Recruit rankings

[OttoinGrotto]

Otto, I would say it is a narrative that some buy into, and some less so. You have the obvious parody of the OP in this thread "I could care less about ratings, but if we get ... then we could move to #57." Or a host of orange-colored claims, that repeat every year:

Our two-stars are better than the three-stars landed by Rutgers, because stars don't mean anything (or rankings are sometimes wrong, for example, Pugh, or it is all biased in favor of Notre Dame, or NY kids don't get rated in the way NJ kids get rated, or ...).
Or, our staff (whether Marrone's staff, or Shafer's staff with a 75% change-over) can both spot and coach up better than [Toledo, or Ball State, or Wake ...]
I don't care how we are doing in July, it is February that counts ...
I don't care about February, remember we landed Jay Bromley in May ...
You can never tell until 3 years out ...

Recruiting is the life-blood of D-1 college sports. You have to hope SU's program becomes more appealing to good prospects, we make more top 3s for visits, and we win our share against BC, Pitt, Temple & Rutgers.

Those are definitely other great examples.

 

[RF2044]

As a fanbase, in general, we have a tendency to gang up on anyone who is critical, in any way, toward our players.

This is the sentiment that RF has his panties In wad about.

Oh, and you better believe that fans are going to start caring more about stars if commits like KJ start being the norm. It's only natural. If this doesn't apply to you RF, then awesome.

LOL--now look who has their panties in a wad.

You're the one who seems to take joy in making generalized, negative straw man attributions, and then applying them to put down our fanbase at every available opportunity. If you don't like being called on it, that's on you.

And no, I don't think that you nor Otto are correct about this. Projecting football recruits is a tremendously inexact science, and there have been many critics of the star system who've expressed that opinion for years on these forums, dating back to when we were still a decent team. I would say that the vast majority of posters who follow recruiting actively [and yes, I realize that not every poster does] understand the star rating system and take it with a grain of salt. Its easier to paint everyone with broad strokes, but that doesn't mean that your characterization is accurate across the board.

And people being excited about landing higher rated prospects doesn't = your premise that suddenly all of the criticisms about the star system will suddenly be rationalized away by SU lemmings.

 

[baggerbob]

As Floyd Little said " you can't teach heart ", guys like Brinkley, and Carter come to mind, people who overcame adverse situations to make it.

 

[HOFCeluck]

LOL--now look who has their panties in a wad.

You're the one who seems to take joy in making generalized, negative straw man attributions, and then applying them to put down our fanbase at every available opportunity. If you don't like being called on it, that's on you.

And no, I don't think that you nor Otto are correct about this. There have been many critics of the star system who've expressed that opinion for years on these forums, dating back to when we were still a decent team. I would say that the vast majority of posters who follow recruiting actively [and yes, I realize that not every poster does] understand the star rating system and take it with a grain of salt. Its easier to paint everyone with broad strokes, but that doesn't mean that your characterization is accurate across the board.

I suppose it depends on how you define "fan." If you are only talking about the group that posts here (which I'm sure we both agree is not representative of our entire fanbase) then you may half a point. If you include everyone, then I tend to disagree.

To be honest I couldn't care less right now...this is the first time I've ever followed/enjoyed football recruiting.

 

[SoBristol]

What I said was kj bumped them from 71 to 57. big jump for one player. I didn't say anything about IF we get player xyz...

Ratings only matter for perception. They don't matter one iota about success and winning football games.

Phat -- your difference ("IF") is splitting hairs. The point is you should care that KJ is a highly regarded, promising WR prospect (whether you go by ratings, or offers, or size/speed, or HS performance, or what his coach may say, or how Rob Moore might view his promise, or video clips of his highlights). You noted that our class as of this stage moved to #57. It isn't all perception -- it is the reality that Williams is a very good prospect, but some of the traditional top 25 schools and most of our rivals have several more very good commits than we do at this stage.

We can all talk about inaccuracies in ratings. It isn't "ratings" that matter as much as whether we are landing some of the talented prospects (like Williams, or Ollison, etc) that any recruiter would want. Recruiting matters, or we wouldn't be talking about how well our coaches do at it.

 

[Van111]

Take it that's over at Rvls?

ESPN has 1 4 star, 6 3 stars and Rodney Willams N/A. Not sure of the team ranking there.

Plus Corey Cooper will at a minimum be a 3 star when he's ranked as a Prep. May very likely be a 4 star.

