Pagoda

A major annoyance… gone! Delightful.

I’m gonna regret this post, but do we use an advanced stats? Or is this just Bostad’s scouting eye? Kinda has to be advanced stats to be moneyball? I think IU is just great conventional scouting. Regardless, I just want players who end up being a good deal. Could be Lou Moore for $400K or Fernando for $2M… good value is good value.

He's an all-state wrestler. I'm no OL coach but I'd guess a lot of those skills and abilities translate. He also does track & field and lacrosse... quite the athlete. We'll see, but he feels like a great find. Recruiting is more than just being high bid for blue chippers.

Yep. He went to one of IU's camps. Then he had a follow-up official visit this weekend. And here we are. The ratings services haven't even evaluated him yet.

Woah. Outta nowhere.

Kinda funny to think back in the mid-2000’s IU had a small $30 annual fee for athletics that was quite controversial. They dropped it and to make up for the lost revenue the north AH bleachers shifted from students to alumni. I agree there is something distasteful about students paying this. Not all of them care about sports, they’re supposed to be mostly paying for an education, and student debt is a concern. But, sports are a big part of the college experience and it’s not like each student’s tuition is perfectly spent on just what that student uses/wants. I don’t know the answer here. I’m not sure this is possible given disclosure laws, but the optics would be better to just increase tuition and funnel money to the AD on the back end… that happens a lot of places already. It’s tough for some ADs to stay competitive, especially outside the B1G and SEC. I think it’s usually the schools’ fault for several reasons. We shall see what congress does.

And he commits to Indiana. Of course, hopefully he signs. We beat out Miami and Georgia... just like with Fernando. I liked this quote: "Miami, Georgia, great programs, they develop players as well, but nobody does it like Indiana."

He doesn’t sound like the highest probability, but our staff knows what they’re doing. If we had no shot they would cut bait. Cig recruited Julio Jones. We just landed the #2 WR in the portal. This is nothing new for this staff. He’s just one of many HS recruitments. If he comes here great. If not, we’re fine.

Time Mag was right to put Fernando in their 100 Most Influential People in Sports! vbg

FYI. He noted he might be in an upcoming commercial (Aflac?). He also said the high school recruiting market is red hot.

I don’t think much of Lane, but it can work out. Louis Moore went to Ole Miss and came back. Kahil Benson went to Deion and came back. Baldwin did the the decommit thing with Colorado. It’s a yellow flag, but still a case by case thing imo.

100% agree. And on top of that we didn't win much with all those one-year left seniors. Painful. As for who the staff let go and brought in... I get your point. I don't know until the season plays out. I get the concerns.

Yep. Cig & Co are great scouts, player developers, and retainers. That's how they spent ~$22M on the roster and beat all these programs spending $35-40M. Most amazing thing I've ever seen.

I get the roster concerns people have. TBD, but valid. I really think the problem was how expensive the portal is and how much we had to use it again in season two. Below is how programs make their roster budget go far: 1) Scouting: This is an extreme example, but Wagler as a #140+ ranked high school kid was probably ~$500K last year (before he blew up and got other deals Illinois didn't have to pay for). What a steal for Illinois -- his real value was closer to something like $4M. 2) Development: A 5ppg player is on a cheap deal. Turn them into a 10ppg material contributor and they're still on the same cheap deal for the rest of the year (sometimes two years). 3) Retention: A happy player in a great situation won't hit the portal for $1 more. For most, it will take several hundred thousand more to hit the portal and risk a good thing. So, retaining players is quite a bit cheaper than getting them from the portal. In season one, we did very little of the above. Not good and really put us in a bad spot. On top of the portal being expensive, IU's recent struggles mean we don't have much to offer but money. We aren't a title contending NBA factory. So, all that means our $18-20M budget couldn't go very far and we've still got roster questions. Also, there is a chance we could have made some player selection errors on top of that. I'm not sure... hard to tell. TBD. Anyways, we need to get on the track of doing a good job with scouting/dev/retention. Without that we have no chance, even if you give the staff top-10 money for the roster each year.

