Let's talk about stars

[anomander]

MF over at Rivalz has one of the more self-indulgent articles up that you will ever read. But still for those stars doubters they did a pretty good job in their evaluations based on the 1st round of the NFL Draft. So far the breakdown is as follows:

5stars - 8
4stars- 8
3stars- 12
2stars- 4

imo that's pretty damn good considering the extremely limited amount of 5 stars that are given out each year. That's why no matter what anybody says, i'd much rather be one of the schools getting the 5 and 4 stars, then...well us. Hopefully this can be the year we can buck the current trend.

 

[tep624]

MF over at . . . . . . has one of the more self-indulgent articles up that you will ever read. But still for those stars doubters they did a pretty good job in their evaluations based on the 1st round of the NFL Draft. So far the breakdown is as follows:

5stars - 8
4stars- 8
3stars- 12
2stars- 4

imo that's pretty damn good considering the extremely limited amount of 5 stars that are given out each year. That's why no matter what anybody says, i'd much rather be one of the schools getting the 5 and 4 stars, then...well us. Hopefully this can be the year we can buck the current trend.

I think the reason why we've historically had issues with the star rankings over the past 10-12 years is because we have typically played in the 2-3 star range over that period and that is the range that is the most subjective and the most often influenced by people with an agenda. If you bump a guy from 2-3 just because X school offers or whatever, people don't really notice. You can't do that as easily once you get up to the 4 and 5 star range because of the amount of eyes on those recruits.

 

[TheCusian]

MF over at . . . . . . has one of the more self-indulgent articles up that you will ever read. But still for those stars doubters they did a pretty good job in their evaluations based on the 1st round of the NFL Draft. So far the breakdown is as follows: 5stars - 8 4stars- 8 3stars- 12 2stars- 4 imo that's pretty damn good considering the extremely limited amount of 5 stars that are given out each year. That's why no matter what anybody says, i'd much rather be one of the schools getting the 5 and 4 stars, then...well us. Hopefully this can be the year we can buck the current trend.

It's not as black and white as "stars don't matter" and "stars mean everything" - I too would prefer to be in the 4-5 star range. Fewer guys in that range don't pan out. And typically size and speed matter - and is the easiest to evaluate.

I'd prefer our coaches run their own evaluation and not rely on stars. Compare tape not stars (which I think is exactly what they do).

And finally - my biggest beef is when the stars fluctuate based on offers and who is offering. At best someone's being lazy, at worst they are allowing bias to over-influence. We've seen it to many times with our kids. Downgraded because someone can't believe we have a better class than Rutgers.

 

[anomander]

It's not as black and white as "stars don't matter" and "stars mean everything" - I too would prefer to be in the 4-5 star range. Fewer guys in that range don't pan out. And typically size and speed matter - and is the easiest to evaluate.

I'd prefer our coaches run their own evaluation and not rely on stars. Compare tape not stars (which I think is exactly what they do).

And finally - my biggest beef is when the stars fluctuate based on offers and who is offering. At best someone's being lazy, at worst they are allowing bias to over-influence. We've seen it to many times with our kids. Downgraded because someone can't believe we have a better class than Rutgers.

Oh I have absolutely no doubt that our coaches do their own evaluations, and don't pay attention to rankings one bit when handing out offers. I think the thing that gets over looked is we usually offer a good amount of these same 4 and 5 star prospects, we just typically don't get much consideration, so for the most part the evaluations are pretty similar.

And you're dead on with size and speed. It's not really hard to give freaks like Clowney, Fournette, Cowart, and the list goes on 5 stars.

 

[qdawgg]

We probably shouldn't get as upset about the rankings our players get in general over the last 10 years or so. Our record over that period is well aligned with the average star rating of our recruits and especially the amount of other big time offers/interest those recruits had. I believe the latter part of that has been trending in a more positive upward direction though, we need to continue that.

 

[anomander]

We probably shouldn't get as upset about the rankings our players get in general over the last 10 years or so. Our record over that period is well aligned with the average star rating of our recruits and especially the amount of other big time offers/interest those recruits had. I believe the latter part of that has been trending in a more positive upward direction though, we need to continue that.

