If you’re wondering how the prospects of Georgia’s February signing day are shaping up, yesterday’s de-commitment by Aaron Brule seems like a significant tell.
While Brule will re-open his recruitment, the Bulldogs — still boasting the No. 1 class in the country — will do the same and pursue a number of priority targets to fill out their class.
The 6-foot-1, 205-pound Brule, who hails from Archbishop Rummel in Metairie, La., had been the fifth-lowest-rated signee or commit in Georgia’s class at the end of the early signing period.
It appears that Kirby is hunting bigger game.
Ranked the nation’s No. 409 overall prospect and No. 13 overall recruit in Louisiana by the 247Sports Composite Rankings, it is not known whether Brule projects as a safety or linebacker at the next level. The split could be an amicable one as Georgia is in the mix for several defenders such as five-star cornerbacks Tyson Campbell and Isaac Taylor-Stuart and could be looking to flip four-star linebackers Quay Walker or Otis Reese. With as few as four total spots remaining in the class, the Bulldogs’ coaching staff will have to be very selective in who they pursue.
The inn is getting pretty full.
Get The Picture 
This sounds an awful lot like the kid was runnoft to me. Am I wrong?
LikeLike
I’ll admit this is the part of recruiting I hate. I assume the kid shut it down on his side after committing to Georgia. Now he pretty much has to start over again. This situation is a big positive of the ESP for the prospective S-A. He gets the word now rather than in another month when he is truly scrambling to find a spot to land. Best of luck to the young man in his future football and academic career.
LikeLike
This is a good point I hadn’t really thought of…. the fact that the ESP gives kids more time to consider other options when teams cut them loose in view of a “better” prospect.
Yeah, I hope he still gets a shot at a great program.
LikeLike
Well yeah, it makes it easier on the kid to find someplace else to go. But it also means that Kirby offered the kid a scholarship, the kid accepted by committing to Georgia, then Kirby backed out when the kid tried to sign on signing day. If that is what happened how do you feel about that?
LikeLike
How do you know the terms of what Kirby offered?
LikeLiked by 1 person
He doesn’t. But jumping to conclusions on imperfect information is so fun.
LikeLike
Do you understand the meaning of the word “if?” I don’t know what the terms of the offer were. Do you? My question was, and is, IF the kid was offered a scholarship and was going to take it (he did commit, didn’t he?) and IF the offer was taken back on signing day and the kid wasn’t allowed to sign, how do Jared and the other posters on this blog feel about that? Is that OK with them? Is that OK with YOU now, Bluto? You sure have blasted a lot of other coaches, particularly Saban, for that kind of thing for years. Try giving a straight answer to my question instead of obfuscation.
LikeLike
The sentence I quoted didn’t contain the word “if” in it.
And now you write, “IF the kid was offered a scholarship and was going to take it (he did commit, didn’t he?) and IF the offer was taken back on signing day and the kid wasn’t allowed to sign…”, which sounds like you are still starting from the position that Smart’s offer was unconditional.
I wasn’t accusing you of anything, just asking how you knew what Smart had promised the kid when the offer was extended.
Sensitive much?
LikeLike
BTW, Mayor, as far as straight answers go, I think I already did that in this post.
LikeLike
The post about Carter was a good post. Also, I’m not sensitive… much. 😉
LikeLike
Is that really what happened though? I admit to have no inside knowledge of how the sausage is made, but the general consensus seems to be that coaches make it clear to these recruits that this is a definite possibility before they commit. This strikes me as plausible, if nothing else for the fact that word would get around pretty quickly if a coach was being deceptive, and I couldn’t see that coach having much success in the relationship-driven world of recruiting for very long. As long as there is honesty and clear expectations from both sides, I don’t personally have an issue with it.
That said, I do think there needs to be some avenue for student athletes to get proper representation during the recruiting process. Coaches and schools have an enormous advantage, and I think you would see a lot less of this kind of thing if players were allowed representation.
LikeLike
Elite schools have an enormous advantage.
Best description i heard of the early signing period is that it forces both player and school to take an honest assessment of where they are in the hierarchy of their peers.
LikeLike
Is the kid ripping Kirby or UGA anywhere? If he has no real beef, why should I?