Come on. We're borderline top-10 roster spend in CFB and something like #7-10 in MBB. BY FAR the main driver of revenue for an athletic dept is the football stadium. And ours is about half the size of the big boys, a HUGE disadvantage. Yet our roster spend in FB and MBB is right there with the biggest athletic depts. That's thanks to our donors. We are giving basketball plenty of money, especially for how much they've stunk. Sometimes I worry we're giving MBB too much money... send it to Cig? We need the damn staff to use it wisely. Depth is only going to come from scouting/development/retention -- IU along with almost every other school cannot buy it. We'll see if this staff can do it. I'm worried, but it's possible they figure it out.

On a related note, I was listening to some podcast where some IU people mentioned Indiana being open to new "rivals" now that we're good at football. That got me thinking... I don't think a new rivalry will happen. It's not a bad thing, but here is the reasoning: What makes for a strong rivalry in college sports? 1) The game matters even if both teams are bad 2) The rivalry permeates all sports, not just one 3) Both schools generally agree it's a rivalry Schools only have bandwidth for a main rival, a secondary rival, and somewhat rarely a tertiary rival. IU obviously has Purdue. We care about games vs. them even when the teams stink, and we care about whatever we play them in. UK is our secondary rival. It's been weakened with the hiatus, but I think factors #1 and #2 are there, though far less than PU. Sorry Illinois, you're not a rival, see factor #3. If we stay good at football, things are going to keep heating up with the football schools in conference. While I think the familiarity of being in the same conference as those schools for 100+ years will drive significant interest, great crowds, and plenty of jabbing... we've seen it happen already, it would take a lot for an actual new rivalry to be born. The reason being if we stunk again people would quicky not care (factor #1). And IU being good at football will likely not make, say, IU vs OSU in soccer, any more meaningful (factor #2). I suppose if we stay good at football for another 10-15 years (Cig's tenure and we keep it up post-Cig), maybe we become a tertiary rival for OSU or UM or whoever. I just think it's hard to form a new legitimate rivalry. It takes a lot of friction to start a long-burning rivalry fire. Anyways, this is a pointless analysis of the definition of "rivalry," but that's what message boards are for.

Fisch and Hoover.

True. There are few other interesting aspects here in my view. 1) This happened because the Big 12 went to federal court with a strong case it could enforce its bylaws. And the Big 12 did this because TTU and their TX Attorney General pal preemptively threatened the Big 12. The Big 12 put TTU in an chokehold and TTU tapped out. Pretty funny. 2) As the saying goes, when you're in a hole, the first thing you need to do is stop digging. I guess TTU did that. But before they stopped they dug quite the hole with their approach of terrible letters and videos. Not good for the TTU #brand. 3) One thing Brendan emerges with from all this is all sorts of goofy diagnoses. Now he's got a gambling "addiction" and TTU found a doctor to say he has panic attacks and anxiety problems. He's now got to explain that all away to NFL teams. Maybe that's easy to do, maybe not. I'm not absolving Brendan, but it sure seems like TTU only cared about what could get him eligible and not what the other consequences may be. Kinda throws into question the "support" TTU provided. Anyways, this whole thing sure sums up college sports in 2026.

Pavia is no. As in never ever would I want him in the locker room inevitably becoming a distraction. If I interviewed Sorsby and he was honest and contrite, I would be good to give him another shot. What he did is worthy of a one year suspension, but not a lifetime ban. My view is he enjoys gambling, but it’s not some serious addiction. His average bet was small and it didn’t affect his finances or daily life. His big error was he didn’t take the gambling rules seriously. Which, is worthy of penalty but not a lifetime ban. Sorsby also has the size and skills to be a serviceable third string QB in the NFL. Maybe second string if he develops.

Haha, OG has been celebrating. Can’t be having these guys booked on morning shows.

Haha. Does she have eligibility?

3*. Not the biggest offer list, but Cig sees something and that’s enough!

Big invite.

Another great video from IUFB.

Yea the Lakers won’t be hitting many threes, which will be a new concept to them. But the Aces will have a tough time on offense vs quite a bit more athletic defenders. I dunno, I see much lower level men do well vs women CBB and WNBA players… bball is a rough game for the athleticism gap.