Technical Tidbits 1/13: A super early top-25 and a big weekend ahead for Tech football

This weekend is shaping up to be one of the biggest for Paul Johnson and the rest of the coaching staff, with eight current commits all slated to make their visits to the Flats. It sounds like the eight players wanted to get together and meet one another before officially enrolling at Tech, a decision which will hopefully strengthen the close-knit culture we’ve seen at Tech over the past few years. Joining the current commits will be three-star linebacker Kendric Haynes and wide receiver Michael Smith, two of Tech’s biggest remaining targets as signing day moves nearer. Ideally those two will get to spend some time with the commits and current members of the team to help sway their opinions.

In some other recruiting news, the Jackets had two of the biggest commits of the 2017 class enroll early when defensive backs Jaytlin Askew and Gentry Bonds finalized their decisions earlier this week. The official Georgia Tech website sure can cherry-pick with the best of them, citing two separate recruiting sources that have each of Askew and Bonds as either three or four-star prospects depending on which you look at. I’m more inclined to believe the Rivals rankings, which have Bonds as the higher-rated of the two, but ESPN giving Askew a four-star rating is a testament to his talent. Whether or not the talented duo takes a redshirt this season remains to be seen, but Tech’s returning depth in the secondary leads me to believe that at least one almost certainly will.

It has now been about three days since the end of the 2016 season, just enough time for us to make responsible conjectures about the top-25 that we’ll see at the start of next season. The odds of that poll being right are roughly zero, but there are a few interesting things to point out.

If Clemson finishes this season No. 13, something has gone horribly wrong. They are going to lose a lot of talent, but that program is still in very good shape.

They phrase this as if Eason wasn’t the starter for the entirety of the 2016 season minus the first half of the first game. Against an absurdly weak schedule, he completed just 55% of his passes and finished with a raw QBR of 51.1. Justin Thomas, for reference, finished with a raw QBR of 69.2.

Stop. The logic here is that their division is so weak that they would have to absolutely suck in order to not win a few games. It just doesn’t make any sense.