Note: I began writing this post prior to Pistolsguy’s post yesterday. Also, when I say you should care about recruiting, I mean from a standpoint that it correlates to on-field production. If you get emotionally involved in a high school kid’s college decision, I think you need help.
Another Note: Congrats to Laquon Treadwell on making his college decision. Of course I was hoping he’d be a Cowboy, but it’s a win any time a guy signs his name on that line to accept a college scholarship offer.
I understand as much as anyone that the number of stars next to a guy’s name isn’t a true representation of his future career. You don’t need to throw Justin Blackmon at me accompanied with the fact Rivals had him ranked as the 91st best wide receiver (okay…wow) in the 2008 recruiting class. They missed on him. Almost everyone missed on him.
If that’s your case for recruiting rankings being a complete farce, I’ll point out that Julio Jones and AJ Green ranked first and second in that wide receiver class respectively.
You cannot hand select one guy, or even a group of them, to make your argument. We can go back and forth about guys who panned out (Markelle, Randle, Dez) and guys who didn’t (Reid, Cole, XLK), but neither address recruiting from a team standpoint.
Ten teams have played in the past ten BCS National Championship games: Alabama, LSU, Auburn, OU, Texas, Southern Cal, Notre Dame, Oregon, Florida and Ohio State.
Using the Rivals Team Recruiting Rankings, I went back to 2002 (because that’s as far back as they go) and came up with each of those teams’ average finish in those standings.
|
Team |
Avg Rivals Ranking |
Title Game Appearances |
Championships |
|
USC |
4.18 |
2 |
1 |
|
Florida |
7.36 |
2 |
2 |
|
Texas |
8.27 |
2 |
1 |
|
LSU |
8.55 |
3 |
2 |
|
OU |
9.00 |
3 |
0 |
|
Auburn |
13.09 |
1 |
1 |
|
Ohio State |
13.55 |
2 |
0 |
|
Alabama |
13.73 |
3 |
3 |
|
Notre Dame |
22.73 |
1 |
0 |
|
Oregon |
24.45 |
1 |
0 |
Those averages mean nothing by themselves, so let’s compare them with four other schools, including Oklahoma State.
|
Team |
Avg Rivals Rankings |
|
Georgia |
8.45 |
|
Clemson |
26.82 |
|
Oklahoma State |
31.73 |
|
Michigan State |
36.27 |
Georgia isn’t part of that first group, but you can’t tell me they’re not a Top 10 program. Before looking at these numbers, I would have told you Georgia is far and beyond the best program of the four, and the other three have been on a similar level as far as success. The history of their recruiting classes tell the same story.
Sure we get that occasional Justin Blackmon or Kendall Hunter, but programs whose success relies more on bringing in the best available talent rather than finding hidden gems have outperformed the second tier programs, such as OSU. If recruiting correlates to winning, then why should we not care about it?
Please tread carefully though because there’s a line between caring and obsessing.
*I used Rivals.com for all recruiting information in this post
Matt, while do agree with your correlation it’s still nice to find those diamonds in the rough. OSU has done a great job of finding them and utilizing them over the years. I and I think most Coboys fans can agree you feel a deeper bond watching those players make good and hustle for that playing time. Fact is I believe Gundy and company have done a great job of player evaluation instead of “star” hunting. Great read though and always enjoy your articles.
As long a Alabama can get kids to “grey shirt” or play without a scholarship when other schools are offering a scholarship, you are going to have to win the evaluation game.
I agree with you in that it’s great finding the Blackmon type players. I’m not against that, but schools like Alabama don’t necessarily put a list together of all the top rated players and offer them scholarships. Perfect example – running backs in 2009. Trent Richardson was the #2 RB and Eddie Lacy was #13. Those are the only two RBs they offered in the top 15. So they did some great player evaluating themselves. I understand that they’re more able to pick and choose, but player evaluation is still critical for them.
Appreciate the comment man!
Again you couldn’t be more right. Hopefully as Cowboy prestige grows OSU too will be able to “evaluate” and choose from higher rated players such as your examples above. As Sean stated above, I too believe we have done a great job at the “evaluation game”.
Gundy has had success because he knows who we are and where to spend his valuable recruiting time. No doubt he’s done an amazing job with recruiting
Nice post
A while back an sports illustrated writer did a piece on this topic. His conclusion was more stars = more wins.