Stars - it has to be asked

Keep this to QBs for now.



Who are the most highly touted QB recruits coming out of high school that BYU has ever landed.

It was not Steve Young. Jim McMahon couldn't get a sniff from Notre Dame where he wanted to go. It was not Ty Detmer - he was too small. It was not Sark. He had to go JC and work his way up. It was not Carter, Sheide, Nielson, or Wilson. Not Doman. It certainly was not Beck - too small again. Hall had some Danny White lineage, but even that did not get him a bunch of stars iirc.



I will name a few that I recall



Benedict Olsen - clear #1 pick and it was not a down year

Jake Heaps - #1 pick by most but in a down year

Paul Shoemaker - never lost a game in high school

Steve Clements - highly touted QB - lefty - transferred from Texas

Larry King - or was it his nephew - not sure how many stars

Others - long forgotten



Keep it to 4 stars. Where are they now? Where will Heaps end up? This is why I expect players to show it on the field before I get all giddy.

What highly touted BYU recruit at QB have I missed - add them whether they were great or not so.



Makes you wonder how many Brandon Doman's got buried and nit developed while waiting for the high potential guys to develop.



I have a theory - sometimes guys that enroll a year late in school to get a little edge, or that have resources to go to camp upon camp and get private trainers peak in high school and although way ahead of peers at that point, have no more upside. Just a theory.



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The book is not written on Jake Heaps. I know for a lot of you it is but for the coaches and the rest of us it is not. He is struggling right now, there is no argument about that, but he is not done yet and should not be benched because the offensive coaches have not prepared our offense to be successful yet. Give it a couple more weeks and if the rest of the offense is playing better ie the Oline is blocking well and the run game is working, then I will jump on the bench heaps bandwagon. Everyone keeps using examples like Texas benching their starter to get to the guy who will win them games and Brandon doman being sat until he was used as a last resort and found out to be a diamond in the rough. We don't have a McCoy or Doman behind Heaps, we just don't. Heaps is the guy and deservedly so. the problem this year is not Heaps, it is coaching, once our rookie coaches get this figured out, Heaps will play up to expectations.

Berry and Munns were highly rated I believe.

Nelson was a parade all-american. I don't recall how many stars he had.

frdbtr wrote:
The book is not written on Jake Heaps. I know for a lot of you it is but for the coaches and the rest of us it is not. He is struggling right now, there is no argument about that, but he is not done yet and should not be benched because the offensive coaches have not prepared our offense to be successful yet. Give it a couple more weeks and if the rest of the offense is playing better ie the Oline is blocking well and the run game is working, then I will jump on the bench heaps bandwagon. Everyone keeps using examples like Texas benching their starter to get to the guy who will win them games and Brandon doman being sat until he was used as a last resort and found out to be a diamond in the rough. We don't have a McCoy or Doman behind Heaps, we just don't. Heaps is the guy and deservedly so. the problem this year is not Heaps, it is coaching, once our rookie coaches get this figured out, Heaps will play up to expectations.

My book on Heaps is not written. This is a question about stars on QB recruits and how it has worked out historically. Try not to Jack the thread. There are bunches of other threads to debate why Jake Heaps is or is not meeting expectations.



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Wickchad84087 wrote:
Berry and Munns were highly rated I believe.

Nelson was a parade all-american. I don't recall how many stars he had.

There was a lot of excitement about Lark and Munns - I just don't recall the star count. I recall posters here saying Lark or Munns had 4.



The great BYU QBs generally had 0-2.



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Cougarbib2 wrote:

The book is not written on Jake Heaps. I know for a lot of you it is but for the coaches and the rest of us it is not. He is struggling right now, there is no argument about that, but he is not done yet and should not be benched because the offensive coaches have not prepared our offense to be successful yet. Give it a couple more weeks and if the rest of the offense is playing better ie the Oline is blocking well and the run game is working, then I will jump on the bench heaps bandwagon. Everyone keeps using examples like Texas benching their starter to get to the guy who will win them games and Brandon doman being sat until he was used as a last resort and found out to be a diamond in the rough. We don't have a McCoy or Doman behind Heaps, we just don't. Heaps is the guy and deservedly so. the problem this year is not Heaps, it is coaching, once our rookie coaches get this figured out, Heaps will play up to expectations.

