Weekly Word: Recruiting's New World Order, Signing Day and more

This fall, Aidan O'Connell — a sixth-year coronasenior — will take Gus Hartwig's snap. Then he might either hand the ball off to Christopher Brooks — who played last season at Cal — or Sampson James — who began his career at Indiana — or he might throw the ball to Broc Thompson, Tyrone Tracy or Elijah Canion — transfers from Marshall, Iowa and Auburn, respectively. He might be relying on offensive guard Sione Finau to keep a pass-rusher off him, as he did at Florida International the past few seasons.

That's a hell of a paragraph, I know, but I typed it not to make you sick to death of suspensive hyphens, but to illustrate college football recruiting's new reality: Forget five years from now, the time is now, and the goal is not to build teams but to piece them together real-time.