Ratings just don't seem to make sense sometimes. Isn't it Rivals that has AJ rated as a 2 star, while all the others have him either as a high 3 or 4 star. The kid threw 37 TDs with just 1 pick last year and ran for almost 800 more, must mean something you would think. I expect his rating and many others to change before the end of the year at any rate, either up or down. Just saying take the ratings with a grain of salt so to speak. I do agree with the author that the kids perception on a school and how it is doing does make a difference.

 

[CaliCuse]

I could care less about the stars and rankings but i do watch them bc so much hinges on perception and buzz. that said, KJ boosted Syracuse from #71 to #57.

8 kids
1- 4 star
4- 3 star
2- 2 star

Cabinda hasn't been rated yet, is expect him to be a three.

zaire based on reputation and desireabilty would seem to be a four ultimately,I would think.:noidea:

 

[Shaggy]

Like some have stated before, our fanbase does not pay out a ton for pay sites Skout and Rivils. The job of these sites is to analyze players, but they also have a huge special interest in making money. If these 8 players were commits at Tennessee or Miami right now, then this class would be ranked in the top 25 in my opinion.

AJ and Ziare would be climbing the 4 star ladder on skout or rivils if they were headed somewhere else. Just my opinion

 

[Orangejet]

Agree! Brian Dorn at Skout is a Rutgers mouthpiece and shouldn't be allowed to write so many RU stories.

 

[bnoro]

Agree! Brian Dorn at Skout is a Rutgers mouthpiece and shouldn't be allowed to write so many RU stories.

It's not so much Dohn as it is Hellman (sp?), every article he writes makes it seem like the kid's going to commit there no matter what.

 

[anomander]

It's not so much Dohn as it is Hellman (sp?), every article he writes makes it seem like the kid's going to commit there no matter what.

Isn't it Dohn the one responsible for putting together Mid-Atlantic grades and then passing it up the food chain? Or is a combined effort of a few MA guys?

 

[PhatOrange]

Phat -- your difference ("IF") is splitting hairs. The point is you should care that KJ is a highly regarded, promising WR prospect (whether you go by ratings, or offers, or size/speed, or HS performance, or what his coach may say, or how Rob Moore might view his promise, or video clips of his highlights). You noted that our class as of this stage moved to #57. It isn't all perception -- it is the reality that Williams is a very good prospect, but some of the traditional top 25 schools and most of our have several more very good commits than we do at this stage.

We can all talk about inaccuracies in ratings. It isn't "ratings" that matter as much as whether we are landing some of the talented prospects (like Williams, or Ollison, etc) that any recruiter would want. Recruiting matters, or we wouldn't be talking about how well our coaches do at it.

I do care that we got KJ but not because rvls gives him four stars - which I wouldn't be surprised to see him rated a 3 when rankings are redone. But I'm glad we got hime because he's a good prospect who tore up some camps and is all of his listed size. Has a jacked physique and some quality offers.

I also love Rodney Williams because he tore up our camp and the coaches offered him a ship
on the spot. He's probably better than 2 stars but nobody should care one way or the other.

Of course recruiting matters but so does staff evaluation and scouting. Not what rvls rates a kid.

As has been pointed out our rankings would be right with our peers if we had 20 recruits. And I'm sure by the time February rolls around we'll have several more very good commits as well.

Even though his offer list looks just like Rutgers' 4 star Qb I'm somewhat worried about the hand ringing over Dawson since he's just a two star kid. Forget the fact that our staff has been recruiting him for months, for you it'll boil down to how many stars he has next to his name.

 

[PhatOrange]

Isn't it Dohn the one responsible for putting together Mid-Atlantic grades and then passing it up the food chain? Or is a combined effort of a few MA guys?

I thought dohn was heavily involved in ratings and he's also a Rutgers shill and is/was one of their longtime writers so I'm sure there's no biases there.

It would be no different if Ryn Mrry was doing rankings for rvls.

 

[PhatOrange]

For the star struck, As has been pointed out with regards to numbers and quality. If you sort by average star ranking we're 46, ahead of Colorado, Nebraska, Georgia tech, Rutgers, nc state, Oregon st, Arizona st, Kansas st, Maryland, Boston college, Texas tech, miss state, Baylor, Oklahoma st, Purdue, Pitt, duke, Illinois, Iowa st, Missouri, wake, ... Etc.

