As mentioned in the Willie Fletcher commitment post, the Cal staff was still doing work late in the 2012 recruiting season. Thanks to a pre-existing relationship through new DL Coach Todd Howard, yet another addition to the class had committed and signed a letter of intent before the week was done. Meet defensive tackle Maurice Bennett out of Madison, Mississippi, the newest California Golden Bear!

via cmsimg.clarionledger.com

Both Jim McGill of Bear Insider and Ryan Gorcey of Bear Territory have good stories on Bennett's whirlwind recruitment and commitment to Cal. Find links to both stories below:

Bear Insider- Bennett talks about late Cal commit

Bear Territory- Cal adds DL to 2012 class

In a nutshell, Bennett had been recruited to Washington State by Howard and had committed to the Cougars. When new head coach Mike Leach was hired, Howard was let go and Bennett was informed he no longer had a spot in the class. As a result, his recruitment was quiet and he was all set to head to Ole Miss...where had been offered a spot a preferred walk-on. Maurice's older brother Bryon is a starting defensive lineman for the Rebels, so he was well familiar with the program. Then on Wednesday (National Signing Day), Howard called and offered Maurice a scholarship to Cal. The appeal of a full ride and Bennett's high regard of Todd Howard as a coach was too good to pass up. He committed to Cal and faxed in his letter of intent on Thursday.

So what kind of player did Cal get in Maurice? Check out measurables, highlights, and my assessment after the jump. Welcome to Cal, Maurice!

Continue reading this post »

In the final days leading up to National Signing Day last Wednesday, the Cal coaching staff wasn't just working on firming up some of our wavering 2012 commits. In fact, they were digging deep and doing some work. We had some open scholarships and it was time to find some late bloomers. The fruits of their labor? An unheralded cornerback prospect from a SoCal football powerhouse. Meet Willie Fletcher, a 6'3 defensive back from Orange Lutheran in Orange, CA!

via images.onset.freedom.com

Dan Albano's post from OCVarsity.com has the scoop on Fletcher's late recruitment and commitment to Cal:

Fletcher’s signing ends a whirlwind week for him with the Golden Bears. He first heard from Cal on Monday. The Bears offered him around 3 p.m. on Wednesday – National Signing Day.

Fletcher had two offers on National Signing Day — Northern Colorado and Southwest Oklahoma – but remained patient that a bigger school would offer. On Friday, his patience paid off big-time.

"I feel excited," Fletcher said. "I had contact with (Cal) a couple days before Signing Day. (Coach Jeff Tedford) said they liked my film and that I was a good player and that I had a lot to offer the program. … I told him I wasn’t signing Signing Day because me and my dad (Willie) wanted to pursue bigger scholarships.

Fletcher said it wasn’t hard to be patient.

"Me and my dad had talked about it," he said. "He just told me to be patient and my time will come, and it came. I knew my talents and capabilities and what (college) division I should be in."

Fletcher had a combined three interceptions in two all-star games in January.

After the jump, a link to some highlights of one of the newest Golden Bears and my thoughts on just what Willie could be bringing to the table. Welcome to Cal, Willie!

Continue reading this post »

What a long, strange trip it's been. Clearly, this wasn't your normal recruiting cycle, and these last two weeks have felt like two years. Cal lost five recruits to decommitment, fell out of favor with probably five to ten top targets, and all signs point toward one man committing downright sabotage to cause all that chaos.

And despite all that we ended up with a top 25-quality recruiting class, and with one or two more good signings it can stick around the top 20. Doesn't sound too bad now, does it? Could've been better, but in the end we'll probably only truly miss not getting one or two of these guys.

We can get to that in due time. Today is about the guys who are here.

(via calathletics)

Now that the dust has settled, let's say hello and welcome to the newest members of the Cal Football team, many of whom are student-athletes in the purest sense of the word. We've always wanted players that conform to the Cal tradition of being great at athletics and great academics, and this is a class that's carrying this tradition.

QUARTERBACK

Zach Kline, QB San Ramon Valley (San Ramon, CA).

The crown jewel. Kline brings to Cal a pure set of skills, fundamentals and mentality that should hopefully match perfectly with Tedford's offense. He's going to have a real good shot to make an impact once he totally develops his body into college football shape.

Kline is already on campus absorbing the Cal atmosphere as an early entrant, and will participate in spring camp. I'm sure none of you will be so premature as to think Tedford is holding Kline back if he doesn't name him the starter after April. If Kline can make the travel team (normally the three deep), then he's done his job as a true frosh. And then he's got a strong shot at having a productive three-four years at Cal right after that.

