The Meyer jinx?

In 2006, Urban Meyer was fired up about one freshman in particular and shared his excitement about Percy Harvin, starting on signing day and continuing into the early part of the season.

Then Harvin injured his ankle in the third game against Tennessee and was hampered for much of the remainder of the season.

A year later, Meyer had high praise for incoming freshmen defensive tackles Torrey Davis and John Brown. Neither are here. Davis had trouble off the field. Brown had trouble in the classroom and is now at Tennessee.

Last year, Meyer’s favorite recruit was defensive tackle Omar Hunter. He went so far as to say that Hunter was the Tim Tebow of the 2008 recruiting class. Hunter turned out to be no factor last season, facing a seemingly endless struggle with nagging injuries.

This past February, Meyer stood at the podium for his national signing day news conference and compared Andre Debose to Percy Harvin. He admitted he likely was putting too much pressure on Debose, but he couldn’t help making the comparison after seeing Debose do some of the same things Harvin did with the ball in his hands.

Debose is now out with an injured hamstring.

Meyer was asked earlier this week if there is a Meyer jinx at work here.

“I’m an emotional guy and I love recruiting and I love players, and I love when I get a monster,” he said. “Andre Debose will be fine. So is Omar Hunter. Is he a year behind? Yes, those kind of things happen. That’s called athletics.”

Meyer said he will not hesitate to heap praise on his top recruits in the future if he feels it’s warranted.

“Am I going to not act excited about a recruit when I come in here?” he said. “No, that’s not going to happen.”