BadgerBlitz.com dives into its message board to take questions from subscribers in this week's mailbag.
RELATED: Mailbag Part 1: Transfer market, future roster management and much more
When do you expect recruiting for 2022 to heat up due to the season being over? Time and resources will be able to shift to these kids more than it was during the season and we could start to see a little more as to who might be on top of the board at positions.
Things do seem a little slow on the football recruiting front right now. At this time last year, the staff had eight commitments in the 2021 class, which turned out to be the highest-rated in the program's history. In this year's junior cycle, the Badgers do not have a commitment yet and it doesn't appear anyone on their board is close to doing so in the near future.
Looking at the Big Ten, Ohio State currently has 10 commitments, with Penn State (8), Michigan (5), Maryland (4) and Rutgers (3) next in line. Michigan State and Purdue both have two verbals; Minnesota and Iowa have one. UW is one of five schools in the conference still looking for its first, though you could make an argument that it was, in fact, Braelon Allen, who has since reclassified.
In a normal recruiting cycle, the staff would be finishing up vacations or time away from the program after Wisconsin's bowl game. Junior day visits would begin at the end of the month and carry on through February and early March. Then the coaches would normally get recruits back on campus for camp practices. All of those options, however, are not available.
To answer the question, things could pick up a bit when the coaches return from vacation, but I don't expect a ton of new offers to go out in late winter or early spring. I think the Badgers are going to hold true to their evaluation process and not deviate much from those principles. There's risk involved without having been able to conduct in-person evaluations.
“That ‘22 class that we would be taking a peek at while we're closing on the ‘21 class, you have no look," Wisconsin director of player personnel Saeed Khalif said in December.
"You don't know body development," he continued. "You haven't seen them. You don't know, so you can't measure their growth from season-to-season. So the ‘22 class I think is going to be more impacted than the ‘21 class, and if things clear up, the ‘23 class would be the one that really gets the concentration. But the ‘22 class, you’ll have to really be careful in your vetting and what you're getting and not go off of just statistics and old film.”
Look for the offered prospects on Wisconsin's board to continue to receive the bulk of the attention this winter and spring. Things could really heat up in the summer if visits and camps are back on, and I wouldn't be surprised if a good chunk of the Badgers' class fills up during that timeframe.