Also maintained a 3.28 GPA and is donating his hair for Locks Of Love.

PS: Zach's blue and gold bike got stolen. Students, could you try and spread the word on Facebook and help him find it?

DEFENSIVE BACKS

Raymond Ford, CB Junipero Serra (Gardena, CA).

Raymond Ford was originally a UCLA commit before Rick Neuheisel got the axe, then started looking around when Ishmael Adams committed to the Bruins.

Ford is an interesting prospect who definitely has a good list of legit offers from other schools like Nebraska, Washington State, Utah, Colorado and the Arizonas. He's on the shorter side at 5'11", 174 pounds, but has long arms that should help him try and drape receivers in man coverage. Looking forward to see him down the line.

Damariay Drew, S Livermore (Livermore, CA).

Drew was considered the best all-around athlete in the EBAL, but didn't receive major attention due to the lack of success of his high school. Drew WAS Livermore football this past year, and his production spoke for itself. Drew looked around between Oregon and Washington (with our BFF Tosh making a last-day push) before making a decision to stick with his original Bear verbal.

With Cal losing their top two safety targets, the Bears will be happy to have an athlete like Drew manning the backfield to shore up much-needed depth.

Continue reading this post »

It wasn't easy. And there's a lot of blood in the water after being dragged out on that boat. There's probably a lot more we're going to hear about "what just happened", and I doubt it's going to be ice cream and daisies.

Still, compared to everything we've seen the past few days...

(HT minesweeper)

Yeah, so today was a good day.

Here are your Cal commits (LOIs in). Click on their names for video highlights.

• Zach Kline (QB, San Ramon Valley, Danville, CA). Early Entree.
  
• Christian Okafor (OL, Oaks Christian, Houston, TX). Early Entree.
• Cole Leninger (P, Bartram Trail, Fruit Cove, FL)
• Freddie Tagaloa (OL, Salesian, Richmond, CA)
• Hardy Nickerson, Jr. (LB, Bishop O'Dowd, Oakland, CA)
• Darius Powe (WR, Lakewood, Lakewood, CA)
• Matt Cochran (OL, Buhach Colony, Atwater, CA)
• Maximo Espitia (FB, South Salem, Salem, OR)
• Jeffrey Coprich (ATH, West Ranch, Stevenson Ranch, CA)
• Chris Harper (WR, Crespi, Encino, CA)
• Steven Moore (OL, Elk Grove, Elk Grove, CA)
• Damariay Drew (DB, Livermore, Livermore, CA)
• Cedric Dozier (WR, Lakes, Lakewood, WA)
• Michael Barton (LB, De La Salle, Concord, CA)
• Bryce Treggs (WR, St. John Bosco, Bellflower, CA)
• Kenny Lawler (WR, Upland, Upland, CA)
• Raymond Ford (CB, Junipero Serra, Gardena, CA)

ManBearCal will have a better recap for tomorrow. This is your aftermath thread. Enjoy and appreciate.

Into the afternoon we go. We've gotten most of the Bears we thought we'd get. Who's joining them?

No one yet.

Markuss Eligwe - Stuck with Florida State. Not a huge surprise

Christo Kourtzidis - Stuck with Florida State. He was 50-50, and we definitely could have used him. Cal went 0/4 on the big California tight ends of this class.

Zach Hoffpauir - Committed to Furd. Missed out on our op two safety targets. Ouch.

Kenny Walker - Officially flipped from Cal to UCLA.

So the Bears are going to fall well short of their targeted 27-28 recruits they wanted to land. Currently Cal has 14 commits, plus Jordan Morgan from last year, meaning we still have around a dozen slots are still available. No chance of filling them all.

Who does that leave? Well, there are a few more making decisions today. Here's the list below.

Here's the announcements to watch out for.

2 PM: Aziz Shittu (DT, Buhach Colony, Atwater, CA): Top four of Stanford, UCLA, USC, and Cal, and the Cardinal appear to be the favorite.

3-5 PM: Announcements can be viewed on FoxSportsWest.com

Brandon Beaver (DB, Dominguez, Compton, CA): Top three of Washington, Utah, and Cal, with the Huskies still looking like a narrow favorite.

Kenny Lawler (WR, Upland, Upland, CA): Top three of Oregon State, Washington State and Cal. No idea where we go from here.

