1.30.2012 Daily Bears Report, Late Night Edition

I'm traveling for work this week, and I'm fairly certain there are cave complexes in Afghanistan with faster internet than the hotel in which I am staying (#firstworldproblems), so this is going to be relatively light on news links. It takes a lot to clip all of those things together, ok? I promise to get something up early tomorrow with so many news links it will make your head explode from the linkaliciousness.

SURPRISE. I posted a ton of links anyway because I'm a link addict. We'll go with the ladies first and then the men. Just like you should have done, Captain Schettino.

• Baylor still No. 1 in AP women's basketball poll - Boston.com- Baylor remains the unanimous No. 1 choice in The Associated Press women's college basketball poll.
• Kansas still leads Big 12, but Missouri, Baylor close behind as second half begins - The Washington Post- Kansas coach Bill Self is sticking by the prediction he made back in October, before the season began and long before the Big 12 race started heating up...
• Big 12 three-pointers: Depth edge goes to Baylor, KSU - KansasCity.com- Big 12 teams have never had a more active January. By Wednesday, all teams will have played nine conference games, more than ever because of the 18-game schedule in the 10-team league. Fatigue could come into play as the weeks continue.
• In basketball, Baylor Bears not yet the finished product- The warts are obvious. They're young, with first-year players everywhere you look. They don't always protect the ball and sometimes handle it with the same dexterity they would a live grenade.
• Perry Jones has 22 points, 14 rebounds to lead No. 6 Baylor over Texas 76-71 - The Washington Post- WACO, Texas — Close games are becoming the norm for No. 6 Baylor.
• College basketball: Iowa State's upset of Kansas good for its NCAA resume - I like it any time Kansas loses in basketball.
• Nine things and one crazy prediction for this week - I only included this (I normally abhore Bohls) because he actually said a few good things about Baylor in between the Longhorn love and the even worse Longhorn love.

A little recruiting news:

• 2012 Baylor Football Recruiting: Art Briles Continues Program's Upward Trajectory - SB Nation Dallas- Robert Griffin III's Heisman Trophy has Baylor poised for their best recruiting class in Art Briles five-year tenure in Waco.-- The only thing I'm not crazy about is the tagline here; I don't think the Heisman Trophy has helped Baylor with this class much on its own. Most of the work began months ago when the coaches started building relationships. The Trophy should do its best work next year.
• Scout.com: 2013 QB Commits to Baylor- The Baylor Bears have snagged a commit from one of the best in Texas for the Class of 2013.
• Bears pick up second 2013 commit- Chris Johnson gives an early commitment to Baylor.
• Chris Johnson talks Baylor commitment - Football Recruiting - Midlands Region Blog - ESPN- As Baylor’s junior day came to a conclusion, ESPNU Watch List quarterback Chris Johnson (Bryan, Texas) realized he had found his college home.
• Orion Stewart gets his chance- I like short headlines, but this might be a little too short. Needs more OOOMPH.

And a stray FB link:

• Breakout running backs in the Big 12 - Big 12 Blog - ESPN- Glasco/Lache make the list as a combo. I like it.

Head below the jump for a little recruiting info...

Now that the links are out of the way, I want to look at something. You guys can come along for the ride. A few minutes ago, I watched a video interview on Baylor's Scout site (BearsIllustrated, you should check it out if you haven't already) with former Baylor DB commit Zack Sanchez. Without giving too much away, one of the things Sanchez said played into his decision to switch was the depth charts of the respective schools and the size of each school's current DB class. After saying "WHAAAAAAAAAAA," I decided to see how our class breaks down by position.

QB: 2 (Russell, Singleton)

RB: 1 (Chafin)

WR: 4 (Hawthorne, Coleman, Linwood, Griffin)

OT: 2 (Fuller, Armstead)

TE: 0 (so far... *wink*)

DT: 2 (Searcy, Ezell)

DE: 3 (Magee, Palmer, Banks)

LB: 3 (Lackey, Nance, Ehrlich)

CB: 3 (Reid, Burt, Levels)

S: 2 (Edwards, Stewart)

That's 9 offensive commits and 13 defensive commits for 22 overall. Think Phil Bennett knows he has work to do?

A few thoughts:

• I'm guessing that Terrance Singleton doesn't play QB for Baylor, but others will tell you that he has been promised a chance. He could go a bunch of different places on this list, from QB to WR (IR) to CB to S. Maybe even RB if he could bulk up.
  
• Rashodrick Linwood is listed as an athlete. I've heard different things about where he's been told he'll play. Most I've heard that he will get a shot at IR, but I could see a little RB action or a move to CB.
• I wish we could have gotten another RB in this class. I guess if I want to make myself feel better I could count Seastrunk as a part of this class as if he was a JUCO coming in with 3 years to play 3. I wouldn't be surprised at all to see us hit that hard in 2013 along with QB (which we already have with Chris Johnson, future BAMF).
  
• In what is by now a trend in this class, I could also see Kiante Griffin moving across the ball. Kiante is actually one of my favorite recruits in this class; he goes 6'0, 200 lbs and supposedly runs a 4.45. Sounds like an amazing safety in the making.
  
• Polo would have been a great bookend to Magee as 4* DEs... I have to stop talking about him. He's not coming here. TALK ABOUT SOMETHING ELSE... OH. Word is that our mystery recruit that may or may not be grayshirting could fit somewhere in the LB list. I think. And we may be taking another WR. Maybe.
  
• I'm somewhat surprised we only have 2 OL on this list given Briles's past recruiting priorities. We should have 3, but Cameron Bailey will not be signing with Baylor on Wednesday for reasons I'm not sure if I'm allowed to say.

What do you think? What position do you wish we would have hit a little harder?