Yep. I totally agree. There will always be outliers, but just like the service evaluators miss, so do college and NFL coaching staffs. This isn't an exact science. You can't measure work ethic, desire, and poise.

 

[jekelish]

The best teams will always bring in some 4 and 5 star guys, but then they'll very rarely miss on 2 or 3 star guys, and the 3 star guys they get are typically at the higher end of the spectrum.

 

[kcsu]

MF over at . . . . . . has one of the more self-indulgent articles up that you will ever read. But still for those stars doubters they did a pretty good job in their evaluations based on the 1st round of the NFL Draft. So far the breakdown is as follows:

5stars - 8
4stars- 8
3stars- 12
2stars- 4

imo that's pretty damn good considering the extremely limited amount of 5 stars that are given out each year. That's why no matter what anybody says, i'd much rather be one of the schools getting the 5 and 4 stars, then...well us. Hopefully this can be the year we can buck the current trend.

no

 

[anomander]

no . . . .

???

 

[OrlandoCuse]

McD AA in hoops = 5 star players in football

High correlation of McD players go onto the NBA. High correlation of 5 stars go to the NFL.

It's all of the other "developmental" players that make or break the teams that can't get the All American/no brainer kids.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

We know the star system has some biases that make its evaluation of individual players questionable, but I think that washes out to some extent when evaluating classes against each other.

Generally, 5 > 4, 4 > 3, 3 > 2, so when you stack up guys with more stars associated with their names, well, you've just got a better chance at having a better team than an opponent that has a roster without so many stars stacked up.

For our program, I think our ceiling in recruiting is to land a few 4 star players every year, with the bulk of our classes made up of high end, well vetted and offered 3 stars, and a sprinkling of high upside 2 stars we really like. When we see a lot of 2 stars it makes me a little leery because while there are still diamonds in the rough, it's pretty difficult actually for a guy that has the chops to go that far under the radar (I know, Bromley, I know. But that guy is rare, ok? You can't count on that.). I think we're better off being really selective on which ones we think those are than try to rely on our staff being that much better at identifying talent and developing it than everybody else.

 

[dasher]

no . . . .

excellent point.

 

[RCDICK44]

It would be interesting to see how many 4 & 5 star players left early versus 2 & 3 star Players.The 2 & 3 star players may have been as good as the higher rated players with the extra year of experiance.Just a thought.

 

[A Clockwork Orange]

Betelgeuse is probably my favorite.

 

[SUskibum]

I think the stars in general are a "decent" indicator but I have always thought there are two big blind spots they have.

1. Teams in transition: I think teams coming off a prolonged poor performance period but are now improving (Duke/Cuse) have their guys a little underrated and teams coming off a prolonged up period but have been recently trending down (Florida) have their guys a little overrated. Teams that are fairly stable (good or bad) tend not to have this bias not show up as much.

2. Kids who commit early (like Shy) or kids who decided they don't want/need to continue doing the combines/camps anymore (like RW) tend to get underrated, mostly out of pure laziness. I figure the kids who are still available are the ones most teams (and fans) pay the most attention to and the rating services know this and direct their attention accordingly.

I dunno, my head is a crazy place :noidea::crazy:

 

[SU68]

For fans like me who do not study recruiting in depth, the stars are very useful in comparing the competition and our own progress. I do not lose sleep over whether we can get any 5 stars or whether a player is a high 3 or a low 4 depending on what school gets him.

I like to compare our stars to those of the schools we play because it does provide an expectation of how successful we should be in future years.
I also like to compare our average star ratings against our W-L record (it's always a year off) to get a feel for our steps forward/backward over a number of years. What is the trend line and what can we draw from it.

 

[LSUBahrain]

Pretty cool article from last year that compares on the field results to recruiting rankings. Nice chart and then some tables embedded in the article with the detailed data.

http://regressing.deadspin.com/chart-which-ncaa-football-teams-outplay-their-recruit-1640831522

 

[TheCusian]

For fans like me who do not study recruiting in depth, the stars are very useful in comparing the competition and our own progress. I do not lose sleep over whether we can get any 5 stars or whether a player is a high 3 or a low 4 depending on what school gets him. I like to compare our stars to those of the schools we play because it does provide an expectation of how successful we should be in future years. I also like to compare our average star ratings against our W-L record (it's always a year off) to get a feel for our steps forward/backward over a number of years. What is the trend line and what can we draw from it.

