2018 Class: Top 50 class strong possibility, more thoughts

Although the official list of recruits who count in the 2018 hasn’t been officially released we have enough information to get a closer of how things will conclude.

Here are some thoughts on signing day morning before Kansas head coach David Beaty holds his press conference later this afternoon.

The way it stands right now, the Jayhawks are going to have a class that ranks somewhere in the 45-48 range. Let’s face it, that is much better than most people would have predicted going into the recruiting season.

There has been a lot of talk about the future of the staff and many thought that would impact recruiting. You can only judge recruiting classes on paper and in real time. If you look at the Jayhawks class the way it stands on signing day morning it, without a doubt, exceeding expectations of where many thought it would finish.

If you count the recruits who will carry over into the 2018 class who are already on campus the mix will be around 55 percent of the class high school recruits and 45 percent coming from the junior college ranks.

There were several recruits who had nice offer lists that inked with the Jayhawks. Like any class you can find weaknesses, but Beaty and his staff, considering all circumstances turned in a solid class.

There were several recruits who happened to get their first Power Five offer from Kansas. Many followed with more offers after getting an offer from the Jayhawks. There were some recruits it appeared Kansas was in the running for but eventually signed with other Power Five schools.

That’s one of the battles the staff faced was holding onto recruits they were the first to offer. And that takes us to the importance of the early signing period.

The early signing period was a big boost for the Jayhawks recruiting efforts. It locked in several players in December who would have been difficult to hold onto in January.

Take Azur Kamara for example. He’s a defensive end from Arizona Western who held offers from Florida State, Ole Miss, Nebraska, Oregon, Tennessee and a host of other Power Five programs. He decided to sign early with the Jayhawks although he will not graduate until spring. If Kamara would have held off and signed in February, he would have had every major college searching for a defensive end knocking down his doors.

Another example is Elijah Jones. A 6-foot-3, cover corner from Ellsworth Iowa. He was committed for a long time to Scott Frost at Central Florida. When Frost left for another job Jones opened up his recruiting. He took a visit to Lawrence, committed, and signed early. If Jones would have been a recruitable target in January he would have had several suitors.

There are others who fall into the same category. This was a good year for the staff to have the early signing period put in place.

For the first time since Rivals recorded player rankings in 1999, the Jayhawks signed two players rated in the national top 200.

Kansas assistant Tony Hull was the lead recruiter for both Corione Harris and Anthony “Pooka” Williams. Both players are from the New Orleans area and held multiple Power Five offers including home state LSU.

Harris is rated the nation’s 15th best cornerback and is already on campus going through workouts.

Williams is the nation’s sixth-rated all-purpose running back in the country. He signed in December and is expected on campus in June.