And . . .runs rampant in the responses, as usual

Posted on: August 19, 2016 at 17:38:05 CT

There are relatively few studies of how many players come from the various star rankings. The most authoritative one that I am aware of is one done by the Wall Street Journal several years ago. If found that a higher percentage of five star recruits became players than four star recruits, a higher percentage of four stars became players than three stars, etc. It also found that less than half the five star recruits panned out. The relevant point is some three, two and even unranked recruits became platters. And the relevant conclusion is the more five and four star recruits in a program the more likely it will have more players than a program with mostly two star recruits. Therefore, the more high ranked recruits a program had, the more likely it is to be successful.

The fact that a program has a two star recruit become a star (the Weatherspoon argument) doesn't alter or negate that conclusion. Weatherspoon was simply a two star who worked out.

Another argument that's always made is Pinkel and his staff were very good at identifying diamonds in the rough. There may have been some truth to that, but that's also a very tough way for a staff to make a living, always having to be better talent evaluators than their competition.

A third argument is Pinkel and staff were good talent developers. Again there was some truth to that and it's again a tough way to make a living, always having to overcome an opponent's edge in raw talent.

The post yesterday or the day before reporting the ratio of five and four star recruits to two and three star recruits on nation championship teams as further weight that it's better to have higher ranked recruiting classes than lower ranked ones.

Look at who Pinkel offered. That group includes a lot of high ranked recruits which suggests they were Pinkel's first choice. Can anyone cite a case where Pinkel passed on a high ranked recruit to sign a lower rated recruit. There may well have been a few, but not very many.

And finally ask Odom whether he would rather have just next ten classes ranked 40th or 20th.

Recruiting produces the raw material that goes into a program. Recruit rankings are far from 100% accurate, but they do have some validity. And the better the raw material, the more the coaches have to work with and the more likely the program will be successful.