My book on Heaps is not written. This is a question about stars on QB recruits and how it has worked out historically. Try not to Jack the thread. There are bunches of other threads to debate why Jake Heaps is or is not meeting expectations.



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Yes, but the entire tone of your post was "how long are we going to go with the pretty boy until we get to the less rated backups that will be our Brandon Doman." Don't give me the "thread Jack" crap.

As far as 2002-present is concerned, scout.com still has all the rankings for the recruits. Focusing on the QB position:



2002

Ben Olsen - 5 star, 3rd in nation



2004

Jacob Bower - 3 star, 38th

Max Hall - 3 star, 46th (committed to ASU, transferred)

Jason Beck - 2 star, Juco



2006

James Lark, 4 star, 16th

Sam Doman, 2 star

Max Hall, 2 star (you think he would have gained a star by going on one of those LDS training camp missions that transforms young boys into freakish athletes)



2007

Jason Munns, 4 star, 27th

Cade Cooper, 4 star, Juco

Brenden Gaskins, 3 star, Juco



2009

Riley Nelson, 3 star (he was 4 when USU got him, right?)

Teysom Hill, 3 star, 30th (committed to Stanford)



2010

Jake Heaps, 5 star, 1st



2011

Alex Kuresa, 2 star, 96th



2012

Tanner Mangum, 4 star, 10th

frdbtr wrote:
We don't have a McCoy or Doman behind Heaps, we just don't.

I'm sorry for the thread jacking but I really can't let this guy get away with this one. How do you know the guys behind heaps can't be as good as Doman or McCoy? As we are talking about starts it appears that the McCoy boy that we "simply" don't have is a three start recruit. Seems like our bench is full of guys rated higher. Amazed.



Anyways, I think you listed all the big time recruits that I know. I think those points is one of the reason that Bronco loves the walk on type of player. The ones that have the physically ability but haven't spent their entire child hood grooming themselves to be a football player. He likes the farm workers and the tough kids. Nelson was an all-american for his numbers but was not rated high by any recruiting sites do to his lack of arm and size. The kid's a player, the kind that Bronco likes. That's the reason why he has asked Doman to have a role for him.

frdbtr wrote:

frdbtr wrote:
The book is not written on Jake Heaps. I know for a lot of you it is but for the coaches and the rest of us it is not. He is struggling right now, there is no argument about that, but he is not done yet and should not be benched because the offensive coaches have not prepared our offense to be successful yet. Give it a couple more weeks and if the rest of the offense is playing better ie the Oline is blocking well and the run game is working, then I will jump on the bench heaps bandwagon. Everyone keeps using examples like Texas benching their starter to get to the guy who will win them games and Brandon doman being sat until he was used as a last resort and found out to be a diamond in the rough. We don't have a McCoy or Doman behind Heaps, we just don't. Heaps is the guy and deservedly so. the problem this year is not Heaps, it is coaching, once our rookie coaches get this figured out, Heaps will play up to expectations.

My book on Heaps is not written. This is a question about stars on QB recruits and how it has worked out historically. Try not to Jack the thread. There are bunches of other threads to debate why Jake Heaps is or is not meeting expectations.



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Yes, but the entire tone of your post was "how long are we going to go with the pretty boy until we get to the less rated backups that will be our Brandon Doman." Don't give me the "thread Jack" crap.

seriously btr. Please don't Jack the thread. I made it a separate thread for a reason when the question occurred to me in a different thread. I am wondering if we have ever seen an exception to the pattern. BTW - I have seen the same pattern to a lesser extent at other positions, but want to keep this to QBs on this thread. What thoughts do you have - fact based - on how star power vs performance worked out for BYU in the last 50 years.



