02-06-2014, 10:22 AM
The recent Stanford players have given the program some pure marketing gold: the Nerd Glasses, the phrase Party In The Backfield, even Skov's trademark Mohawk and eyeblack, while more individual, are instantly recognizable and linked to Stanford football, outside of just the realm of Stanford fandom. The Nerd Glasses were all over yesterday, particularly in Texas, with the entire Brandon Simmons clan donning them, and Solomon Thomas, the kick-off recruit on ESPNU, playfully working into his announcement both the quirky Tree mascot and the glasses. Combine these with the success of Andrew Luck, Zach Ertz, Coby Fleener, and above all Richard Sherman and Doug Baldwin, PLUS David Shaw appearing all over the Super Bowl, and you have to ask: has there ever been a better single moment in the history of Stanford at which to approach a recruit? Stanford's "cool" factor has to be off the charts for a lot of recruits. A program that can simultaneously produce an edgy, brash CB who is the best in the NFL, and can make your parents positively glow with pride, as was the case with Thomas's parents yesterday. If Shaw and his coaches had not been on the phones making offers, they would have been guilty of missing a golden opportunity.
There is no telling exactly how long all this will last. Stanford doesn't have the long history of dominance of a true Football Factory like Alabama or USC. Those program can go through a slump and always point to their past and get recruit's attention. And we don't have the bizarre mystique of Notre Dame. I think Stanford's success, so completely different in some ways for our PAC-12 rival to the north, is a bit similar to the rise of University of Oregon. We attract very different types of players, play polar opposite styles of football, and our program is squeaky clean while U of O seems to suffer constant run-ins with authorities, whether the NCAA or local law enforcement. But we are both programs that have had intermittent success in the past, but that have risen relatively recently and forced our way into the college football elite. It may seem odd to think of Stanford, a University that exists in the public imagination as one of the truly elitist institutions in the country, as an "outsider." But college football makes up its own little universe, and in THAT world, both Stanford and Oregon are clear outsiders, "New Money" folks who are making their way into the "Old Money" neighborhood, where all the cherry property is owned by the folks whose families seemed to have been there forever: Texas, Florida, Notre Dame, USC...the usual suspects. Residents of that neighborhood, rife with their internal rivalries, may love it when we best one of their neighbors, but collectively, that group would love nothing better than to oust all the interlopers, and get back to the golden days.
The coaches understand these dynamics, and just stole a march on the recruiting trail.
There is no telling exactly how long all this will last. Stanford doesn't have the long history of dominance of a true Football Factory like Alabama or USC. Those program can go through a slump and always point to their past and get recruit's attention. And we don't have the bizarre mystique of Notre Dame. I think Stanford's success, so completely different in some ways for our PAC-12 rival to the north, is a bit similar to the rise of University of Oregon. We attract very different types of players, play polar opposite styles of football, and our program is squeaky clean while U of O seems to suffer constant run-ins with authorities, whether the NCAA or local law enforcement. But we are both programs that have had intermittent success in the past, but that have risen relatively recently and forced our way into the college football elite. It may seem odd to think of Stanford, a University that exists in the public imagination as one of the truly elitist institutions in the country, as an "outsider." But college football makes up its own little universe, and in THAT world, both Stanford and Oregon are clear outsiders, "New Money" folks who are making their way into the "Old Money" neighborhood, where all the cherry property is owned by the folks whose families seemed to have been there forever: Texas, Florida, Notre Dame, USC...the usual suspects. Residents of that neighborhood, rife with their internal rivalries, may love it when we best one of their neighbors, but collectively, that group would love nothing better than to oust all the interlopers, and get back to the golden days.
The coaches understand these dynamics, and just stole a march on the recruiting trail.