Since 2000

[patdog]

All that matters is the ones he signed. And so far, has hasn't signed even one in 5 years who has proven he can get the job done. Carroll has a chance, but he hasn't proven it yet (worst passer in the SEC other than Henig & Schaeffer last year). And Russell (assuming he signs) looks to be the real deal, but again he hasn't even started his HS senior season.

Edited to add that the fact Croom hired a RB coach as OC/QB coach probably had at least something to do with top QB prospects not beating down our door.

 

[DowntownDawg]

...my point is that Peaches acts like we have purposefully been going out and ignoring good offensive players in order to sign good defensive ones. Hell, we've tried to get good qb's and wr's to look at us, but it's been difficult up until this point.

You can, however, debate whether or not somebody like Pegues should've been on the offense or defense, and I think that is what Todd is getting at. Obviously, Pegues is a tremendous athlete and is a weapon with the ball in his hands. The coaches chose to put him the secondary instead of at receiver or in the backfield. And that obviously paid off last year. There's no question that Pegues could probably help in some way on the offense, but he was put on defense because 1) the coaches thought he could be a better defensive player than offensive player and 2) if you buy into what Todd is saying, they are choosing to build the defense first.

 

[patdog]

that you don't have to totally neglect your offense to build your defense. I do agree that Croom should have concentrated on the defense first when he got here, and it should probably always be the first priority. And Croom deserves credit for the job he's done with our defense. BUT, so far his offenses have been a complete failure. And he deserves full blame for that. It's easy to see why a good QB and good receivers wouldn't want to sign with a team coming off of 3 straight losing seasons (6 straight before we finally broke through last year) that didn't even care enough about its passing game to hire a decent QB coach. Hell, if my own son were a legitimate QB prospect I would have advised him not to sign with MSU in the last 3 years. And it's not because I have some kind of bias against Croom. I used to get bashed on the board regularly for saying that Sherrill deserves most of the blame for Croom's first two seasons (I still believe that).

 

[DowntownDawg]

....but our inability to sign a good quarterback and wide receivers was around long before Croom came. Every once in a blue moon we'd sign a blue chip prospect, only to have him not do very well, sometimes because he was just a bust (Jordan), and sometimes because of the lack of a team around him (Fant). I sure as hell can't blame any qb for not looking at us around the 2004-2005 era. We were on probation, had pitiful offensive lines, and you could see Fant get beat to hell every week for 2-3 years before that. On the other hand, we have been known as a fairly strong defensive school, so we are more attractive to defensive players, and it's easier to get them here. Russell is a big recruit, because he represents the first solid prospect that we've seen at QB since Fant, and hopefully, we'll have the team around him to give him an opportunity to be good.

And I think that you make a good point when you talk about the offensive coaching staff. In my opinion, the reason the offense has failed is not because of a lack of effort on the recruiting trail, but because of a combination of bad playcalling, poor player development at key positions (QB and WR), and lack of personnel. Two of those have to do with Croom and McCorvey, and that is a huge problem. Some imaginative playcalling would definitely help things, but we really need a solid qb coach, especially if we are going to run this WCO crap.