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BYU made a name for itself recruiting the guys that other teams passed up and then grooming them into stars. So while the question may be legit in your mind, it is not as relavent today since there really aren't many kids that have true talent get passed on anymore because of the attention that is given to recruiting and the additional resources that are available to schools to evaluate talent.



We have 1 5 star QB 2 4 stars and 1 3 star QB on the roster. According to our coaches evaluations, the 5 star one is deserving to start. none of the others has asserted themselves in practice or scrimmages enough to make the coaches change their minds on who should start. I don't see it happening either.

Steve Young started out as like a 7th string QB. He moved up because of how he performed in practice. BAck then, BYU also had a JV team, so that helped build the pipeline. The JV team played against Snow, Ricks, Dixie, etc back then. But BYU scrapped it due to cost, so many backups do not get the same game experience like they used to. Even so, if you can not show you got it in practice, chances are good the coaches are not going to give you a shot, unless they are desperate. And BYU is not desperate yet..

I thought the JV went away due to NCAA rules. Anyone remember? If we get Big12 money it might be worth the investment if we can do it. The money would be worth a couple wins and the exposure it would mean. I don't think any teams have JVs any more.

scott715 wrote:
I tought the JV went away due to NCAA rules. Anyone remember? If we get Big12 money it might be worth the investment if we can do it. The money woudl be worth a couple wins and the exposure it would mean. I don't think any teams have JVs any more.

I think he was talking about Ricks, or BYU Idaho.

I am tempted to reply to some posts, but it would hijack the thread into a Heaps debate.



So instead I will start with other positions, since it seems like we have a good list of recent QB stars.



I couldn't find his stars, but Dennis Pitta was not offered a division 1a scholarship. He turned out pretty good.



Jonny Harline was a 2-star recruit and he was better than Eric Weddle.



Austin Collie was a 3 star recruit. That was good enough for Peyton Manning.

Isola wrote:
I am tempted to reply to some posts, but it would hijack the thread into a Heaps debate.



So instead I will start with other positions, since it seems like we have a good list of recent QB stars.



I couldn't find his stars, but Dennis Pitta was not offered a division 1a scholarship. He turned out pretty good.



Jonny Harline was a 2-star recruit and he was better than Eric Weddle.



Austin Collie was a 3 star recruit. That was good enough for Peyton Manning.

I was going to mention Dennis Pitta in my post about how recruits don't get overlooked very often with a few exceptions, but since I had already gotten accused of hijacking the thread and he mentioned that he was only asking about QB's, I changed my mind.

Dcr36 wrote:

2011

Alex Kuresa, 2 star, 96th



2012

Tanner Mangum, 4 star, 10th

Looks like we have good things to expect from Alex Kuresa.

Cougarfan87 wrote:

2011

Alex Kuresa, 2 star, 96th



2012

Tanner Mangum, 4 star, 10th

Looks like we have good things to expect from Alex Kuresa.

I was going to say that as well, along with Hill.

hawkwing wrote:

I tought the JV went away due to NCAA rules. Anyone remember? If we get Big12 money it might be worth the investment if we can do it. The money woudl be worth a couple wins and the exposure it would mean. I don't think any teams have JVs any more.

I think he was talking about Ricks, or BYU Idaho.

I think the closing of Ricks' sports programs has hurt our football pipeline to some extent for other players. However, the QB's usually came to BYU as freshman and played on the JV team (there was a JV team at BYU). IIRC, they played some IAA teams such as SUU. They usually got clobbered, but it was great experience rather than just sitting on the bench.

On a side note, one year during the Crowton years BYU had a JV team (the year that Olsen was at BYU). I don't think they played an entire year, just something like 4 games. Berry was the QB that played the most, so I know it was before the Air Force game that year.



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