Everyone ignored him because time spent talking to a track ref is time wasted by a D1 college football coach.
There isn't a fan base in the United States that doesn't think that recruiting more local talent will turn their program around. I hear the same thing here in South Carolina. Frequently it's the dying wish of a dying program.
I present to everyone the Wake Forest Roster. On the entire team, there are only three kids from Winston-Salem. Very few are from what people call the Triad (W-S/High Point/Greensboro). If they tried to load their team up with a ton of kids from the Triad, they would be firmly located in last place of the Atlantic division instead of first place and ranked below 100 instead of 13th. I'm still not entirely sold on this team because of the putrid defense, but so far so good. I'll see tomorrow at 4 if they they lay an egg or not against Duke. The point is even a historically pathetic program like Wake can win with the right vision and players recruited to fit into the vision/culture. Dave Clawson would fail at almost every school in the country. An AD saw he had the perfect background for Wake, hired him and let him fulfill what was his vision. Clawson is an example of a leader who knew how to hire into a specific culture. It took a lot of balls to give Grobe the boot, but it worked out for the best. We need that kind of vision in an AD. Someone specifically suited for Akron is the key to success.