Notre Dame's 2023 Class Has A Chance To Be Bold And Change The Tide
College football and college football recruiting has changed quite a bit over the last year, and it would seem there is nothing standing in the way of the current trends. The arrival of name, image and likeness, and the modern transfer portal, has exposed the lack of NCAA leadership in a way that nothing else could have.
NIL was needed, and the old transfer process was broken. Both are welcome changes in theory, but the no holds barred manner in which they are currently being employed, and the utter lack of leadership from a NCAA that is too afraid of being sued to stand up and do it's job, has created a free-for-all from a talent acquisition standpoint.
Recruiting has always been a shady business, but all of this has created a perverse process that has cheapened the game in many ways. The narrative that has been created is that you have to play the game to win, and that the best players have their hands out, that they are looking for the immediate score, with all the other past priorities becoming more and more irrelevant, or at least secondary.
It is the new normal, or so I am told, and in many ways this is true.
Notre Dame and head coach Marcus Freeman, however, are going to try and show that you can win a different way. Its 2023 recruiting class, and the players that make up this class, have a chance to be the group that pushes back against the current direction, to show that there are still plenty of young athletes that show far more intelligence, far more depth, far more forward thinking and far more courage than the alleged leaders of the NCAA.
Notre Dame is engaged in NIL, and its top players are doing quite well when it comes to cashing in on their name, image and likeness, but it has to be earned during their time in college. Notre Dame won't use it as an enticement to come play for the program. From a recruiting standpoint, Notre Dame still has to sell what it has always sold. That is the opportunity to be more forward thinking, to look past the emphasis on immediate satisfaction and instant gratification, and instead focus on how a sacrifice of the now can create a far bigger boon in the future.
The 4 for 40, or the new 4 for Forever, means more now than it ever has.
That is what Notre Dame can sell, and it's important. The coaches can say, hey, we can't offer you the immediate six or seven figures that other schools are offering you, but we can offer you an opportunity to play for an elite program, get an elite education, get a chance to play for a championship and we will develop you into a NFL player.
The Irish staff can sell that while they won't make the huge amounts of guaranteed money that other programs are offering the Notre Dame commits in an attempt to entice them to leave, if the prospects are willing to bet on themselves, turn down the enticing offers of immediate satisfaction, they'll benefit immensely down the road, both as men and financially.
It's the old proverb that if you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.
That is what Notre Dame has to offer these young men.
Notre Dame's 2023 class has a chance to blow up the narrative that currently exists about young people and their lack of foresight, or that money is always the most important thing, and also the narrative that Notre Dame can't recruit elite athletes, and can't compete for championships without getting into the mud and slopping around with the rest of the college football world.
With all of the supposed roadblocks in front of them, Freeman and Notre Dame have a class that currently ranks No. 2 by ESPN and Sports Illustrated, and No. 3 by Rivals and 247Sports. It has a chance to be Notre Dame's best class since 1990 when the Irish landed future Hall of Famers like Jerome Bettis, Bryant Young and Aaron Taylor.
From a football standpoint it's a special class. Notre Dame's class is filled with elite skill players like Peyton Bowen, Jeremiyah Love, Christian Gray, Micah Bell, Braylon James, Jaden Greathouse, Adon Shuler and more.
Notre Dame currently has arguably the nation's best haul of running backs (Love and Jayden Limar), the nation's best wide receiver class (James, Greathouse, Rico Flores Jr., Kaleb Smith) and the nation's best offensive line haul (Charles Jagusah, Sullivan Absher, Sam Pendleton, Joe Otting, Christopher Terek). The Irish also have one of the top tight ends in the class with Cooper Flanagan being on board.
Adding quarterback Kenny Minchey to this class put the offensive haul over the top and made it truly special
Even without Keon Keeley, who chose to go down a different path that has been followed by so many others, the Irish defensive line class (Boubacar Traore, Brenan Vernon, Devan Houstan, Armel Mukam) is a strong unit. Notre Dame also has arguably the best secondary class (Bowen, Bell, Gray, Shuler, Ben Minich) and the linebacker haul (Jaiden Ausberry, Drayk Bowen, Preston Zinter) in the country, and a player like Brandyn Hillman who could slot in at four different positions.
Good luck finding a group of secondary and linebacker groups that run and play like the Notre Dame group.
Believe me, there are young men in that group who have been offered six and seven figure deals to sign somewhere else. They've been coerced with the typical shallow, condescending recruiting tactics like follow friends or girlfriends, stay close to home (I can't believe this is still a thing in today's world), avoid those tough academics (I mean, why challenge yourself), take the money, etc. that show those schools don't understand the depth of character of young man that makes up Notre Dame's 2023 class.
That's what makes this class special beyond their athletic talents. It's a special group of young men, because it takes a special group of young men to turn down things most of us wouldn't be bold enough, or have the foresight to turn down when we were 17 and 18 years old.
They are choosing the hard path, believe me. That's always been true at Notre Dame, but now players are turning down lucrative financial offers to bet on themselves, to bet on each other, and to bet on Freeman's ability to take the Notre Dame program to the next level. They are betting on their ability to come together as one group, combine with the excellent 2022 class and the classes that will follow, to do something that very few others have the courage to do.
It's a class that is willing to be bold, one that is willing to refuse the easy path, the ignore the "now is all that matters" push that so many are selling. Why? Because they know that the sacrifice now will allow them to turn into champions on the field, into future high draft picks, and they are trusting in their own ability to take their talent, their vision, their intelligence and combine it with the huge, worldwide brand that is Notre Dame and the world class education they will receive in order to turn it into a brand that will allow them to create a far more longterm personal brand that will far outshine, and be more profitable, than the short-term offers they are getting now.
It's not easy, trust me. Some of the numbers I've heard thrown around to these young men are staggering. That's how I know these young men will thrive as a group, and individually.
There's an expression that legendary coach Bo Schembechler had, and it went like this:
Those that stay will be champions.
That is true for Notre Dame's 2023 class in ways that go far beyond the football field. This group, if it stays together, has all the talent Notre Dame needs to close the gap and start competing for, and winning championships. If it stays together this group has the talent to do just that, it really does.
But it goes way beyond that. Once these young men see their football careers come to an end their vision, courage, intelligence and the education they'll receive at Notre Dame, along with the money they will make through NIL, will give them a chance to be champions in the business world, or whatever professional fields they choose to pursue.
They will look back and realize their willingness to stand against the tide and say no, we are going to be different, we are going to be bold, we are going to change the narrative, will serve as the foundation for Notre Dame showing the rest of the college football world that you can win championships this way ..... the right way.
The Notre Dame way.
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Notre Dame 2022 Roster
Notre Dame 2022 Schedule
Notre Dame 2023 Class Big Board
Notre Dame 2023 Commits Board - Offense
Notre Dame 2023 Commits Board - Defense
Notre Dame 2023 Scholarship Offers
Notre Dame 2024 Scholarship Offers
Ranking The 2022 Signees - Offense
Ranking The 2022 Signees - Defense
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