Texas A&M's Recruiting Rampage in June

Sports fans can be forgiven if much of the past month is a bit of a blur. We've seen California Chrome fall short in a Triple Crown bid, the Spurs reclaim their NBA throne, and an incredible start to the World Cup.

Let's collect ourselves and recall that the birthstone for June is the recruiting service star. This brilliant, often-faked gemstone changes quantity depending on the nature of an offeree. It is most abundant in Tuscaloosa or Baton Rouge and is generally a symbol of joy and good fortune.*

*None of this is true.

For Texas Aggie Football, the past month has been a whirlwind off-the-field as Kevin Sumlin and company have earned eight commitments, starting on May 28th with Kyler Murray choosing A&M over offers from virtually everyone in North America. While many spun the quarterback's commitment as a virtual certainty, in reality Murray took a long, hard look at Oregon, and Sumlin and offensive coordinator Jake Spavital deserve a boatload of credit for landing the outstanding prospect.

With rumblings that several high school standouts across the state were waiting to see which school Murray chose, it took fewer than 24 hours for the next domino to fall as Cy Ridge wide receiver Kemah Siverand chose the Aggies over Arkansas, LSU, Ohio St., and (theme alert) Texas.

Murray's commitment didn't just influence the offensive side of the ball, as one week later defensive tackle Kingsley Keke turned down offers from Florida, Miami, OU, and Texas to play alongside Daylon Mack on Terry Price's line.  The defensive run continued on June 15th as Plano East linebacker Landis Durham set off the #YESSIR bat-signal, selecting the Aggies over Nebraska, Oregon, and Baylor. On Monday, June 16th, offensive lineman Keaton Sutherland announced his intention to sign with A&M, with Arkansas, Baylor, Clemson, OU, and Texas again being left behind.

The run of Class of 2015 commitments culminated on June 19th, as the Cedar Hill duo of wide receiver Damarkus Lodge and linebacker Richard Moore made their commitments known. The undersized but highly skilled Moore sported offers from Nebraska, Oklahoma St., and Wisconsin, while some have casually suggested that 5-star Lodge fits the mold of Dez Bryant.

That would be an extraordinary recruiting run for any program, at any point, and certainly helped increase the national perception of the 2015 class as the Aggies currently rank #2 (behind Alabama) in most recruiting pundits' rankings.

So, what did the A&M coaching staff do for an encore? In this case, they waited exactly one day and added who many think will be the #1 overall prospect in the class of 2016 in Allen offensive lineman Greg Little.

24 days.

8 verbal commitments.

Those of us who pay entirely too much attention to the Twitter activity of high school athletes can argue stars and rankings until our collective flux capacitors break, but the bottom line is this: Kevin Sumlin and his staff are getting their first choice of recruits, on both sides of the ball, at an an unprecedented rate in the modern era of Texas A&M football. If this collection of coaches can scheme and develop as well as most think they can, the best days of Kyle Field look to be the ones in which 100,000+ fans are in attendance.