Yeah - we've over performed our star ranking since Marrone's tenure.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

I think the stars in general are a "decent" indicator but I have always thought there are two big blind spots they have.

1. Teams in transition: I think teams coming off a prolonged poor performance period but are now improving (Duke/Cuse) have their guys a little underrated and teams coming off a prolonged up period but have been recently trending down (Florida) have their guys a little overrated. Teams that are fairly stable (good or bad) tend not to have this bias not show up as much.

2. Kids who commit early (like Shy) or kids who decided they don't want/need to continue doing the combines/camps anymore (like RW) tend to get underrated, mostly out of pure laziness. I figure the kids who are still available are the ones most teams (and fans) pay the most attention to and the rating services know this and direct their attention accordingly.

I dunno, my head is a crazy place :noidea::crazy:

I think you're right on both accounts. That's why I think that looking at classes is a little more reliable. Although even that has its quirks, like that guy that was convinced we couldn't have a better class than Rutgers and so he ended up downgrading some of our individual player rankings.:crazy:

 

[anomander]

Here is an interesting article. It should tell us 2 things:

1. The star system isn't as bad as most people make it out to be. In fact it's pretty damn accurate.

2. The ACC Atlantic is absolutely loaded with talent. FSU, Louisville, and Clemson were in the top 12 in terms of players drafted. Even BC had 3. It just shows what we are up against. It's obvious just by watching we need an enormous upgrade in talent, and this is the actual proof.


http://www.sbnation.com/college-foo...results-college-conference-recruiting-ratings

 

[jekelish]

Here is an interesting article. It should tell us 2 things:

1. The star system isn't as bad as most people make it out to be. In fact it's pretty damn accurate.

2. The ACC Atlantic is absolutely loaded with talent. FSU, Louisville, and Clemson were in the top 12 in terms of players drafted. Even BC had 3. It just shows what we are up against. It's obvious just by watching we need an enormous upgrade in talent, and this is the actual proof.


http://www.sbnation.com/college-foo...results-college-conference-recruiting-ratings

The good news is that I legitimately believe that with last year's class (getting guys like Pickard and Clark and, if he qualifies, Blair, along with Henderson and Cullen, etc, etc) and this year's class (in terms of what it will HOPEFULLY be once the snowball effect really takes hold), we're addressing the talent gap.

 

[bcubs9497]

Here is an interesting article. It should tell us 2 things:

1. The star system isn't as bad as most people make it out to be. In fact it's pretty damn accurate.

2. The ACC Atlantic is absolutely loaded with talent. FSU, Louisville, and Clemson were in the top 12 in terms of players drafted. Even BC had 3. It just shows what we are up against. It's obvious just by watching we need an enormous upgrade in talent, and this is the actual proof.


http://www.sbnation.com/college-foo...results-college-conference-recruiting-ratings

It shows that 2 4 7 sports has a better group of analysts than that craptastic garbage of a site AKA Rivals. I'd trust them, and Scout, over Rivals.

 

[anomander]

The good news is that I legitimately believe that with last year's class (getting guys like Pickard and Clark and, if he qualifies, Blair, along with Henderson and Cullen, etc, etc) and this year's class (in terms of what it will HOPEFULLY be once the snowball effect really takes hold), we're addressing the talent gap.

I actually think the 2014 is better, so we should hopefully start to see some results this year. Kind of why I am so hyped about the potential of our defense. It's going to be young, but there is a lot of potential there.

It shows that 2 4 7 sports has a better group of analysts than that craptastic garbage of a site AKA Rivals. I'd trust them, and Scout, over Rivals.

It's actually the 2 4 7 composite, which is an average of all the major services (2 4 7, Rivalz, Skot, ESPN).

 

[tep624]

And like clockwork Rivals downgrades Cam Degeorge from 3 to 2 stars with no justification at all.

 

[anomander]

And like clockwork Rivals downgrades Cam Degeorge from 3 to 2 stars with no justification at all.

Yep this is definitely the shady stuff.