Recruiting Country: The latest recruiting news surrounding the Maroon & White

TexAgs' recruiting analyst Ryan Brauninger joined TexAgs Live on Wednesday morning for another edition of Recruiting Country presented by American Momentum Bank, highlighting the latest news and notes from the recruiting trail surrounding Texas A&M.

Key notes from Recruiting Country

• I was going to drive down to Lake Charles for the Southland Conference championship game, but I've got a speaking engagement on Thursday in Austin, so that would be a lot of driving. I'll be locked in on McNeese State basketball today at 4 p.m. CT. The McNeese administration is prepared for Will Wade to be a hot name on the coaching carousel. As he makes the transition back to big-time college basketball, McNeese has been good to him, and he has been good to McNeese.
   
• A&M is extending new offers in-state. The first one was Dillon Mitchell‍, whose dad is Billy Mitchell, who played at Texas A&M. Dillon is running some incredible track times as a freshman. He ran a 100m time that broke the national record for freshmen. Some of those times that came out of the meet this week at E.B. Cushing Stadium were incredible. A kid from Duncanville ran sub-10. It's still early in the spring, and as the weather heats up, the times get better.
   
• Mitchell is at C.E. King, and when he runs that time, A&M and everybody else hopped on board. He had very little varsity tape. I bring it up because we talk about measurables, and this A&M staff has honed in on finding measurables for kids and not necessarily star ratings. Obviously, you have to be a good football player, but what else is standing out? If you look at X position group, they usually have Y traits. A lot of that intel continues to be gathered. When kids put up verified track times, it's important. If you're a big guy on the line and you have a throwing distance in the shot put or discus, that translates.
   
• Listen to how Mike Elko described some of the kids in the last class, specifically Tristan Norman‍. He's a skinny kid, but he has some functionality from his jumping numbers. He's holding his weight now at A&M.
   
• Jayden Warren‍ at Iowa Colony is another one who has run real times and has real football team, and A&M jumped on board there, too.
   
• Every kid's timeline is different. Inevitably, there is a kid in that freshman kid who might not be as fast as Dillon Mitchell right now, but he could be in the future. You have to keep combing through that information.
   
• I like what this staff is doing. We've been talking about recruiting the state of Texas, and on the commit list right now, there are zero Texans. I know they are doing the best they can to make sure they're not missing anything in the state.
   
• You have to look at prospects, and there is a difference between a prospect and a player. We saw it a lot in the 2022 class. How many real football players were there? Josh Pate said something to you and then asked Elko about it: A&M has always stood out in recruiting rankings, but the NFL Draft and the NFL Combine haven't reflected that. Elko said you should always evaluate a recruiting class through the NFL Draft.
   
• Look at the 2023 class. They had real football players like Dalton Brooks and Taurean York. As a coach, you're looking for the perfect mesh of outstanding prospect and really good football player. When it works out like that, you have an elite football player.
   
• We firmly believe the Aggies are in a great spot with a lot of their top in-state prospects. When spring practice ramps up, we'll see visitors for those.
   
• The spring game is the most overrated event in terms of recruiting on the calendar. How many times have people made big deals about where kids visit for spring games? It's overvalued and overhyped by fans. There are way more important things, like coming to practice to see how their position coach actually coaches. That's way more beneficial for their relationships. We're going to see much more of an emphasis on getting their top-flight players to come watch practices. Similarly, the junior day lists were impressive but not great in number.
   
• There are guys on the team who will tell kids the truth while they're here on official visits, and I do think there is value in that.
   
• Jermaine Kinsler‍ is another that everybody will be after.
   
• A&M is in a great spot for a lot of these re-classified prospects. Richard Wesley‍ and Boobie Feaster‍ are guys A&M is in a great spot with. How many do you take of those? They just took one of those in Brady Hart‍. When a kid has a full year taken away from their development in high school from strength and mental ability, are they going to be able to work through that in a new environment? Both Wesley and Feaster are tremendous talents. It will be interesting to see how many kids A&M is all in on as far as re-classifying prospects go.
   
• How much is NIL playing a factor in re-classifying? It'll take a toll on your academics because you'll have to work through summers to get your credit hours up to ensure you can graduate early. For those kids, I can't imagine them showing up in the spring. You could sign them, but they won't be here until the summer. We're seeing how beneficial enrolling early has become. If Jerome Myles‍ didn't have that knee injury, I think he'd be here right now.
   
• If you get in a scenario where everybody is bigger, stronger and faster than you, that creates doubt. Sometimes, all they need is the patience for their body and brain to catch up. It's very rare that you hear about a Marco Jones‍, who is mentally and physically right there with everybody else. There is usually a transition period for early enrollees. It's a roll of the dice when you start taking these re-classifying prospects.
   
• Sometimes, the decision to re-classify is made suddenly. Again, players like Hart, Wesley and Feaster are all incredibly talented, and they'll be highly sought-after recruits.
   
• In-state, Legend Bey‍ is a guy who played quarterback in the DFW area, and A&M offered him as an athlete after he put up impressive numbers at some of these camps.
   
• You can look at A&M's current roster. Maybe some of these guys are shining in offseason workouts, and maybe the staff is looking for a similar player in the state right now. Amari Niblack is an interesting-looking H-back, and you can look at the offer to James Scott‍ and see some similarities there.