Take Two: Will Jimbo Fisher and the Aggies finish strong?

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Take Two returns with a daily offering tackling a handful of issues in the college football landscape. Rivals.com National Recruiting Analyst Adam Gorney lays out the situation and then receives takes from Rivals.com National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell and a local expert from the Rivals.com network of team sites.

CLASS OF '18 RANKINGS: Rivals250 | Team | State | Position | JUCO

As it stands, Texas A&M has the second-to-last recruiting class in the SEC, a far cry from the high hopes when coach Jimbo Fisher left Florida State for College Station months ago.

But National Signing Day is still a few days away and that means there is still a tremendous amount of time for the Aggies to close strong. Expectations are high that A&M will do that with a bevy of high-level players and so any concerns about Fisher’s recruiting prowess could be put to bed by early Wednesday.

Since Fisher’s hiring on Dec. 1, Texas A&M has only landed commitments from two three-star prospects - DT Mohamed Diallo and TE Jace Sternberger. As Texas closed with one of the nation’s best recruiting classes, the Aggies have quietly gone through December and January without much to show.

Does that change Wednesday with a huge haul? Is it even fair this early to judge Fisher and his staff when it comes to recruiting or would the 2019 class be a better barometer? Or do the Aggies finish with a flourish with many top targets still on the board?

“It's no secret that Jimbo Fisher's start to his tenure at Texas A&M has been slow and left some people underwhelmed. But signing day isn't quite here yet, and it looks like the Aggies are positioned to make a big splash on Wednesday. A&M appears to be the favorite to sign Rivals100 safety Leon O'Neal, four-star DE Jeremiah Martin, four-star RB Jashaun Corbin and three-star TE Glenn Beal. They're at least even money to land five-star WR Jaylen Waddle, and the Aggie coaching staff has been confident about him for some time. There's a very real chance they could land four-star DT Bobby Brown and three-star ATH Vernon Jackson, both Alabama commits, as well. The Aggies and Tide also seem to be the favorites of QB Brock Purdy of Arizona.

“With Grant Gunnell and now Brian Williams, the Aggies have the start of a very nice 2019 class already in place. Virtually every standout in the class was in College Station this weekend and Fisher and his staff certainly have appeared to grabbed early momentum. A good class in 2019 was pretty much expected considering the recruiting clout of this staff - but it could be the strong finish to 2018 that impresses most.”

“They’re going to finish strong. They’re not going to finish that low. It’s a smaller class and Fisher has been pretty picky on who he wants to bring in but they’ll finish strong.

“They’ll probably get Waddle, O’Neal, Martin, maybe Corbin, and possibly others. I don’t think he’s overloading for this year like some others are and taking fliers on kids. He’s being very picky. It won’t be a super high-rated class because it will be smaller but it will be fine.

“The 2019 class is going to be pretty interesting because it’s loaded in the state of Texas. You have Texas recruiting extremely strong, you have Jimbo and Texas A&M now, you have Oklahoma. Getting Williams was an important start and could be a lot of momentum heading into the spring when you look at the 2019 recruiting class.”