Bryce Treggs (WR, St. John Bosco, Bellfower, CA): Cal commit and likely to stay that way, but still looking at UCLA or USC.

5:15 PM: Announcement can be viewed on CBSLA.com

Raymond Ford (DB, Junipero Serra, Gardena, CA): Top 3 of Washington State, Utah and Cal.

Here's to hoping we at least finish out National Signing Day with a flourish. GO BEARS!

Damn. Lots of comments. Let's keep discussing here! GO BEARS!

So many comments! Discussion is now in Overflow thread. Join the party here!

FREDDIE TAGALOA AND COLE LEININGER HAVE FAXED IN THEIR LETTERS OF INTENT

HARDY NICKERSON JR'S LETTER OF INTENT IS IN

DARIUS POWE'S LETTER OF INTENT IS IN

MATT COCHRAN AND JUNIOR ESPITIA HAVE SENT IN THEIR LETTERS OF INTENT

STEVEN MOORE AND CHRIS HARPER ARE IN

CEDRIC DOZIER AND DAMARIAY DREW HAVE FAXED IN THEIR LETTERS OF INTENT

MICHAEL BARTON HAS FAXED IN HIS LETTER OF INTENT

Today is the day! All the rumors and all the crazy innuendo finally come to an end. We get a clear end to the crazy recruiting season of 2012. (Unless some of our targets decide to hold off on an LOI for a few more days, in which case we keep on going!)

Today, we are all about verifiable information. Not this person said this. That tweet said that. To that end, there are two main locations for finding this verifiable information.

The first is the CalBears.com Signing Day home. You can find that here.

The second is the CalBearsBlog twitter account. You can find that here.

Here's the announcements to watch out for.

8:15 AM: Markuss Eligwe (LB, Stone Mountain, Stone Mountain, GA): Eligwe remains a Florida State commit and will probably stick, but Cal has entered the mix at the eleventh hour.

9 AM: Announcements can be viewed on FoxSportsArizona.com

Zach Hoffpauir (S, Centennial, Peoria, AZ) Cal decommit, now considering the Bears along with ASU and Stanford. Stanford is the likely choice.

9:20 AM: Thomas Johnson (WR, Skyline, Dallas, TX): Johnson will make his decision on ESPNU. Texas A&M and TCU are the likely two finalists, although Cal and Oregon are remote possibilities.

2 PM: Aziz Shittu (DT, Buhach Colony, Atwater, CA): Top four of Stanford, UCLA, USC, and Cal, and the Cardinal appear to be the favorite.

3-5 PM: Announcements can be viewed on FoxSportsWest.com

Brandon Beaver (DB, Dominguez, Compton, CA): Top three of Washington, Utah, and Cal, with the Huskies still looking like a narrow favorite.

Kenny Lawler (WR, Upland, Upland, CA): Top three of Oregon State, Washington State and Cal. No idea where we go from here.

Bryce Treggs (WR, St. John Bosco, Bellfower, CA): Cal commit and likely to stay that way, but still looking at UCLA or USC.

5:15 PM: Announcement can be viewed on CBSLA.com

Raymond Ford (DB, Junipero Serra, Gardena, CA): Top 3 of Washington State, Utah and Cal.

The Twitter account will probably be much more agile than the Signing Day home, but both should have key information about the newest Golden Bears. We will try to keep up with all the information here, so you can reference this post for up to date information. Enjoy the discussion! If we go to new discussion threads, we'll link to them here, so you can easily find out where the party is!

GO BEARS!

First up, Wide Receiver Jordan Payton announces his college decision at 1:10 PM. You can watch it at ESPNU. Here is the online ESPN360 channel for ESPNU.

Word on the street is that Jordan Payton, who previously did choose Cal, will not choose Cal when it is time to put pen to paper. But those are all just rumors and innuendo right now. Hope springs eternal!

UPDATE: As expected, Payton switches from Cal to Washington.

That is at 1:10. At 2:30, Athlete Cedric Dozier will make his college decision. He is between Cal and Washington State. The News Tribune, out of Tacoma, WA, will try to webcast the announcement. It appears that the webcast might be listed here. We'll keep an eye out for it and try to edit in a link if we can find a direct one as the time approaches.

UPDATE: Dozier commits to Cal once more. GO BEARS! (Read up on our original story here.)

So, use this thread to discuss the two announcements. Hopefully, Cal will go 2-2, although there are serious concerns that that will not happen. GO BEARS!