So by now we've all seen that the Frogs 2010 recruiting class has been finalized - I am assuming Ethan Grant will be part of it - with only one hiccup. This currently places us 46th in the Rivals rankings, behind conference rivals BYU and Utah. It's always disappointing to see your class finish below a conference rival, let alone two, but, as we all know, these rankings are increasingly arbitrary, and it's not like unheralded recruiting classes have kept us out of the BCS discussion or anything. So, let's be pleased with what we DO have and start taking a look at the 2010 commits.
I'll go ahead and get things kicked off with Quarterback Matt Brown out of Allen, the 11th ranked dual threat QB in this year's class, according to Rivals. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find too much on the kid on Youtube, but for those of you who are interested, here is the beginning of a long stream of videos that comprise the entirety of the Allen/Longview - hey! I went there! - game from this year. It ended up being Allen's only regular season loss, but seeing as how Longview was the state runner up in 4A and is now being shifted back into 5A, it's not as bad of a loss as you might think. Allen would eventually lose in the third round of the 5A Division 1 playoffs to Arlington Bowie, but not before knocking off Southlake Carroll in the second round.
Brown, as most of you know, was originally committed to the University of Arizona, but when Offensive Coordinator Sonny Dykes left to become the head coach at Louisiana Tech, he reopened his commitment and ultimately chose the Frogs. Perhaps it's because I watched the premiere of Lost last night, so I'm all into how fate has a way of intervening in people's lives, but Matt Brown's situation does raise some ironic points: Tennessee HC Lane Kiffin leaves to become the coach at USC, which causes TCU to go into a panic because Patterson seems to be a very viable candidate for the opening. Patterson then denies the opening, which causes Tennessee to have to go with a lower level choice in Louisiana Tech HC Derek Dooley. Tech then announces the hiring of Sonny Dykes exactly one day after Dykes and Arizona Coach Mike Stoops met with Matt Brown, where they made no mention of Dyke's interest in the LT job. Brown, feeling deceived, pulls his commitment and signs with TCU. So, ultimately, we have Lane Kiffin to thank for all of this, and, in a circular way, he helped himself out by causing a conference rival to lose a major commit. My brain hurts...
After that tangent though, perhaps I should get to the matter at hand which is assessing what Matt Brown will mean for the Frogs. Now, I'll be completely open and honest - I'm not an expert on this kind of stuff, nor do I follow much Texas High school football outside of Longview, so I can't honestly sit here and pretend like I know a lot about the kids. However, I do have access to a Rivals account and I like watching sub-2 minute highlight videos at work, so I can at least give you the narrow analysis that provides.
On the surface, Matt Brown is going to receive a lot of comparisons to former Frogs QB Jeff Ballard. He's not a huge kid - 6'1", 185 - so he's going to get on some of those Colt McCoy caliber performance enhancing drugs to build muscle, but what he lacks in size he more than makes up for in quickness. He doesn't have a cannon of an arm - or at least in his highlights, he doesn't throw the ball more than about 15-20 yards on any given play - but he's precise at short routes which should aid him in the Anderson/Fuente offense. There's obviously a gap in competition when running the ball against high school defenses versus college, so it's hard to say he'll be a major success when he has to make plays with his feet, but I think he has as good of a chance as anyone to be one of those guys. The biggest drawback I could see was that he leaves a little too much air under his throws and most division 1 cornerbacks are entirely capable of taking advantage of that, but this can definitely be corrected over time. This seems to be the guy everyone is the most excited about, and I don't think he'll disappoint.
The obvious situation here is that Brown is going to have to come in and compete with Casey Pachall for a starting role down the road, but I kind of see this playing out like the Dalton/Pachall situation where Brown will obviously take a redshirt year to get acclimated then be ready to go when his time comes. He doesn't have Pachall's 6-5, 210 lb frame, and Casey is definitely every bit of the athlete Brown is, but I think once he pays his dues he can be a highly successful starter for the Frogs.
Welcome Aboard, Matt!
