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Is Mason Fine the Football equivalent of....

I.I.

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Basketball’s Caleb Green? TU said they weren’t good enough though they both begged to come to TU.
 
Let's not even touch Caleb Green. JP was not a good recruiter, not a good talent evaluator, and not a good coach.

As for Mason Fine...you can't project success like he has had at UNT...and it was probably the perfect combination of Littrell's style of offense, Mason Fine trying to prove everyone wrong, and a favorable schedule of teams that are down. Who else recruited Fine? The only other school I can find is Austin Peay, and they're an FCS school. Some guys just won't be denied and they will outwork absolutely everyone. Doug Flutie, only had 1 D1-A offer- Boston College. There are guys out there that don't fit any of the measurables coaches are looking for and they have a hard time projecting them as a player at whatever level. The one thing they can't measure is that some guys are just winners and will outwork everyone to win. Mason Fine is one of those players just like Flutie was. We're beating Monty up over passing on this kid, but so did 130+ other FBS schools.
 
Who did we sign that year as QB instead of Fine?
 
Who did we sign that year as QB instead of Fine?
Just don't. You have no idea how Fine's skill sets translate to Monty's offensive scheme. I've been impressed with what Fine has done at UNT...but I would venture a guess that maybe 10 people on this board who are still on this board even asked the question of why we weren't looking at Fine. Hindsight is always 20/20.

I remember when Garret Mills was up for the Draddy Award and Bob Stoops went up to his mom and told her they really missed on their evaluation of Garret and her response was 'it all worked out for the best' or something like that. It's easy to say you made a mistake by not recruiting a player that led the nation in yards for their position.

The Caleb Green situation is different because he was one of the best players in the city and JP is out there recruiting kids that probably weren't good enough to play D2 basketball, let alone D1 at Tulsa.
 
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Let's not even touch Caleb Green. JP was not a good recruiter, not a good talent evaluator, and not a good coach.

As for Mason Fine...you can't project success like he has had at UNT...and it was probably the perfect combination of Littrell's style of offense, Mason Fine trying to prove everyone wrong, and a favorable schedule of teams that are down. Who else recruited Fine? The only other school I can find is Austin Peay, and they're an FCS school. Some guys just won't be denied and they will outwork absolutely everyone. Doug Flutie, only had 1 D1-A offer- Boston College. There are guys out there that don't fit any of the measurables coaches are looking for and they have a hard time projecting them as a player at whatever level. The one thing they can't measure is that some guys are just winners and will outwork everyone to win. Mason Fine is one of those players just like Flutie was. We're beating Monty up over passing on this kid, but so did 130+ other FBS schools.

How many did Fine want to go to? How many are within 50 miles of his home? This is exactly the kind of recruit TU has had success with in the past and a kid they could recruit on a tank of gas. Overlooked gems. It was a recruiting blunder and honestly it gave me pause for the first time on this staff. Dont give me the hindsight excuse because several wanted him recruited.
 
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Just don't. You have no idea how Fine's skill sets translate to Monty's offensive scheme. I've been impressed with what Fine has done at UNT...but I would venture a guess that maybe 10 people on this board who are still on this board even asked the question of why we weren't looking at Fine. Hindsight is always 20/20.

I remember when Garret Mills was up for the Draddy Award and Bob Stoops went up to his mom and told her they really missed on their evaluation of Garret and her response was 'it all worked out for the best' or something like that. It's easy to say you made a mistake by not recruiting a player that led the nation in yards for their position.

The Caleb Green situation is different because he was one of the best players in the city and JP is out there recruiting kids that probably weren't good enough to play D2 basketball, let alone D1 at Tulsa.
Phillips signed the 6'10" kid from Kingfisher instead of Caleb, but Caleb kept growing all thru high school. His freshman year at Memorial he was 6'3' and had guard skills and 6'7" his senior year with those same guard skills. I remember watching CALEB abuse TU's player in the All-State game so bad that his coach took him out until Caleb took a breather and when Caleb went back in Kingfisher would go to the bench .
 
I’m almost certain there were academic issues that made Fine not an option for TU.

He’s a great story and doing big time things at UNT, I wish him all the best.
 
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Pretty simple imo. We liked Skipper more than Fine. They were fairly similar prospects. We went with the guy who looked more like a D1 QB. I get it.
 
Pretty simple imo. We liked Skipper more than Fine. They were fairly similar prospects. We went with the guy who looked more like a D1 QB. I get it.

I was wondering who we signed instead of Fine. I guess it was Skipper. Maybe there isn't much difference in the two and we took the taller one.
 
Haisten's column today mentions this topic. Here's an excerpt:


In advance of Saturday’s North Texas-Liberty contest (the Mean Green’s final nonconference game), Fine is third nationally in passing. Meanwhile, the University of Tulsa is 108th nationally in passing.

TU’s program wasn’t the only one that failed to recognize Fine’s potential, but TU and Fine always will be synonymous because Fine hoped to play for the Golden Hurricane.

