Sounds like the college equivalent of the Steelers approach in the NFL. Seems to have worked well for both Wayne State and the Steelers.
I was never close to being a D-1 caliber athlete, so I have no idea, but will this scenario translate when recruiting quality D-1 players? Most of them are pretty cocky (and rightly so) and firmly believe they're going to come in & be BMOC right off the bat, right?
(Just playing devil's advocate here, because I know PW already has plenty of experience in recruiting D-1 players. Also, if need be, I'm sure PW could tweek his strategy a bit.)