Fax machines are often slow, outdated and unreliable.
But on the first Wednesday of February every year, fax machines are the most important thing in the world to football programs throughout the country.
Twenty-one commits (19 high school seniors and two junior college transfers) faxed their Letters of Intent to Peden Stadium on Wednesday to complete the 2017 recruiting class. It was a recruiting class that added depth to the offense and helped re-vamp the defensive line and secondary.
But for now, the big takeaway is just that: big.
“They’re physically, maybe, more ready than some classes in general," coach Frank Solich, who just finished his 12th season with the Bobcats, said. "You look at those offensive and defensive linemen, they’re ready to participate right now in terms of their strength. Guys in this class, we don’t need to put on a lot of weight, get them a lot of strength, take weight off, they’re pretty, well, game-ready. That’s gonna serve them in playing early.”
Ohio signed five offensive linemen and four defensive linemen in the 2017 class. No lineman is smaller than Kaieem Caesar, who is 6-foot-2, 260 pounds. Samson Jackson, at 6-foot-6, 285 pounds, is the tallest.
The Bobcats have set themselves up for the future, and maybe even the present, with behemoths up front — a staple of any Solich football team. The defensive line, aided tremendously by late commit and three-star tackle Marcus Coleman, is especially tall and athletic.
"Seems to me you can’t have enough depth on both the offensive and defensive lines," Solich said. "One of the things that was valuable to us this past year was we were too deep on the defensive line, so our guys were able to play hard the entire time they were on the field and not miss a beat."
Ohio recruited an "Albanian Bear" to serve as the big man paving the way up front, but there weren't just linemen that made this class stand out. The Bobcats recruited seven players from Florida and, in total, covered 10 states and even one Canadian province — Ontario. Only two players committed from the state of Ohio: Brevin Harris, a wide receiver, and Tariq Drake, a cornerback.
“We always start in Ohio, and we always will," recruiting coordinator Brian Haines said. "If you look at the MAC the past two years in general, there’s 35 to 40 from the state of Ohio that have gone to the MAC, where the previous four, it was up around 65 to 70. Overall numbers are just declining.”
For Haines and the Bobcats, it's not a matter of selective recruitment, it's just where the recruits hail from.
“We have six coaches in Ohio, then we break it up and go down to Florida," Haines continued. "We hit the camps there hard, Florida, Georgia, Oklahoma. Where there’s good talent, you’ve got to put people there.”
To try and replace Sebastian Smith, Jordan Reid and Kyle Belack, the Bobcats added four wide receivers: Harris, Willie Cherry (early enrollee), KJ Minter and Isiah Cox.
In addition to two quarterbacks, Drew Keszei and Nathan Rourke, Ohio also added a running back, Julian Ross. Twelve of the 21 commits are on the offensive side of the ball.
“We do a ton of evaluation, from talking to their high school coaches, to teachers, to watching them in camps to see these guys prior to summer," Solich said. "Then you see them on film. We’ve been around for a little bit. We’re pretty good evaluating guys off of film. We put our own star system on them.”
For a class being hailed in the program as a home run, it's important to put in context that not all 21 players will compete right away. All 21 players may not even start in their four years here.
Solich may not outlast the current class, but its lasting legacy might be big-maulers, as it looks in 2017. Or maybe a few years down the line, they'll be remembered for something far different and far more important.
