Eleven Warriors

Squirrel, I believe it's Hoke's policy that no commit may visit elsewhere.  If they do, they no longer have a scholarship offer from scUM.  I would be surprised if that isn't the case with Gareon.

JRich, wouldn't David Dawson actually be the first test?

To me, this just screams that more kids are leaving during the off season then we're expecting. With our needs at OL, LB and S I wouldn't think the staff would be taking another CB even though he has the potential to play WR as well.

I've heard a few people say he's leaning towards Oregon (claiming they [those saying he's leaning towards Oregon] know him, his coach, etc.) because he has family out west, and because he felt insulted by the late offer, but I'd take it with a grain of salt. I'd think if he's willing to visit OSU he's at least considering us. Same with Dawson. Would love to nab both.

And Dymonte Thomas while we're at it hahah. Not gonna happen, but a man can dream.

I love poaching.

love it.    come see what you're missing.   Then decide not to miss it at all! 

I've said before that Hoke's policy is going to bite him in the ass because he is in a no-win situation here...

He pulls Conley's scholarship and it looks like he is trying to control where recruits can or can't visit. Sure it is a sound policy but it doesn't give recruits assurance. If i was a recruit I'd like to hear a coach say, "we want you here and we're confident we're the best school for you, do what you have to do, we'll be here"

If he doesn't pull Conley's offer, he's made an exception to his rule and either every recruit gets this option and it was a line of bs or he is showing unfair treatment to recruits.

Conely and Dawson standing next to Dorian Johnson, James Quick and Trey Johnson on OSU Sidelines Nov.24 wearing OSU gear and watching OSU play hard= awesome.

@OSU07ASU10,

So either way TSUN and Hoke are screwed. It's a good day. :)

I can completely understand Hoke's philosophy, but concede it has its drawbacks. To ask a kid for a "commitment" works both ways. He's saying that Michigan is committed to the player as well. The real test of whether this will be a philosophy that works will be seen soon as we drift closer to NSD and Michigan continues to hold onto or lose players. I think he'll hang on to most. If not, I'm guessing they'll re-examine. It has definitely been put to the test in a year that saw UM get so many early recruits.

I still like it better than how kids commit, flip, decommit, and then commit somewhere else in the SEC and ACC. The "Latest News" sidebar on Rivals is embarrassing to look at somedays with all of the movement.

^High. Once Michigan rescinds it's us and Oregon, with his home state having a big pull.

The policy is that he will lose his commitment, not his offer, if he takes an official visit elsewhere. Either way, the odds of him being a Wolverine would be almost gone. The reason it's never looked like that's the policy is because they've had to deal with this stuff very little and when they have the recruit in question (Dawson, Pharoah Brown) have been dishonest with the coaching staff regarding potential visits, etc. 

Michigan's policy is what it is; there are advantages to it and disadvantages. Regardless of what it is, if Conley wanted to be a Wolverine, he would be. If he doesn't, he won't. 

The thing I don't like about it is that it puts them in a corner in regards to recruiting other players. All their DB eggs are now in the McQuay basket and if they miss on him (relatively likely) they'll fill the spot with someone who probably hasn't been offered yet. I'm not a big fan of them not leaving other options relatively open in case something like this happens. 

Conley is alot better of a player than what ppl think. I remember when he commited to UM, ppl said "OSU didnt need him", "OSU dosnt want him", "He's not OSU material", "UM can have him", & just the fact that the ppl that scout Ohio the best, guys from scoutingohio.com & jjhuddle.com are both very high on him & both sites believe Conley & Burrows are neck and neck as a top corner.

the ppl at scoutingohio & jjhuddle know the talent in Ohio better than everyone else as they see these kids every friday night unlike these National recruiting sites.

I agree with them & I hope that Meyer can pull him in. Having Corners like Woodard, Conley, Burrows & the possibility of Burrows going to Safety with Thompson already at safety with the chance of adding Vonn Bell & Chris Worley would make one hell of a DB class that is already very solid prolly top 5 in the Nation for 2013. Darron Lee could end up at Safety also, & Worley could end up at LB if not Safety like Lee as I see Worley being in this class no matter what.

@TennBuckeye, AFAIK it's an official visit policy. It hasn't been tested "unofficially" if you get my drift. 

The reactions to Dawson and Conley will be very different. I think most M fans have already conceded that Conley is gone and are hoping he at least ends up in Oregon. Also, Dawson was real vocal about his love for Michigan for months after committing, but has done a complete 180 and I think it turned a lot of fans off, whether that's right or wrong. 

