National Signing Day Thread

Feel free to bitchand moan.  I'm gonna be in and out all day, so I'll try and keep this updated.  But here is LSU's official commitment list.  Here is the link to Rivals' list of signees.

Michael Ford gets up early.  He was the first to officially sign, at 8:08 AM. 

9:15 AM: Barkevious Mingo has apparently signed with LSU per Rivals radio, though it's not showing up on the web yet.  Also, Janzen Jackson is supposedly waiting until tommorow to fax his LOI.  He's one of our verbals, and I'm not taking this as a good sign.  He'll still probably sign, but I hate when a verbal waits to officially sign.  It makes me nervous. 

9:30 DeAngelo Benton to Auburn?  And does this actually help us with Randle?  Who knows? 

10:45 Sorry, I was out for a bit.  As mentioned in the comments, Sam Montgomery signed with LSU on ESPNU.  That's a big get, and it is cool for him to plug Shepard for his work.  So far, it's been a good day, despite losing Benton. 

11:00 Rumors are flying all over the internet regarding Randle and Richardson.  Nobody really knows anything, but the message boards are blowing up.  If you believe the rumors, LSU will be very happy by the end of the day.  I don't believe it until it happens.  Trust no one, especially a college sports message board. 

11:30 Still waiting on the big announcements.  Jarvis Jones and Rueben Randle are scheduled to announce in a hour.  Russell Shepard is currently on ESPNU giving us lots of good publicity.  He's an easy guy to like and is really comfortable on camera.  He's getting me pumped up.

11:45 Bama is having a wierd day.  They've lost some of the big names on their board, but almost all of their verbals have signed, so it's not like they lost anyone.  Richardson is still the big worry for them, but they just signed Brandon Moore and Eddie Lacy.  Saban has been real good at getting kids from Louisiana that LSU showed lukewarm interest in early.  He got the foothold early, and when LSU made a late push, it was too late.  Though Montgomery makes up for losing Sentimore.  Especially since his recruitment is sort of the reason LSU didn't target Sentimore that highly until late. 

12:15 Trent Richardson is live chatting on espn.com.  Here's the money quote:

Trent Richardson: (1:18 PM ET ) I will make my decision later today and I hope I do well wherever I go. And thank you.

So, no decision yet. 

12:45 Kelly to Bama.  Jones to USC.  Still waiting on Randle.  Richardson, if we're trying to play Kremlinologist, mentioned his love of the I-formation in his ESPN chat.  That would bode well for LSU.  But Bama is finishing real strong, so that bodes well for them. 

1:00 Randle is a Tiger!  Now, philosophical question: I tend to be a guy who would rather have two four-star guys than one five-star guy because I believe in the whole numbers game theory.  Now, Benton has gone to Auburn and it is possible now that Bell will now sign with Bama.  So, did we essentially run off Benton and Bell in order to sign Randle and is that a good decision?   

2:30 Hey, late updating again.  Bell is officially at Bama.  Xavier Su'a Filo to UCLA, but he was always a longshot.  This class seems complete with only the hail mary of Richardson still on the board.  It is a terrific class that will compete for the mythical recruiting title.  No complaints here. 

4:10 Trent Richardson signs with Bama.  Even put on the houndstooth hat.  21,000 losers watched online.  I was one of them.  Bama had a rough morning and then an awesome afternoon.  Richardson wasa longshot, and I'm still very happy with the LSU class.  This would have just been lagniappe. 

5:15 Last update.  Pittman will come on and clean up the mess I've made and make sense of today.  I don't know enough about recruiting to give any real analysis other than the rankings and whatnot.  But the last update is that Kenny Bell has not faxed his LOI to Bama and is now talking about switching back to LSU according to MaxPreps.  Which means there are still two LOI's pending (which means they could still go anywhere as far as I'm concerned): Bell and Jackson. 

5:25 I lied.  I just checked lsusports.net and Randle hasn't officially sent his LOI either.  I'm less concerned about that considering he had a press conference and all, but it's still a concern.  OK, now I'm signing off and leaving it to Pittman.