Good news for Missouri Tigers: he is back….

The Three-Step Method Eli Drinkwitz Developed to Improve Roster Talent

I penned an article on these electronic pages last spring that examined Eli Drinkwitz’s change in strategy for roster building between his first and fourth seasons at Missouri. He focused a lot of his first two years on high school recruiting, signing some of the top prep classes in the school’s annals. With the launch of the transfer portal and the development of his roster, he reduced the number of high school recruits he signed and added veterans to his squad, concentrating on transfers from Power Five schools with multiple years of eligibility.

This offseason has seen that trend continue thus far, albeit with a new twist. The quality of players Missouri can sign has increased thanks to Eli and his staff, the NIL program, and top-down alignment. Success in each of the three crucial areas of talent acquisition and roster building has allowed for this luxury.

Eli’s initial successes at Missouri came from his high school recruiting exploits, so there’s no need to endlessly hash and rehashing this. In retrospect, his response to Ennis Rakestraw’s commitment on signing day—when an Alabama offer was on the table—was a sign of things to come.

You could argue that Luther Burden is the most influential recruit in school history, even though some of the blue chippers who were signed have never played or were undervalued. Nevertheless, many of them have already had a significant impact for the Tigers on the field. (Maybe an off-season column?) Yesterday, Drinkwitz and associates signed a top-25 class that included six blue-chip players according to 247’s rankings, continuing their success in high school recruiting. In addition to Courtney Crutchfield, Cameron Keys, Kewan Lacey, and other outstanding prospects, one of the best players in the nation is Williams Nwaneri. Eli Drinkwitz has excelled in the most crucial of the three roster-building categories in Mizzou’s recent history.

In my post from the previous season, I detailed Drinkwitz’s embrace of the transfer portal era and his definite preference for the kind of transfers he was looking for—Power Five players with multiple years of eligibility. Three of Missouri’s four transfers thus far this offseason fit that description, continuing the trend.