From Matt Hennessy, there was a cannon-shot quote last year.

“OU and OSU (coaches) spent more time at our place than TU did,” said Hennessy, who coached Fine at Locust Grove and now is the head man at Pawhuska. “I would get frustrated because it was all about the tape measure. I’m not knocking those coaches, but they’re not going to recruit a quarterback of that height. That’s just the way it is.

“Mason would have been a great fit at TU and he wanted to go to TU. The academics are high and he’s a family kid. He would have been close to home. He liked the coaches. He knew they had a spread offense and wanted to play fast, and that’s what he likes.”
 
Haisten's column today mentions this topic. Here's an excerpt:


In advance of Saturday’s North Texas-Liberty contest (the Mean Green’s final nonconference game), Fine is third nationally in passing. Meanwhile, the University of Tulsa is 108th nationally in passing.

TU’s program wasn’t the only one that failed to recognize Fine’s potential, but TU and Fine always will be synonymous because Fine hoped to play for the Golden Hurricane.

From Matt Hennessy, there was a cannon-shot quote last year.

“OU and OSU (coaches) spent more time at our place than TU did,” said Hennessy, who coached Fine at Locust Grove and now is the head man at Pawhuska. “I would get frustrated because it was all about the tape measure. I’m not knocking those coaches, but they’re not going to recruit a quarterback of that height. That’s just the way it is.

“Mason would have been a great fit at TU and he wanted to go to TU. The academics are high and he’s a family kid. He would have been close to home. He liked the coaches. He knew they had a spread offense and wanted to play fast, and that’s what he likes.”

Dang that’s 3 for 3 on the negative pieces on TU from local publications.
 
Haisten has always thought of us as little brother. Still it's not his fault. The kid is killing it even if we were doing well it would be brought up.

I can't help but think the history of a too short Owasso qb and the fall out that caused influenced the decision on this kid.

It was a miss. But I hope in two years while the kids is still killing it we're reading articles about how it worked out for the best because Skipper turned out great.

Kid has drive and love for the game, Doug Flutie, Baker Mayfield, Wes Welker have all proven over and over again thats what counts.
 
From my post on this issue over on the payboard:

“We have no idea what happened with the recruiting of this kid. For all we know, he needs to be schemed so that throwing lanes are available to compensate for his lack of height (see Drew Brees who freely admits this fact) and TU's passing game isnt structured that way. Or the kid came in hard and arrogant expecting an offer since that was his top choice, he was highly rated in state, and didnt think TU could get better (which is clearly still his belief no matter how humble the writer wants to display the quotes to make the dig at TU more credible). Or quite simply the coaches knew hewouldn't be happy because they didnt plan on throwing 40 times a game and he told them that is how he sees his career going so they made a decision in his best interests without telling him that. “

In short (no pun intended), we only have one side of the story. We do know that TU did have interest, they just went with someone with better physical tools. Rivals covered his recruiting here.

As for Mayfield who is considered short but is at least three inches taller than Fine, he came out of the highest profile football school in Texas as a state champion. Lake Travis is essentially a professional sports franchise that accepts public money to educate students part time. Despite that, he only got three offers, including Rice. Unlike Fine from tiny obscure Locust Grove, he turned them down to prove himself as a walk on at better programs and won the starting job. I’m pretty sure nobody is complimenting Rice on them not missing on Mayfield and their ability to judge talent. And Mayfield didn’t go around complaining that Texas missed on him.

I’m glad it worked out for both of them.

But the cliff notes on this story is that Fine thought he could use TU as his best path (or perhaps only path at the time) to a chance at the NFL. TU did not agree. Now that he is getting noticed, he can vent his frustration. His play now does not automatically de-legitimize TU refusing to invest a half million dollars in a kid from small town Oklahoma with unknown potential when what seemed to be better options presented themselves at the time - a QB that OSU wanted too.
 
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Both Matt Hennessy(Mason’s coach at Locust Grove) and Seth Littrell are Muskogee guys. Seth trusted his buddy when he said the kid can play. So North Texas took a chance. But I can guarantee you that Seth would be lying if he thought Mason was gonna come in and be a 4 year starter and help turn that program around.

Recruiting is such an inexact science. The reason guys try to have a standard set of “measurables” is it helps you narrow your focus and minimize the number of kids you miss on. But there are always outliers. That is what Mason is. Not particularly big, not particularly strong, not particularly athletic. Just a damn good football player. It’s easier to justify taking “football players” at other positions. IMO Coaches tend to be more leery doing that at the most important position on the field.

I’m incredibly proud of Mason. He’s an okie and he’s balling his ass off. Wish we would have kept him in the state but it has worked out great for him.
 
Mason was a risk. And if you look at the quarterbacks behind Dane Evans at the time of Fine’s recruitment, I don’t think we really could have taken a risk. Skipper was the safer and surer bet. It makes sense.

Good for Mason Fine for succeeding at UNT but I’m sick of these stories already. Let him grow where he’s been planted instead of wondering what would happen if he was in a different garden.
 
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