While it’s fun to speculate on recruiting classes and what they might turn out to be, and we will certainly do that in a few days with this year’s Iowa class, it’s just as interesting to look back on the classes from the past to see how they panned out.  We find that what we thought we knew four or five years ago wasn’t quite the sure bet, and in the case of Iowa football, many of the unheralded players turn out to be something special.

Today, we’ll look at the Class of 2005 plus a few select players from the class of 2006 that played as true freshmen and/or left school early to enter the professional ranks this year.

First, here’s a link back to the Class of 2005 with star ratings:  Scout.com (8th nationally) / Rivals.com (11th nationally)

Here is a list of names that didn’t make it to campus, didn’t make it to senior day at Iowa and either left school for one reason or another before their eligibility had expired or had to give up the game due to injury:

LB Julian Smith (Clearinghouse)
DT Vernon Jackson (injury)
DT Ryan Bain (transfer)
S Justin Edwards (transfer)
RB Kalvin Bailey (grades)
RB Dana Brown (suspended)
RB Corey Robertson (grades)
DT Justin Collins (transfer)
LB B.J. Travers (grades)
QB Jake Christsensen (transfer)
WR Marcus Wilson (grades)
DT Alex Kanellis (injury)

**Shonn Greene was listed in the Class of 2005 on both Scout and Rivals.  He attended Milford Prep in the fall of 2004, and had originally committed to Iowa with the Class of 2004. 

If you choose not to include Greene in this class, it started with 23 members. 12 of those 23 did not see senior day and 10 of those 23 did not make any meaningful on field contributions.

However, those that stayed were (bowl) champions, as the old saying goes. Tyler Blum was also a member of this class, but injuries marred his career. Had Jake Christensen stuck around for his senior year, the Hawks probably get past Northwestern, although how things played out, it’s probably best that he was at Eastern Illinois, for himself and for the Iowa program.

In seeing some of these names for the first time in a long time, I remember back to interviews and videos from the past…Corey Robertson reminded me of Eric Dickerson, which is upright running style and long strides. Kalvin Bailey was the top fullback in the nation. BJ Travers had offers from over 30 schools, including USC.

Here is a list of the players that did finish things out from this class:

TE Tony Moeaki: It was good to see Tony get to play the majority of the snaps this year, even if it wasn’t an injury free season. He has incredible talent, and his career at Iowa will likely be remembered as a guy that couldn’t stay healthy. If he had been able to do that, he probably wouldn’t have been around the entire time because he would have been able to turn pro early. If he can stay healthy at the next level, he’s going to make someone look real smart this April.

OL Dan Doering: Dan was a big piece of the Class of 2005. Good kid, just was unable to break into the starting lineup during his career.

OL Dace Richardson: Mid season All American this year after a remarkable comeback from devastating knee injuries.

OL Rafael Eubanks: I recall some of the Iowa commits calling Rafael from the US Army All American game, urging him to choose Iowa and saying he should have been down there with them. Eubanks had offers from Miami (FL), Minnesota, Notre Dame, Oklahoma and several others. He played his best football as a senior this past season, and did a darned good job.

OL Marshal Yanda: Sort of a late addition to the Class of 2005 from the junior college ranks. I recall at the time people just saying that he was farm strong. Moved into a starting role this year with the Baltimore Ravens, including their playoff run.

OL Andy Kuempel: Had offers from Michigan and Florida, plus a host of other schools. Injuries hit him early and often.

LB Pat Angerer: One of the best Iowa linebackers of the past three decades.

OL Kyle Calloway: Iowa watched him work out at their June camp, and a few days after he got home, he had an offer in the mail. He was a big surprise to them, one of the biggest from the camp.

WR Trey Stross: Another Iowa camp standout, but he was on Iowa’s radar before that. Jake had committed during Iowa’s June camp or around that time. Stross committed days later, and then Ohio State came through with a written offer and he said no thanks. Some of his high school football tape still amazes me to this day. He was an athletic freak, but he was hit hard by injuries at Iowa.

So when you look at this class as a whole, you had just seven players make multi-year and significant contributions on the field: Moeaki, Christensen, Stross, Eubanks, Richardson, Yanda, Calloway and Angerer.

When you look back on the 2006 & 2007 seasons, when the players in this class would have been eligible to play, especially as third year in the program players in 2007, it’s not hard to see why Iowa struggled in those years, finishing 6-7 & 6-6.

This is not a program that can afford close to 60 percent attrition from one recruiting class the way Iowa did with the 2005 class, which was the highest rated (on paper) class of the Ferentz era.

However, we have to add a few names to this group that saw their Iowa careers come to an end after this season. That’s a good way to go back and look at the classes; it’s not necessarily who signed in a class, but the kids that go out together. In essence, you have a ‘playing class’, guys that finished their Iowa careers at the end of the same season.

LB AJ Edds: Played as a true freshmen, which is why he goes out with the players mentioned above. He was overmatched that first year, but his class was the first that Kirk Ferentz and the Iowa staff began to change their paradigm about playing first year players. The following season (2007) Ferentz would say that Edds was more than twice the player he was a true frosh, for having played that year and then having had the spring to improve. Edds leaves Iowa as an excellent assignment football player and one of the better coverage linebackers Iowa has had in the past two or three decades.

CB Amari Spievey: Came in with the 2006 class, redshirted, left after that year due to grades and came back to make two full seasons of excellent contributions. Leaves school with one year of eligibility remaining.

And we have to add one name from the signing Class of 2007, and that is:

OL Bryan Bulaga: Will be selected in the first round of this April’s NFL draft, one of the top five linemen of the Ferentz era, with Robert Gallery, Bruce Nelson, Eric Steinbach & Rob Bruggeman in that mix, at least in my opinion.

So of this collection of 10 players, six of them were starters in their final year at Iowa. Again, that is a very small number and it’s a testament to the younger players from classes that came later, much less heralded classes, who have stayed with the program, put in the hard work and helped carry this team to a 20-6 record the past two seasons, with wins in the Outback and Orange Bowls.

Monday night, we will take a look at some underrated (on paper) Iowa recruiting classes from the Ferentz era, but classes that made a big on field contribution.

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