The new Early Signing Period, from Dec. 20 to Dec. 22, is nearly upon us and it has changed quite a bit in college football recruiting already, but in some ways has not created the chaos many predicted. Rivals.com National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell shares his thoughts on how this could change things moving forward and some improvements that could be made.

More Mind of Mike: A look back - thoughts from National Signing Day 2017

- First off, let me say that I have long been a proponent of an Early Signing Period. I started to campaign for it back in the mid 2000s when I started to see the trend of decommitments on the rise and the number of prospects committed to a school continuing to take official visits late in the process. Many of those official visits are unnecessary and just for fun.

However, I always felt the timing of the Early Signing Period was very important. The current timing - late December - is awful and downright foolish. I’ll get to that down the road. But the bottom line is an Early Signing Period has been necessary for a long time.

- So why is it necessary? The more information exchanged between prospects and colleges the better. And the earlier that information can be exchanged makes for a more honest process. By making schools and prospects put their money where their mouth is (so to speak, not speaking scandalously) by allowing an earlier chance to sign a Letter of Intent leads to accountability.

Currently, most of the power is in the hands of the prospect, as he can verbally commit, take visits and string along schools for as long as he wants and flip or decommit at any time. Yes, schools can drop prospects as we’ve seen from programs as big as Alabama and Michigan and as small as UConn, but the backlash for those schools in the media is much stronger than it is when a high school student changes his mind.

However, the balance of power was far too skewed toward the prospects. Now, in many ways, it’s put up or shut up time if you’ve been committed to a school. You either sign in the Early Signing Period (ESP) or you’re not committed - or at least that how the schools can look at it. That gives the college a chance to start pursuing other players if they choose, to cut ties with the prospect if he doesn’t want to sign or at least be prepared for a flip if and when it comes.

For the player, the ESP gives them an opportunity to be assured they are wanted by the college they have been committed to by looking for a Letter of Intent (LOI) and the opportunity to sign. If a LOI isn’t presented, it is clear to them that they are not a top priority despite being committed (or even uncommitted) and it gives them much more time to find a new destination. The days of prospects being dropped at the last second should end with this early and honest communication and the opportunity to put pen to paper in December.

This will hopefully allow us to avoid situations like we saw with Jarez Parks last year, in which he waited to commit and by the time he did, the only offer he had was a grayshirt offer from Alabama. For Parks, it would have been clear in late December who wanted him and who didn’t if the ESP was in place. Maybe that’s not 100 percent accurate, but it would have at least given him an opportunity to find out if he wanted to. The earlier honest communication occurs, the better it is for all parties.

- The committed player will get more attention in December than in years past. Maybe I’m naïve in this thinking, as colleges will tell you that they recruit committed players just as hard as they recruit uncommitted players. But that’s simply not true. But now, if you want a committed prospect to sign with you during the ESP, you’d better be recruiting them hard. That means in-home head coaching visits for committed prospects will need to be done before Dec. 20 and the committed players will need to be “loved up” more and more leading into the ESP. That’s a good thing. The days of “checking in” with committed prospects while focusing on uncommitted players who may or may not be interested are over.

And the ESP gives the college a great chance to gauge the true commitment of a player. If he wants to sign and does so, he’s clearly committed and locked in. If he doesn’t sign, how committed could he be? We hear it all the time from prospects: “I’m 100 percent committed, but I’m taking other visits to make sure.” That, as we know, makes no sense. It's like telling your wife you’re 100 percent married, but want to date other women to make sure. Now you have to put pen to paper to show your level of commitment as a prospect and that’s good. But as a recruiter, you have to show the love, as well. So one big change with the ESP will be a larger focus on committed players from Dec. 1 to Dec. 20 than ever before.

- There are more things we don’t know about the ESP than we do know. Why? Because it’s the first one. How many decommitments will occur? How many schools will drop players because they didn’t sign? Will early enrollees, who can just wait and enroll a few weeks after the ESP, actually sign a LOI? What’s the point? The majority of early enrollees are highly rated prospects with plenty of options. Those are guys you essentially can’t drop if they don’t sign, so they still hold all the power.

If I’m Trevor Lawrence for example, do I sign with Clemson on Dec. 20 when I can just wait it out and enroll in mid-January? What advantage is there for him to sign? These are things that interest me. And perhaps the most interesting thing about this new phenomenon will be – everything. We won’t know what to expect until it happens and we’ll have a much better gauge of how things will work with the 2019 class next December after we go through this process once.

- Decisions to poach other prospects from smaller schools will need to be made much quicker than in the past. Power programs could always wait until the last second to tap a prospect on the shoulder and have him decommit from a middling program, and it continued to lead to a lack of recruiting parity. Now? Most of the middling or smaller schools will have their prospects signed, sealed and delivered through the ESP than ever before, which means the pool of recruiting fish becomes much smaller after Dec. 22. If you covet your neighbor’s cornerback prospect, you’d better try to steal him before Dec. 20 or he’s gone. The ESP will increase recruiting parity, which is a good thing overall for college football.

- Finally, allow me to complain a bit. The timing of this ESP is simply awful and not well thought out. The dates, Dec. 20 to Dec. 22, are far too close to the first Wednesday of February to truly give kids a break from recruiting. They are saving about three to four weeks of phone calls and visits if they sign early because of the dead period. That’s not enough time.

It’s also far too close to early enrollment, so many can just avoid signing and enroll because there’s not enough incentive to put pen to paper when you can just wait a couple of weeks and show up at the school of your choice.

And finally, the dates are way too close to the coaching carousel. Every year around this time coaches are being fired and hired, staffs are being filled out and confusion runs amok. Why put the ESP so close to that mess? It makes no sense.

The ESP should be in August, and I’ve said this from the start. August is nowhere near early enrollment dates. August is nowhere near the second signing period in February. And August is nowhere near any coaching carousel.

But what about coaching changes, you may ask? Such is life is my simple response. If you are sure of the school you want to attend, the school and not the coaches, then sign in August and avoid five months of recruiting while you enjoy your senior season. If you’re not sure and are worried about coaching changes, then don’t sign. At least players won’t be asked to sign in one of the most tumultuous times of the recruiting year.

You may disagree, but I’ve thought about this for well over a decade and I’m the expert after all, right?