to consider a team that already has 4 PG's on the team, and just signed another PG this season and signed one last season too? At this other school you won't start till your Senior year, if at all!" And as an extension of this thought, I also think it should be harder to sign multiple players at the same position in the same season. If a team signs a PG, early in the signing period, wouldn't it often be less likely another PG would want to sign there too, so why do I often seem to end up in a recruiting battle for a kid with a team that already signed a recruit that plays the same position and has several more players ahead of them on the depth chart. Most kids don't want to compete for minutes, especially at lower level schools. Some discernment would help spread good recruits to more teams.
Also I've tried to grab transfers from D1 without much success due to the same issues. A guy transfers after his junior year from a D1 school after playing something like 3 mpg as a Junior. If he's transferring now, you know he wants minutes. Is he really going to sign with another same level D1 team that's going to bury him on the depth chart and is just signing him to avoid the walk-on hit?
So the changes I think would help would be more discernment from recruits, such as:
- The amount of players you have that play the same position should effect the recruits signing decision. Should be easier to recruit a PG with only 1 other PG on your roster, as opposed to 4 (with some different levels based on the year of the players ahead of them - easier to recruit a PG with only a Sr. PG on the roster, as opposed to a So PG.).
- It should be even harder to sign multiple players at the same position in the same signing period.
- With this I think there should be more of a weight on promised minutes/starts, and this should extend past just 1st year. (you can promise a player he'll be a 3 yr starter, or play an average of 20mpg over career).
I think with this, it would help spread the good recruits among more schools, instead of the best schools being able to hoard and red-shirt, etc.
- A difference in preference for playing time/ability to be a star vs. winning. Some guys (but not all) would rather put up 25ppg on a C+/B-/B/B+ school then play 5mpg on an A-/A/A+ school. Just like you can promise minutes, you should also be able to promise offensive distribution or off%, and these promises should extend past the players 1st year.
With the extended promises going past 1st year (or the ability to promise for 1yr, 2yr, 3yr, etc.), it should also be tracked/rated like prestige, reputation, loyalty, home court, etc. Recruits will know if you keep your promises to players or not, and your promises to recruits, combined with how reliable your promise is will help sway a recruits decision.
At the least I think promised minutes/starts should weigh more heavily on a recruits decision, and extend past the 1st year.
Just some of the changes an inexperienced noob thinks would help