Closer Look: Tracking Oregon Commits Last Five Years

Recruiting is a fickle creature. There are commitments, decommitments, coaching changes and the ripple effect of all of those elements.

For Oregon, the coaching turnover has been a major wrench in the recruiting wheel.

Since we are currently in the midst of the 2023 recruiting cycle, I haven’t used any of those numbers below. Instead I selected a five year period dating from the 2017 signed class to the 2022 signed class.

There’s been some one-offs and some other elements. But for the most part, here is what Oregon recruiting has looked like for the past five full recruiting cycles. There are a few interesting numbers I didn’t realize until I started researching.

For example, the month with the most signed, SIGNED commits is surprisingly June. Which is 22 total by the way. The second closest month is January with 18.

Another number that seemed out of whack, but probably wasn’t due to the coaching turnover, was the number of decommitments. In the last 5 years there have been 52 decommitments for Oregon.

By comparison, Alabama had 38 in that same span. With no (head coaching) turnover. I don’t know why I picked Bama for comparison, I just did. USC has had 49 by comparison.

Anyways, the number seemed high, but I guess it really wasn’t after all.

For what it’s worth, 5 of the 52 decommits ended up signing with Oregon after all. (Net loss of 47)

There was no real way to go back and see everyone who committed in any given month. Meaning the decommits won’t be included in these totals. Unless I went back and looked up the 52 one by one. And frankly I don’t have that much time.

I’m simply offering transparency in the numbers.

Here’s a quick snapshot of the last 5 signed classes and some numbers from each.

2017

Total Signees: 25

Decommitments: 7

Recommits: 1

Biggest Month of Commits: January = 8

Class Ranking: 21 (On3)

2018

Total Signees: 24

Decommitments: 13

Recommits: 1

Biggest Month of Commits: April = 6

Class Ranking: 17

2019

Total Signees: 26

Decommits: 7

Recommits: 0

Biggest Month of Commits: June = 6

Class Ranking: 8

2020

Total Signees: 22

Decommits: 4

Recommits: 0

Biggest Month of Commits: June = 7

Class Ranking: 12

2021

Total Signees: 23

Decommits: 5

Recommits: 0

Biggest Month of Commits: May = 6

Class Ranking: 6

2022

Total Signees: 17

Decommits: 16

Recommits: 3

Biggest Month of Commits: January = 4

Class Ranking: 11

In the last few years there has been a steep trend in recruiting. Earlier and earlier commitments. For example, back in 2017, 12 of the 25 signees committed in January and February. In that same year only 5 committed in May-July.

Now 2022 is kind of an outlier. With Mario Cristobal leaving, most of those Spring commits went on to sign elsewhere. Kelvin Banks, Cam Williams and Teitaroa McMillan just to name a few. So the numbers only show 2, which we know aren’t accurate.

But 2021, From May-July there were 11 of the signed commits. That’s half the class in those three months. Conversely, the months of January and February yielded only 2 commits for Oregon in that cycle.

Really the two key points I’ve taken away from this are this: the trend of Spring commitments is real. That’s not ground-breaking but it’s still good to validate it with some statistical proof. Secondly, there have been fewer decommitments from those early Spring commitments. Again, the outlier to this data being the 2022 class, obviously impacted by Mario Cristobal’s departure.

It’s pretty clear this staff is on track to have another big Spring. And as long as Dan Lanning doesn’t bolt Eugene this Winter, that class should hold together pretty well.

Lastly, it’s also pretty clear that very few of your decommits come back. Also something most of us were aware of.