K-State Q&A: Collin Klein, Adrian Martinez, recruiting, Christmas movies and more
The most loyal of K-State Q&A readers should know this story by heart, because I shared it at the top of my very first weekly mailbag when I decided to start answering your questions a decade or so ago, but I’m going to tell it again now that Sam Mellinger is leaving us for for a job with the Kansas City Royals.
This fun, long-running exchange between beat writer and subscribers wouldn’t be a Friday staple without him. He came up with the idea to ask readers for questions on Twitter and respond to them with answers on our website. I read Mellinger Minutes, or Twitter Tuesday as it used to be called, for a few weeks and quickly realized I should be doing the exact same thing, only with a focus on K-State instead of the Kansas City sports scene. I was skeptical all you cool cats and kittens would care enough about my opinions to ask me questions every single week, but you delivered. Here we are all these years later about to become the longest active sports mailbag on this here site.
I can’t thank Sam enough for letting me borrow his idea. When I first approached him about K-State Q&A, I offered him a royalty payment of beer. He could pick whatever he wanted, and I would buy it for him. As long as he didn’t ask for a delivery truck filled with Duff, I was happy to comply. Fortunately, he didn’t ask for anything and gave me the thumbs up to do my own thing free of charge. That didn’t sit right with me, so I bought him one of those big bottles of Tank 7. I probably owe him another one by now.
Without Mellinger and beer, I can confidently say K-State Q&A would not be here today. Best of luck to him in his new adventure.
Now, without further ado, let’s dive into your questions. Thanks, as always, for providing them.
Oh, there are some candidates.
I shared three names that could end up being Kansas State’s new offensive coordinator two weeks ago, and I think they are all still viable candidates today.
Collin Klein will get every opportunity to earn the job over the next month. He was on the road recruiting with Klieman immediately before and after Courtney Messingham was relieved of his play-calling duties. It seems like he made an impression on Klieman during that time.
Klieman now seems genuinely curious to see what Klein can do as offensive coordinator at the Texas Bowl. If the Wildcats win and drop 40 points on LSU, it’s not hard to see him getting promoted.
That’s not to say he is a lock for the position or even the leader in the clubhouse. His quarterback development has been less than impressive in recent years and until recently I got the vibe that few would complain if he found a new job elsewhere. If he doesn’t get the full-time gig, there’s a good chance Old Dominion will try and lure him there as offensive coordinator.
He is a legit candidate. Few people in Manhattan are respected more. K-State players may enjoy playing in his system. Perhaps he is the answer. If he has good ideas for the future of the offense, there’s no harm in waiting to see how he handles the job in Houston.
He’s the internal candidate. Wyoming offensive coordinator Tim Polasek and former Texas Tech head coach Matt Wells make sense as outside candidates.
Klieman used to work with Polasek and he is close friends with Wells.
But I have my doubts either one of those coaches ends up with the gig. At one point, an insider told me Polasek was the runaway favorite, but that speculation has died down considerably. He is too similar to Messingham to excite the fan base. Wells seems too expensive. He also never beat Messingham while he was at Texas Tech.
I think the job will ultimately go to Klein or an up-and-coming assistant coach they interview in January.
I also don’t believe Klieman when he says he hasn’t put much thought into the person he might hire. It might not be at the top of his to-do list with recruiting and bowl prep going on, but I guarantee he has thought about it.
Some will say Klieman should work to bring in a new offensive coordinator more quickly, and I get that. But that’s just not Klieman’s style. He wants all 10 of his assistant coaches working to help the Wildcats win the Texas Bowl. Bringing in a new OC before then would reduce that number to nine.
Rather than answering all of those questions, I’m going to share my overall thoughts on Kansas State’s 2022 recruiting class.
I hope that’s OK.
For the most part, it’s what we have grown accustomed to from the Wildcats. Depending on your recruiting service of choice, K-State’s latest class ranks somewhere in the high 50s nationally and eighth or ninth in the Big 12.
That’s not going to wow anybody. There are only 65 power-conference teams, so beating a handful of them on signing day isn’t great. But stars have never seemed to matter as much at K-State as they do elsewhere. As long as the Wildcats are signing recruits they like early in the process and are winning the occasional battle for a prospect they will have enough talent to win.
A few things I like about this recruiting class:
- Jalen Klemm is the son of a NFL offensive line coach and chose K-State over a boatload of power-conference teams. He could end up being really good for the Wildcats.
- John Pastore is 6-foot-6 and 285 pounds before he steps foot on campus. He’s already bigger than some of K-State’s blockers.
- Tobi Osunsanmi could be a steal at linebacker out of Wichita East
- Jake Clifton probably could have flipped to Oklahoma or Oklahoma State and chose to stay with K-State.
- Sterling Lockett has the best last name imaginable for a K-State receiver
- Klieman thinks Kobe Savage can help immediately at safety next season.
A few things I don’t like about this recruiting class:
- Not a single four-star recruit.
- No quarterback (although that seems less important now that Adrian Martinez is on board).
- No running backs.
- Only one wide receiver.
- Only two Kansas recruits.
Now, I imagine a lot of things I mentioned in that second category will be addressed during the late signing period with more high school recruits and transfers. So it’s a little unfair to judge the class just yet.
