The two people who publicly complained were Fair, who had his offer revoked because he hadn't made the academic progress that was expected, and Pola-Mao, who said that all of his suitors had gone quiet in January. It also appears that that was related to some academic issues not being addressed. I don't know the details of either beyond what's been published, but both seem like the sort of situations where the Nebraska coaching staff was sincere in the offer, but they couldn't make the commitment after it was clear that there would be academic issues. The same thing happened with Mapieu last year. In all three situations, and with what we know about Desmond Bland's on-going situation, it would appear that Frost & staff have been above-board in their communications with these players, and they would appear to have been more loyal and patient than most people would expect for someone in their situations.Until NU gets back to being BIG RED Frost will likely offer a ton of people to hopefully start a conversation. Unlike Alabama which offered 275 or so and then backed away from some kids (as Texas did with Houston, and Bama with Gates), dont think NU turned down the commit of very many of those 422. Once NU gets back to winning I expect that number to go down quite a bit. Also they will have had more time to establish relationships and evaluate the players that they believe will fit at NU. This first year or so they didnt have that luxury.
The only other commitments that we "turned down" that we know of would be someone like Bivens (assuming that he doesn't sign), and it seems clear that there was always a condition on that from the start as he seems to have been waiting for a commit-able offer that (as far as we know) hasn't come yet.
Who am I missing? Can we name anyone else who held "an offer" from Nebraska, tried to commit, and was turned away besides these (or others) with academic issues? As others have mentioned earlier, we (apparently) made several commit-able offers to top QB prospects for the '19 and '20 classes, and McCaffrey and Smothers were the first to accept. It seemed to be implied that Johnson (from Oregon) was interested, but he didn't commit, and that door closed when McCaffrey did.
Am I wrong about any of the above? I'm just summarizing what I've read here and elsewhere, so I'd love to hear more details from anyone who knows more.