With national signing day on Wednesday, it's time to hop into the DeLorean again and set the target date for Feb. 1, 2012.
Look, there's Bobby Petrino and he's addressing the crowd after signing 24 players for Arkansas. Like all coaches on national signing day, Petrino is pleased with the haul. Or, at least he pretends to be.
"I think it's a really good class," Petrino said. "We did a good job of evaluating and finishing strong."
But not strong enough for many Razorback football fans, who had their hopes dashed by a 6-foot-6 recruit rated as the best receiver in the country.
Dorial Green-Beckham, remember him? He chose Missouri over Arkansas and is now playing with the Tennessee Titans in the NFL.
Petrino was so distraught by the snub, he loaded up some precious cargo on the back of his motorcycle and drove away never to return. Actually, he did return with a neck brace and a few scratches, but we all know how that turned out.
Given the distance of four years to evaluate, we can now say that Petrino's final recruiting class at Arkansas was actually pretty good. Much better than the instant analysis by Rivals.com, which rated those new Hogs as the 11th best class in the SEC that year.
Arkansas' recruiting effort for 2012 included running back Jonathan Williams of Allen, Texas; tight end Jeremy Sprinkle of White Hall; receiver Keon Hatcher of Owasso, Okla.; linebacker Deatrich Wise of Lewisville, Texas; and Darius Philon of Mobile, Ala., a defensive lineman who flipped from Alabama to Arkansas.
That's a lot of talent, especially for a class that was mostly made up of 3-star athletes. Philon is in the NFL, and the others will have a chance to follow. Remember that quarterback Brandon Allen, who'll play in the Senior Bowl with Williams and Sebastian Tretola, was part of the 2011 signing class. Tretola signed with Arkansas in 2013 from a junior college in Iowa.
There were some misses in the 2012 class as well, including Vin Ascolese, a linebacker from New Jersey who was a favorite of the message board crowd. Ascolese never made it to Arkansas.
Tight end Demetrius Dean, a favorite target of Allen's at Fayetteville High, couldn't take advantage of a second chance with the Razorbacks. Linebacker A.J. Turner of Lepanto showed great promise on the field when he finished third with 53 tackles and made the SEC All-Freshman team. But he missed the 2013 season with a wrist injury then mostly disappeared after Bret Bielema took over at Arkansas.
Turner transferred to Arkansas State but was dismissed from the team before he even played a down with the Red Wolves.
Remember, too, that Dorial Green-Beckham was kicked off the team at Missouri and tried to play at Oklahoma before getting a third chance in the NFL. What players like these had in talent, they lacked in other areas that can't be easily detected during the recruiting process.
Fast forward to 2016 and the DeLorean is parked again in a bunker beneath the B-wing at Pomfret Hall. With three days to go before the signing period, Arkansas' current recruiting class is ranked No. 36 overall and No. 11 in the SEC, just like it was in 2012.
Coaches whose teams don't finish near the top in the recruiting rankings attempt to convince their fans they recruit for need. That's probably true at Arkansas, where Bielema and his staff have shown an ability to coach 'em up.
Unlike 2012, this class has a 5-star recruit in McTelvin Agim, a defensive lineman from Hope. Razorback fans are also excited about Devwah Whaley of Beaumont, Texas, a 4-star recruit who'll fill a need at running back after the departures of Williams and Alex Collins.
As for the rest, who knows?
We'll check back again in 2020 when the price of plutonium, hopefully, is plunging like the cost of gasoline.
Sports on 01/31/2016