Year of the Rat Recruits

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YEar of the Rat.jpg

Today begins the year of the Rat, which not only ushers in the celebrated Chinese New Year, but restarts the entire twelve-year cycle of the Chinese Zodiac. Today also brings a new year to the Trojan football team; just yesterday USC added 19 to their future roster, now committed with binding letters of intent. This specific year, the rat corresponds with the Earth element and as fate would have it, the “Earth-Rat” shares strong similarities with this 2008 recruiting class.


Being the animal that kicks off the Zodiac cycle, the rat is associated with leadership and conquerors. Being that the Trojans are focused on beefing up their offensive and defensive lines, the new recruits will definitely follow suit. These young players are coming onto a team that has a championed history of leadership and conquest.

In life, rats are known for their suave personalities and charm. But get them in competition, they become smart, controlling, aggressive and calculative. Get in their face and it’s even worse. Rats can get quick-tempered, aggressive and even dangerous to others. And the future promises a lot of competition will be right in their faces. Rats are known to become obsessed with perfection, detail and order. They are known for their long hours, work ethic and discipline. All characteristics that will come in handy with Pete Carroll’s strenuous and competitive practice style.

And last but not least, Rats are inclined for exciting weekend adventures…and I am sure Saturdays this coming fall will bring plenty of excitement. Happy New Year, and fight on!

  1. You guys are a bunch of rats, that’s for sure. ha ha

  2. got this in an email from someone:

    Bruins aren’t good for much, but put them in a glass enclosure for extended study and they’re an illustrative bunch. Granted, the medium is crayon on rock, the style is primitive stick figures and the motif is early gay porn. Still, they serve a useful purpose, if only as a bad example.

    We all know recruiting rankings to be a particularly imprecise branch of sports punditry. Get a great quarterback and your ranking surges. Grab two more and you vault proportionally higher, ignoring the fact that there’s only one position available for the trio. Sign 35 kids and
    get the big total on the bottom of the receipt, nevermind that a dozen or so defective items are going to get returned.

    So the Bruins reel in their epic class and are collectively working through their last sets of dry pants. Far be it from me to interrupt a good leg flow, but if the Bruins scrutinized their presents a bit more, they could save a few wash cycles. Okay, so it’s not very far from me.

    The UCLA O-Line could only be called mediocre if the term “average” is understood to signify a front wall of crudely developed snowmen faltering in the afternoon sun. They have no concerns about quality depth because they’re still figuring out how to get a gloss on the surface. When a fanbase laments the graduation of a Shannon Tevaga, you know the coaches on the blocking sleds haven’t been getting much of a ride. I don’t recall us holding a wake for the departures of Rome Douglass, Ryan Bowen, and Phalen Pounds.

    In response to this roster emergency the Bruins signed not just one, but two offensive lineman. Two. A total of six stars. Given the typical odds that about half of three-star recruits wash out (as opposed to a quarter of four-stars and ten percent of five-stars), the Bruins probably garnered one warm body. At UCLA they don’t reload, they relent.

    I can only assume the incandescense of Chow will somehow scheme around the fact that his lineman are only a slightly stouter barricade than the paper hoops high school players burst through. Perhaps the plan is to go with 8 wide receivers and petition for a rule change. Flag football is probably on the shortlist of options.

    By comparison, USC actually looked in a real mirror, eschewing the funhouse variety. They saw talented linemen, but dwindling depth. So they bring in a handful of All-American types on the o-line, all sporting position rankings that look like golf handicaps for club champions.
    We bring in five equally touted studs on the other side just so they’ll have playmates to bang with for the next few years. Some have said that our class isn’t sexy, but we’re sure sporting some impressive wood up front.

    The Bruins loaded up on defensive backs, running backs, quarterbacks and wide receivers. They’ll need the numbers on offense because I’d bet the line will ensure they go through the QB’s and RB’s pretty quick. The D-backs will certainly be useful during the 35-40 minutes the Bruin offense doesn’t have the ball.

  3. Phenomenal Class at SC. And, add another 10 stars for Mitch Mustain and Damien Williams, who were 8-0 winners at Arkansas, before they joined the 2008 class at USC. If only PC could come up with a platoon of the A-Team (with Sanchez, Vidal, McKnight, et al.) and a B-Team (with Mustain, Williams, Stafon, et al.), or a mix-and-match combination of all of the talent at SC — it would drive all of the nation’s defensive coordinators Looney Tunes, and carry the scrimmage rivalries to a new height, resulting in wins by 50 points/game, over the other teams’ defenses run ragged to the melting point.

  4. Before your dads were glints in the eyes of your grandpas, SC had a pair of excellent quarterbacks, Beathard and Nelson, who alternated, and won a Rose Bowl game against Wisconsin (SC almost blew a 4- or 5-touchdown lead with the “Prevent Defense”). The more you think about it, the more intriguing it is to think of Sanchez’ platoon coming in with 6 or 8 consecutive no-huddle plays, followed by Mustain’s platoon with another 6 or 8 no-huddle plays. The other defenses would be run ragged, and SC would have more fun than you can imagine! FIGHT ON !!!!!!

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