Conley has been quiet ever since he committed. I did a short interview with him months ago. He said he grew up a Michigan fan. He also prefers basketball to football. He'd be a bigger loss because of his high ceiling; he's only played football for a couple years. 

starting to see the reality of the effects of a 9 & 0 season, couple with Michigan not meeting expectations....and 12 & 0 is a reality --- certainly can't hurt recruiting

michigans policy is horrible. most coaches take the approach of go ahead visit every where see what the world has to offer. you want the kid to want to be there. telling him if you commit here and visit else where your out is asinine.

@Tremendous: "Dawson's reaction has been interesting. The belief is that he was misleading both the Michigan and Florida coaches, hence the lack of a commitment upon his trip to Gainesville last weekend."

Maybe he's just an 18 year old kid who's still trying to make up his mind? Don't know why it has to be deception lol. If I was making a decision that could affect the rest of my life, I might flip flop a bit as well--seems like people forget that too often with recruiting. And it's not like decieving people would even get a recruit anywhere, outside of a bigger raise in pay for play SEC country.

@LLJJGG 

I'm not arguing one way or the other; I'm just telling you what the rumor was.

He showed interest in Florida over the summer, talked to the coaches, told him he was solid and that he wouldn't visit. This entire time, he was still attempting to set up visits to Gainesville. 

RDubs is right, really. The policies between the two schools really aren't very different; Michigan has just been unfortunate to deal with a couple commitments who might change their mind. The staff has told many recruits to take visits before committing. 

LLJJGG - You forgot about Mike McCray too! !!!

You take Bell no matter what

^^^@DALLAS, absolutely...there is no way that we tell Bell that there's no room for him. He will have a spot on the roster unless he chooses otherwise. I'm not very confident that we will land him though. Gotta get him to campus. Although, Tennessee sucks right now and Dooley probably will be coaching JV football sometime in the near future..

I am really twisted on this.. If we are supposed to be getting Dawson, Dorian Johnson, and now Conley that leaves probably 2 spots left. Most people seem to agree a spot needs to be saved for Bell. That means with only 1 spot left you can only take 1 player out of Quick, Mitchell, McMillan, Timmons, Elder, North, etc.

Most of the experts on the recruiting have the Bucks getting a class of around 24-25 now. There are supposedly more guys leaving the program than we imagined (specifically I read in the Boarding House on 247 that Tommy Brown and Blake Thomas are two potentials). I'm not too worried about numbers right now.

I could see Tommy Brown going.  Maybe O'Connor depending on how serious this knee injury. Tanner is another thought.  Could Thomas go to ND? Pretty sure they recruited him hard.

I just wanted to thank Hail and Tremendous for clarifying Hoke's policy.

No problem.  Steve (Tremendous) has A LOT more information than I do. 

Over on TOS it appears that a Massilon coach thinks Conley is Oregon's to lose. He isn't a make or break the class kind of guy, but I'd love to have him. He is a solid corner and seems to be a pretty decent reciever as well. Plus its always nice to take one (or two) from the guys up north

I love it!  Let the excuses begin TTUN fans...we love that as much as stealing your recruits;-)

I'm going to assume before it's said that Hoke and TTUN didn't want Dawson and Conley right...??? ;-)  Gotta love it.

Heard on tos that conley is visiting TOSU Friday so we will see!!!

Gareon is from Massilon Ohio. I never really looked at Massilon as the type of place that a Michigan recruit would come from honestly. It just seems like a whole world away from Ann Arbor. I've spent every summer in Newcomerstown Ohio, where Woody Hayes played center for the high school. You go through Massilon to get there, & once you reach Massilon you know you're almost in Newcomerstown. It's all Ohio State country, everything around there has a scarlet & grey feel to it if you ask me. In other words: that's just pure Ohio down there. With his home state team being 10-0, & Michigan's loss to Bama being possibly the biggest reason the BIG is made fun of, I would stay home if I was him. I'm only 20, so I consider myself only a few years removed from the age where a kid would be recruited. And although I haven't been a recruit, that's just how I would look at it. But that's just my opinion

With his home state team being 10-0, & Michigan's loss to Bama being possibly the biggest reason the BIG is made fun of, I would stay home if I was him.

I get what you're saying, but you do realize a.) the Big Ten is super weak this year and thus should be made fun of, b.) the bigger problem with UM is that they've already lost 3 games this year, and c.)Ohio State kinda got the whole Big Ten laughingstock ball rolling by losing back to back National Championship games to SEC teams, right? 

So, would Conley mean the end of the Worley courtship? I know we keep space open for Vonn Bell regardless, but I don't think the same applies to Worley and can't imagine us having space for possibly three more DBs in this class (with Conley, Worley, and Bell). I'd be interested to see how others want Meyer to play this one, especially since Bell wants to commit in early December (as least from what I know). I think either Worley/Conley, wait for Bell, and use it for something else if he goes Tenn or Bama.

