What to expect on Early Signing Day 2021

I know not everyone cares about recruiting and even I, someone who does care about it, can be a little weirded out when some SEC school offers a seventh grader, but it is important to remember that recruiting well has been the top indicator of whether or not your team will consistently be in contention for a College Football Playoff spot.

The Wisconsin Badgers have always been a team that is known to do “more with less” when it comes to star ratings, and that’s awesome and commendable, but if the Badgers really want to compete with Ohio State or Alabama or Clemson they need to recruit more talented players. You see it in all of the Big Ten Championship games where the Buckeyes eventually just “out-talent” the Badgers and it’s extremely frustrating.

This year, the Badgers are expected to sign their best class ever, which comes on the heels of the 2020 class which was the previous best class ever. Stacking “best class evers” on top of one another is a great step towards closing the talent gap between the Badgers and the Buckeyes. Now, if we are being serious with ourselves we know that the gap will never close all the way. There are too many historical and geographical reasons against Wisconsin for that to happen.

But...if the Badgers can continue to develop players better than just about any other school, imagine what they’ll be doing when the developed players all have a 4-star floor. I, for one, can’t wait to find out.

The Early Signing Period for college football starts on Wednesday (aka tomorrow) and Wisconsin is expected to sign their entire 2021 class, which is currently ranked No. 16 (up from No. 26 last year) in the country by the 247 Composite and No. 3 (up from No. 5 last year) in the Big Ten.

Here is what you can expect from us for the rest of the week:

• podcast with 247Sports’ Allen Trieu, who is the lead Midwest Analyst for 247Sports
• profiles on every scholarship player that signs
• a walk-on roundup
• quotes from Paul Chryst once all the players sign and he’s allowed to talk about them
• an interview with 3-star DE/OLB Darryl Peterson (Akron, Ohio)
• roundtable discussion with the B5Q staff on the entire class
• a look ahead to the 2022 class, because ‘crootin never stops
• and more!

Here is a list of the recruits that have announced some sort of “signing day event”:

• 3-star in-state DE Ayo Adebogun who, like all of this year, has no idea what month it even is. We are assuming he means “December 16th” and just wrote the wrong month, but we have reached out to him for clarification.

• 3-star WR Markus Allen (Clayton, Ohio) recently flipped from Michigan to the Badgers but appears to be all in on Wisconsin.

• Not that he’s announcing any sort of ceremony, but it would appear that 3-star DE Darryl Peterson (Akron, Ohio) is ready to get to Madison.

• 4-star DE/OLB TJ Bollers (Tiffin, Iowa) wants you to come to his signing day ceremony but only if you’re practicing proper public heath protocols. High IQ kid!