NFL Draft Position & Star Ratings

[Whitey23]

Sc0ut put together an interesting list of the draftees and their star ratings coming out of HS. Always a topic of conversation around here.


http://recruiting.sc_ut.com/2/1181347.html
(drop an "0" into the blank for the link)

 

[kingottoiii]

The 4 and 5 star guys are the elite HS players. IMO everyone else is a crap shoot when it comes to rankings. What I am interested in is what % of 5 star and 4 star guys are drafted and what is their average draft position. If that turns out how I assume, then yes star rankings of those types of players is a big deal and we want to get these kids. However if there isn't a strong correlation, then we can just say that these rankings are totally meaningless.

 

[SWC75]

I counted 8 five stars, 9 four stars, 8 three stars and 5 two stars. Not sure what to make of Brandon Weeden having no rating: does that eman he had no stars? (The "high school profile" link doesn't work). That makes it seem like it's as easy to make the first round if you are a 3 star, 4 star or 5 star but, of course, there are more 4 stars than 5 stars and more 3 stars than 4 stars, (by a large margin). But you've got to understand that the star ratings are based on their high school careers and guess about their "upside". This if for kids still in their mid-teens. Their NFL draft level is based on their college careers and an evaualtion of the upside of players in their early 20's by professional scouts. Imagine if you were a law firm evaluating high school kids vs. college grads.

 

[Whitey23]

Not sure what to make of Brandon Weeden having no rating: does that mean he had no stars? (The "high school profile" link doesn't work).

My thought was that his baseball career and the fact that he graduated HS 10 years ago allowed him to slip past the scout rankers.

 

[MCuse44]

It would also be interesting to see conversion rates for colleges. Are teams like SU more or less efficient at maintaining a 4/5 star prospects draft trajectory.

The 4 and 5 star guys are the elite HS players. IMO everyone else is a crap shoot when it comes to rankings. What I am interested in is what % of 5 star and 4 star guys are drafted and what is their average draft position. If that turns out how I assume, then yes star rankings of those types of players is a big deal and we want to get these kids. However if there isn't a strong correlation, then we can just say that these rankings are totally meaningless.

 

[xc84]

I counted 8 five stars, 9 four stars, 8 three stars and 5 two stars. Not sure what to make of Brandon Weeden having no rating: does that eman he had no stars? (The "high school profile" link doesn't work). That makes it seem like it's as easy to make the first round if you are a 3 star, 4 star or 5 star but, of course, there are more 4 stars than 5 stars and more 3 stars than 4 stars, (by a large margin). But you've got to understand that the star ratings are based on their high school careers and guess about their "upside". This if for kids still in their mid-teens. Their NFL draft level is based on their college careers and an evaualtion of the upside of players in their early 20's by professional scouts. Imagine if you were a law firm evaluating high school kids vs. college grads.

Yup. Based on this small sample size, appears to be little difference in the number of 5, 4, 3 star kids in terms of being a first rounder. And, I still think there is a fair amount of post recruiting influence on the ratings which doesen't invalidate the ratings, it just means that the rating services are not really evaluating from talent, they are borrowing from the evaluation done by the schools . i.e. Alabama has a lot of 5 star kids on this list. So, if Alabama is recruiting a kid, their rating goes up a notch. And don't get me wrong, these are obviously legit 5 stars. I just wonder if e.g. Griffin had been successfully recruited by Alabama if we would be seeing 5 stars next to his name.

 

[Rocco]

Sc0ut put together an interesting list of the draftees and their star ratings coming out of HS. Always a topic of conversation around here.


http://recruiting.sc_ut.com/2/1181347.html
(drop an "0" into the blank for the link)

How do you open that link? Dumb it down for me, thanks.

 

[Whitey23]

How do you open that link? Dumb it down for me, thanks.

Copy it into your browser. Delete the _ in Sc_ut and enter an O. Should work then.

 

[SWC75]

My thought was that his baseball career and the fact that he graduated HS 10 years ago allowed him to slip past the scout rankers.

Yeah but they ranked high school guys ten years ago.

 

[rrlbees]

1/2 the 1st round picks were 4 and 5 star guys. that seems pretty good.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

1/2 the 1st round picks were 4 and 5 star guys. that seems pretty good.

And, it's a numbers game. Get a bunch of those guys and you only need a few to be really good.

 

[SWC75]

And, it's a numbers game. Get a bunch of those guys and you only need a few to be really good.

The nice thing aobut college football is that if you have a few outstanding indivduals in the right places, you can compete with teams that have a roster full of them. That Auburn team that beat Oregon for the title looked to me like our teams of the 90's if both McNabb, (Newton) and Freeney, (Fairly) were at their peak at the same time.

 

[Henny & Coke]

I've found that this article (which breaks down a series of articles written about recruiting rankings) is the best out there. It pretty much covers all of the questions asked in this thread, including which teams best develop thier lower ranked players & which teams underperform even though they are consistently ranked highly in recruiting top players.

http://www.tomahawknation.com/2011/1/31/1965917/recruiting-rankings-do-matter

 

[xc84]

If you told me which teams offered a kid, their vitals, who eventually landed the kid ...without ever seeing the kid, I could probably be nearly as "accurate" with my ratings as scout/rivals. My problem with rating services is the fallacy that THEY rate players. They really don't. They follow the schools. Anyone think Chandler Jones would have been 2 stars had he, all other things being equal, been heavily recruited by Alabama, USC, and ND?

 

[SWC75]

I've found that this article (which breaks down a series of articles written about recruiting rankings) is the best out there. It pretty much covers all of the questions asked in this thread, including which teams best develop thier lower ranked players & which teams underperform even though they are consistently ranked highly in recruiting top players.

http://www.tomahawknation.com/2011/1/31/1965917/recruiting-rankings-do-matter

He noted that 1 in 13 Five Stars became All-Americans and then warns us not to view five stars as players who are supposed to become All-Americans but simply as players more likely to. He acknowledges that a lot of Two and Three Stars become all Americans but says that since they are 85% of the total recruits, you'd expect some of them to become All-Americans.

When teams recruit top players and don't do well, that's attributed to "bad coaching". I did like this paragraph:
"Elite recruiting is necessary but not sufficient to have an elite team. That is, it won't guarantee you an elite team, but if you don't recruit at an elite level, you will be guaranteed not to have a consistently elite team." We've never been a "consistently elite team". We'd like to be consistently good and occassionally elite. That's our history when we are good.

I don't think anyone doubts that schools that consistently have higher-rated recrutiing class will be better most of the time than schools that don't. But I don't think we are in a position to suddenly have a top recruiting class. We have to win our way to that level with the players we can get. It's therefore encouraging to see some Two and Three star recruits make the college All-American lists. It can be done.

 

[All4SU]

I'll be interested to see if they complete this through the entire draft.