 

[bnoro]

I thought dohn was heavily involved in ratings and he's also a Rutgers shill and is/was one of their longtime writers so I'm sure there's no biases there.

It would be no different if Ryn Mrry was doing rankings for rvls.

Mike Farrell is a huge BC shill too so I'm sure that doesn't help. Cabinda and Rodney Williams just got "upgraded" to two stars on scout, which is pure garbage considering all BC's guys have been bumped to 3 stars as soon as they committed.

 

[OrangeMojo]

Mike Farrell is a huge BC shill too so I'm sure that doesn't help. Cabinda and Rodney Williams just got "upgraded" to two stars on , which is pure garbage considering all BC's guys have been bumped to 3 stars as soon as they committed.

nothing new here - MF has been juicing their rankings since this group was a r_v_ls board - surprised he stopped at just 3 stars for most of them

 

[RMH44]

Mike Farrell is a huge BC shill too so I'm sure that doesn't help. Cabinda and Rodney Williams just got "upgraded" to two stars on , which is pure garbage considering all BC's guys have been bumped to 3 stars as soon as they committed.

I could be wrong, but I believe that any player who commits to a BCS school automatically gets 2-stars even if he hasn't been evaluated. Remember that ND has their very own shill as well, in Tom Lemming.

The entire system sucks.

 

[Oakland]

As a fanbase, in general, we have a tendency to gang up on anyone who is critical, in any way, toward our players.

This is the sentiment that RF has his panties In wad about.

Oh, and you better believe that fans are going to start caring more about stars if commits like KJ start being the norm. It's only natural. If this doesn't apply to you RF, then awesome.

I just got a lesson in this on the BB side just by stating that some of our recruits were not our first option, and I didn't even criticize the players!

 

[Oakland]

I could care less about the stars and rankings but i do watch them bc so much hinges on perception and buzz. that said, KJ boosted Syracuse from #71 to #57.

8 kids
1- 4 star
4- 3 star
2- 2 star

Cabinda hasn't been rated yet, is expect him to be a three.

Phat this is intended as a response to the whole thread not just you. The stars (and especially the rankings are guesses, sometimes educated sometimes not) are full of flaws, the lower you go the more flawed. But they are much better than many in this thread think. For all of you who think that the stars don't correlate with ability, would you bet your money on a team consisting of 4 star players vs a team of 5 star players? My money is on the 5 star team, and I'd guess that the 5 star team would win 10 out of 10.

 

[HOFCeluck]

I just got a lesson in this on the BB side just by stating that some of our recruits were not our first option, and I didn't even criticize the players!

Yeah I saw that...I've seen enough recruiting battles that I have complete faith in our staff.

Even when it doesn't work out for us...it works out for us (Hakim Warrick, Nerlens Noel)

 

[HOFCeluck]

Phat this is intended as a response to the whole thread not just you. The stars (and especially the rankings are guesses, sometimes educated sometimes not) are full of flaws, the lower you go the more flawed. But they are much better than many in this thread think. For all of you who think that the stars don't correlate with ability, would you bet your money on a team consisting of 4 star players vs a team of 5 star players? My money is on the 5 star team, and I'd guess that the 5 star team would win 10 out of 10.

Ummm...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Appalachian_State_vs._Michigan_football_game

 

[Oakland]

Ummm...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Appalachian_State_vs._Michigan_football_game

I'm talking about teams of recruits. AppSt was a great (and very rare) upset, which I enjoyed immensely.

 

[Oakland]

Yeah I saw that...I've seen enough recruiting battles that I have complete faith in our staff.

Even when it doesn't work out for us...it works out for us (Hakim Warrick, Nerlens Noel)

I do too, but that wasn't the point of the thread.

 

[HOFCeluck]

Not sure what you mean...theres obviously a significant difference in calibre of recruits a FCS (albeit a top five program on that level) program gets vs what UM gets.

You really think the delta is that great between four and five stars that the latter wins EVERY GAME of a ten game series?

 

[dasher]

Phat this is intended as a response to the whole thread not just you. The stars (and especially the rankings are guesses, sometimes educated sometimes not) are full of flaws, the lower you go the more flawed. But they are much better than many in this thread think. For all of you who think that the stars don't correlate with ability, would you bet your money on a team consisting of 4 star players vs a team of 5 star players? My money is on the 5 star team, and I'd guess that the 5 star team would win 10 out of 10.

10 out of 10? Really?