Wow, some seriously good effort at keeping the average IQ around 100 on this board. Freshman are 18 year-old kids. Occasional exceptions, but most (even 4-5 stars, and especially linemen) need a year or two to be competitive against 21-22 year olds. How this isn't self-evident is beyond me. A mature, successful program doesn't take its 2 top 5 recruiting classes in a row and try to win conference titles with a bunch of freshmen. It sticks their butts on the bench, in a strength program, with liberal use of redshirts, to learn from 4-5 stars that are now redshirt sophomores and juniors and seniors. It's been said 1000000 times - CDD didn't recruit a SINGLE OL one of his years, and if people can't understand the hole we've been in the past 3 years on the OL and how it doesn't matter if you have 10 star skill players, you aren't going anywhere without a serious OL in this league - really no hope for you. Everyone is tired of being down, but it is no excuse for stupid rants about being tired of the excuses. CBR's first recruiting class was barely his - and nobody with a brain could not see the following 2 were stellar and at an entirely different level. In 2016 that group of kids will be in their second and third years in the program, in 2017 third and fourth years - a much higher level of talent top to bottom - like what we've seen at Bama for more years than I care to remember. Bama hasn't been winning so consistently playing true freshman and sophomores. CDD took us to the Bill Battle days from a roster standpoint. CJM was never the coach some reinvent him to be, but look at how long it took him to recover somewhat from Battle.
CBJ isn't perfect and doesn't walk on water - jury definitely still out on offense and game management. But this whole "tired of the excuses" internet tough guy thing is infantile, like 2 year olds screaming I want what I want. Makes VN sometimes a hard place to lurk around.