LikeLike
Unlike some others, Mayor, I see where you asked “If that is what happened…”, sounding to me that you are not assuming that it IS what happened.
To answer your question, if that’s the way it went down, I don’t like it one bit.
If, on the other hand, the UGA recruiters were crystal clear up front that this could happen, then so be it.
LikeLike
^Finally…a man who can read.
LikeLike
I’m sure that commitment had contingencies that had to be met before he could actually sign….
LikeLike
GO DAWGS! GATA. #RAREBREED18
For the record. I was born in ’83. And this is, by far, the most fun I’ve ever had during a college football season. From the utter domination of lesser opponents to the ultimate revenge game and SEC Title in Atlanta against the tigers/wareagles/plainsmen (not to mention the utter incidental implosion of UT and UF this year)….. now watching a team have a chance at making history against a blue-blood program (and playing them for the first time!) in The Rose Bowl Game in which we haven’t played since the historic ’43 trip…… and now pulling down 5-star (and many 4-star) recruits left and right like we’ve got some sort of elite recruit magnet (which we do in elite recruiters…..) It’s nuts.
Thanks, Kirby! Now don’t go ruining it by incurring some weird NCAA sanctions down the road.
(I know, I know…..I’m still in the habit of waiting for the other shoe to drop.)
LikeLike
He had at least 5 major schools plus others looking at him at time he decommitted.
LikeLike
According to the article, he has offers from three SEC programs (Arkansas, Mississippi State, and Tennessee) and three other solid programs (Oklahoma State, Texas, and TCU). He’ll probably have a better chance to start at all of those schools, especially the Arkansas and Tennessee. Brule will be okay.
LikeLike
I hope he finds a school he feels good about. I hate this part of recruiting.
LikeLike
Nobody has benefited from the ESP more than Kirby & Co. Is there any doubt left out there that we’ll land 4 or more studs in February? No DTs are listed above, but my bet is that we get one of the top available, along with at least 2 of the targets listed. This may be the recruiting class of all time.
LikeLike
Some of us may have guilty consciences after blogging of the hypocrisy other major programs have shown during recruiting. Mixed with that is a little greed to fill the last four (?) slots with two 5-stars plus two 4-stars in the place of four 3-stars. What does that say about our deification of 3-stars that pan out and how we shouldn’t view them as weaker than 4- and 5-star players when there is so much athleticism that we see that can be coached up in those players? All of a sudden, if I’m one of the three that have signed a LOI, I don’t feel so swell.
Methinks that we posters don’t like the view in the mirror after supplying perceived self-efficacious remarks concerning our sensitivity towards players’ lives. Brules’s remarks may have tripped the conscientious remarks trap door that many of us smugly set up when posting here.
LikeLike
mehh. I think Georgia is an elite program, reserved for elite athletes. As a soon to be (or already) young adult, best take an honest assessment of your skill level and determine whether you want to be the trophy wife for the Mississippis and Arkansas’s of the world or UGA’s nice looking side piece. That’s life in the big leagues
LikeLike
I am in agreement with not liking this part of recruiting. It has been going on at UGA and all major football schools. But, the ESP is working for Brule. If UGA had kept him and he signed, then what are the chances he would even get in games? With the kind of talent Kirby is bringing in, not very good. Now Brule can go to a school and have a better shot at playing and perhaps be a starter. Might go on to be a superstar and gain NFL status. Chances of that are diminished if he is not given this chance.
LikeLike
I expect we see a couple more of the 3 stars not sent papers to sign will be doing same shortly. Having looked at other schools (bama) doing it looked a little shady, but new way of doing business now.
LikeLike
“…but new way of doing business now.”
semiprofessional. 1 : engaging in an activity for pay or gain but not as a full-time occupation. 2 : engaged in by semiprofessional players.
LikeLike
Seems a real live example of a player being “Billy Bobbed”. But the ESP did just what it should do, made both sides have straight look into each other’s eye and have an honest conversation….and doing so with 5 weeks left for each side to achieve their goals. There doesn’t have to be a loser.
Does it have an edge to it? Sure, it is a big boy world and this is an adult situation. No trophies for not making the grade. Had this been the old system with everything happening in one day in February, this would have been that dirty deal where someone was going to get screwed. This way, there is some time for both to land on their feet.
LikeLike