Early Signing Period Open Thread

Welcome to perhaps the most unusual signing day any of us will ever see. Washington should be two days away from playing in the Pac-12 championship game but sadly that’s not happening. The way that 2020 has played out means that the class of 2021 got an extremely raw deal. Unless they took an official visit just after their junior years, most players never got to have a normal visit to their new homes. Coaches both head and assistant are sure to be fired and replaced post-signing day at a much greater frequency than in years’ past.

Washington currently expects to bring in 15 players in this 2021 class and all of them are expected to sign at some point today. There are always a few that wait until later school ceremonies that lead to some minor freak outs from fans but Washington under Chris Petersen almost always kept everyone in the boat. We don’t expect that to change under Jimmy Lake.

This is the open thread where we will periodically post status updates throughout the day. As each player signs they will have a player profile post go up. If you want to talk about a specific guy, feel free to head over and comment on that post. If you want to talk about the class in general, keep it here. There is also a signing day story stream so that you can go to one place and have easy access to each of the individual posts.

Finally, there are some guys the Huskies wanted who will be signing with other teams today. That’s unfortunate but we should be focusing right now on the ones who did choose to become Dawgs. Let’s celebrate each of them.

Scroll down for updates with a timestamp throughout the day until Aaron wraps up the class once it’s done tonight.

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Update 7:25a

The first 2 signatures for the Dawgs are in and they’re for the two players who were first eligible to sign by virtue of their location. RB Caleb Berry from Texas and DL Voi Tunuufi from Utah became the first official members of the class of 2021.

Thoughts on UW’s twitter announcements for this class?

Update 8:40a

Over half of the 2021 class are now officially signed as 9/15 have been announced. There’s still no concerns that the other 6 will join on at some point but are taking their time for one reason or another.

The headliner of the class, 5-star QB Sam Huard, is among those that has already signed and submitted his LOI. Huard is the highest rated QB commit in the modern recruiting ranking era which goes back to the early 2000’s. The only one to come close was Matt Tuiasosopo who ultimately decided to enter the MLB draft rather than play college football. Jacob Eason obviously joined the Huskies as a transfer and he was higher ranked than Huard but they are very different players.

In between the classes of 2014-2020 there had been 11 pro style QBs ranked as a 5-star. Over half of those players did or have already transferred at 6 of the 11. Although I would say that only 2 of them appeared to be busts: Blake Barnett and Hunter Johnson. Kyle Allen transferred to Houston and went undrafted but has been a part-time starter in the NFL. JT Daniels transferred from USC to Georgia after tearing his ACL and has been spectacular for the Bulldogs the last few games once healthy. Husky fans are intimately familiar with Eason’s career and Shea Patterson was above average at both Ole Miss and Michigan.

The ones who have stayed put have all been at the worst solid. Washington has felt the brunt of Stanford’s Davis Mills who is now 2-0 against the Huskies in his career. Josh Rosen has had his issues in the NFL but played well enough at UCLA to become a top-ten draft pick. Spencer Rattler at Oklahoma and DJ Uiagalelei at Clemson both have shown potential in their first career starts this year. And the last one? Trevor Lawrence who is a lock to be the #1 overall pick in the draft this year.

Update 9:45a

With the signature submitted for Hawai’i DL Kuao Peihopa the Huskies now have all 15 new players in the class of 2021 added to the class. There’s no one else expected to join the class today. Obviously local 5-star JT Tuimoluau will continue to be a target for the Huskies up until he signs in February but it appears that Alabama and Ohio State have taken the lead for him.

We’ll see when the dust settles if any players who the Huskies offered don’t end up signing today although the most likely possible flip targets appear to have signed already. If any coaches were to leave their job in the next week or two (*cough Mario Cristobal to auburn cough*) then it’s possible some recruits could become available if let out of their letters of intent. But given that this was going to be a small case no matter what and seniors now have the option of coming back, there isn’t exactly a lot of space.

Next up will be Coach Lake’s press conference which is scheduled for 11:30a this morning.