I can see Conley going all Chris Gamble two way style. How do you think Urban snatched this delicious morsel from going down Hoke's gullet? With Urban promises, that's how!

Get him...I'd love the TSUNers to have to eat a little crow with all the bragging they do about how well Hoke recruits in Ohio.

@DMCDougal24 - Urban already has if you remember a year ago and the Brionte Dunn recruitment.

@DMC, I would agree with Hail, and believe that the Michigan staff has done some work on the the Conley situation.  Unfortunately for Michigan, recruiting is in a NCAA mandated quiet period right now, which ties the coaches hands a little bit on what they can do.  The current quiet period is for the months of August, September, October, and November.

Please see the NCAA definition of a quiet period below. (link will follow for your convenience)
During a quiet period a college coach may not have face-to-face contact with college-bound student-athletes or their parents, and may not watch student-athletes compete or visit their high schools. Coaches may write or telephone college-bound student-athletes or their parents during this time.

http://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/public/NCAA/Eligibility/Becoming+Eligible/Recruiting  (In the FAQs)

Now you might be asking, if the above is true, how can the tOSU coaches be on the road recruiting right now?  Well, it's because nothing related to the NCAA is ever simple.  The August - November quiet period has an exception, wich is below.

(a) August 1 through November 24, 2012, [except for (1) below]:  Quiet Period

(1) 42 evaluation days (54 for U.S. service academies) (see Bylaw 13.02.6.2) during the months of September, October and November, (not to exceed a period of 42 days) selected at the discretion of the institution and designated in writing in the office of the director of athletics; authorized off-campus recruiters shall not visit a prospective student-athlete’s educational institution on more than one calendar day during this period: Evaluation Period

http://www.ncaa.org/wps/wcm/connect/public/NCAA/Resources/Recruiting+Calendars/2012-13/2012-13+NCAA+Division+I+Football+Recruiting+Calendar

So the simplified version of the above is that college coaching staffs may call, write, and only visit a player's school once from September 2012 to November 2012.  So since we know Hoke visited  Conley's school during Michigan's bye week the last week of September to see both Conley and Nathaniel Devers, Michigan coaches are currently unable to visit him again to discuss him wanting to take visits.

Ok, so the Michigan coaches can't visit, but they could call or write.  Shouldn't they be doing that?  Fair enough, they could be doing more, but at the same time, Conley has been talking about taking other visits since September at least, maybe even a little sooner.  I don't remember the specific timeline, but the point is, since it has been more than two months since Conley started talking about taking visits, I'm sure there were very thourough conversations between him and the coaching staff previously as far as what that would mean.  Remember, Conley cancelled a visit to Cincinnati after first discussing it with Michigan's coaches.  I'm sure Hoke and the coaching staff don't feel it is necessary to keep rehashing the visit scenario with the kid. At the end of the day, they know Conley will do what he wants to do, make the decision he feels he must make, and the ball is in his court to notify the Michigan coaches of his decision.  Right now, they might feel Conley just needs some space to make his decision without feeling pressured from them.  From all accounts, this staff is upfront and low pressure.  They also are just a phone call away, so if Conley really wanted to know his true status, he could call them.  My guess is that for multiple potential reasons, that is a phone call he currently doesn't want to make.  I don't blame him. 

My current guess on his status is that his spot in the class is still held until he a) calls the coaches to inform them he is going to visit another school  at which time he will be considered decommited but may still have an offer or b) he visits another school at which time he will be considered decommitted (duh) and his offer will be pulled.

Hail and Steve (Tremendous), if you disagree with any of the above, I would be interested to hear your thoughts. 

I have to admit, I love that here on 11W we can have a civil conversation with Hail and Tremendous (a mgoblog writer).  You have to admit Tremendous if Alex came over to Mgo and started writing posts on threads, we both know how well that'd go over, and yet, here you are on 11W and we're being civil.  Says a lot about the 11W community and we appreciate your contributions to the site from the TSUN perspective and hope to see you commenting on threads more often.

@Hail

With Max Redfield's decommitment from USC, everything I've heard sounds like USC is the new favorite for McQuay, as they previously were full in the secondary. Not to mention Jalen Ramsey appears to be looking around as well so that could be another USC DB headed elsewhere. IMO that's where McQuay ends up. Still believe you guys get Treadwell and I'd say 50/50 on Green

I am in no way a Hoke apologist, but in his defense, do you know how hard it is to win @ Ball State and San Diego State? I would venture to say it's more difficult to win there than Bowling Green & Utah. 

^"...Bowling Green...boring places that suck."
Disagree.
 

@Buck-I 8 I'd actually argue that Salt Lake City is a Hell of a lot better than San Diego, and there is a shit ton to do there as well. I do however agree with your observations on BG and Ball State. 

Urban for the win.