The players a team signs on early signing day is only half the battle these days. Honestly, it’s probably best to wait until spring practice starts to truly judge a team’s recruiting efforts.
E-MAIL QUESTION: Hey Kellis, I hope I got this question to you in time for K-State Q&A this week. What should we expect from Adrian Martinez? Is it bad that I’m a little underwhelmed? I get that he is probably better than Will Howard, but it’s hard for me to get excited about the guy after watching him throw so many interceptions at Nebraska. - Andrew B.
There is no wrong opinion about Martinez at this moment.
You can hate the transfer. You can love the transfer. You can shrug your shoulders and say “meh” about the transfer. And no one can definitely say you’re wrong. Martinez strikes me as perhaps the most volatile free-agent quarterback of this transfer cycle. His time at K-State could go a million different ways.
He is coming off shoulder surgery and is unlikely to participate during spring practice. There’s no guarantee he will be able to adjust to a new offense or win the starting job by the time September rolls around.
But if he gets healthy in time to play next season, I am probably more optimistic about what he can do in Manhattan than some. He will be an upgrade over Will Howard, Jaren Lewis and Jake Rubley.
Yes, he turned the ball over way too much and never won more than five games at Nebraska. No K-State fan should be booking flights for the 2022 Big 12 Championship Game just yet. But maybe a change of scenery will do him some good.
Martinez put up monster stats over four seasons and clearly has talent. His dual-threat athleticism could pair nicely with Deuce Vaughn. He could give the Wildcats a ground-oriented identity that opens things up in the passing game.
Adding him to the roster raises both the team’s ceiling and floor next season.
Howard or Rubley may still be Kansas State’s quarterback of the future, but it’s hard to get excited about either one of them leading the offense next year. Martinez at least provides a veteran option in the short term.
They all wanted to leave the state apparently.
None of the top seven rated recruits in the Sunflower State opted to stay home for college. Jaren Kanak committed to Clemson and will probably end up at Oklahoma. Mekhi Miler and Jalen Marshall left for Missouri. Landon Dean favored Oklahoma State. Nick Herzog chose Northwestern.
Gavin Meyers is still a free agent.
It stinks that both the Jayhawks and Wildcats missed out on all of them.
I’m not sure why it has been hard for K-State to convince local talent to stay home in recent years. But this is becoming a more competitive recruiting area. Any top-rated player in Kansas City and Wichita is getting offers to go elsewhere.
K-State was painfully close on Crawford, Dean and Herzog. It made an impression on Kanak, too.
It just didn’t do enough to close any of them.
What’s the answer? Other than winning more games on the football field, I’m not sure.
K-State hasn’t signed the top recruit from its home state since 2004. So something clearly needs to change.
A string of 11-win seasons would help.
Between the years of 1997 and 2003, K-State had six of those and Bill Snyder took the Wildcats to several major bowl games. Four-star recruits wanted to play on teams that won like that.
Fast forward to now, and K-State hasn’t won more than eight games in a season since 2016. Top recruits need more convincing now.
We can sit here all day talking about NIL deals and the NCAA transfer portal, but winning still reigns supreme.
1. Christmas Vacation: This will always be the GOAT for me. I have seen this movie nearly 100 times and it still cracks me up every December. Watching the Griswolds, Cousin Eddie, Frank Shirley and the neighbors survive the holiday season never gets old. I like this movie so much that I own a Clark Griswold hockey jersey and three glass moose mugs.
2. Home Alone: The original and Lost in New York are both total classics. I could watch Kevin McCallister torture the Wet/Sticky Bandits all day long.
3. Die Hard: Yes, it’s a Christmas movie. Let’s not waste time arguing about that. I can’t enjoy the holiday season until I’ve seen John McClane drop Hans Gruber off the roof of the Nakatomi Plaza.
4. Elf: You’re a cotton headed ninny muggins if you don’t laugh when Will Ferrell pours syrup on his spaghetti noodles. My only gripe with this movie is I would never choose to watch it on my own. It’s great for the whole family, but not so much for just the parents.
5. Jingle all the Way: The cast includes Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sinbad, Phil Hartman, Jim Belushi and a young Anakin Skywalker. It’s turbo time!
Honorable mentions: Noelle, The Night Before, The Christmas Chronicles, Office Christmas Party, A Christman Story.
Matt Campbell probably needs another big season like Iowa State had last year on its way to the Fiesta Bowl for him to get a coaching opportunity at one of the premier schools in all of college football.
This seemed like the year for him to make the jump, given that he had a top 10 team entering the season and plenty of desirable jobs opened. But it didn’t work out that way. The Cyclones only won eight games and the best job openings went to other coaches.
I feel like Luke Fickell and Campbell will continued to be mentioned every time a marquee job opens in the midwest, but Campbell’s perception did cool a bit this year.
He’s never won more than nine games in a season at Iowa State. That may need to change before he leaves Ames. But he did just sign a top 25 recruiting class this week. So maybe it will happen at some point.
This story was originally published December 17, 2021 at 10:20 AM with the headline "K-State Q&A: Collin Klein, Adrian Martinez, recruiting, Christmas movies and more."