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Stars or Evals?

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OrangeBowlMagic said:
Evaluate all you'd like to determine which blue-chip recruits you'd like to go after the hardest, and where they rank on your board. That's fine, should happen, and does happen. But there is literal concrete data that the teams who sign the highest ranked recruiting classes (which is calculated on stars) win the most. It's not opinion. It's not a mirage. It's a ******* fact. We have this same conversation 10 times a year, and each time is dumber than the last.

There is gray area here, as there is in almost all aspects of life. It's not completely black and white. If you have the cast of Barnum and Bailey coach your 85 5-star players, yes, you're probably not going to be very good. But in order to win national championships, you MUST sign highly ranked recruiting classes. Period. There is no debating that. There is no rule that says you need to be a certain type of coach, be in a certain region, run a certain type of scheme...none of that. The only "rule" is you have to sign multiple top ~5 classes. That's not the *ONLY* thing you have to do, but it is one thing that is non-negotiable.
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That’s just not true. Care to guess what Yabba-Dabo-Doo and Clemson’s 4 classes prior to their 2016 title were ranked?

There are a few ways to skin this cat. Find yourself the next Vince, Cam, or Deshaun - and you don’t necessarily need multiple top ~5 classes. (I’d want them, though).
 
They go hand in hand. Everyone evals guys they don’t just blindly recruit like it’s ncaa football 14 and hope it all comes together lol. They make sure they are getting guys that fit the culture they are trying to build. Bama ain’t recruiting headaches and uncoachable guys. They get dudes that’s about that BIDNEZZ! They ain’t got time to hold Lil Timmy hand!
 
Ajcane8 said:
That’s just not true. Care to guess what Yabba-Dabo-Doo and Clemson’s 4 classes prior to their 2016 title were ranked?

There are a few ways to skin this cat. Find yourself the next Vince, Cam, or Deshaun - and you don’t necessarily need multiple top ~5 classes. (I’d want them, though).
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Clemson has prioritized quality > quantity, and it's worked for them. Their overall class rank hasn't been Top 5, but the content of their classes has been right there. The overall score is impacted by not only the level of kids you sign, but the quantity of them.

Our class last year was a good example. Officially ranked 16th, but it's because we only signed 15 kids. We actually had a higher star ranking than any of the 7 teams directly ranked ahead of us. Not a good plan long-term, as you need depth, of course, but it's similar to what Clemson has done. And yes, your last point is correct. Finding a generational QB certainly helps mask bigger roster issues. But I'd rather not play that game. It's got a much lower success rate than just loading your entire roster with elite athletes, a la UGA and Bama.
 
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Some of our commute will get a Bump for the star lovers. The Texas Tight End was committed to Clemson, and chose Miami over Oklahoma. Those programs are rather solid. Carver has already been bumped according to one service. The QB is an elite 11 finalist. I know i know means crap. And we will add guys with the star appeal. To me, evaluations mean the world to me. Trusting the staff to get it right and trusting this group in particular makes me feel good about this group. Chris Johnson just raved about Miami after visiting Alabama and other powers. Since Bama offered, watch, he will add a 4th star.
 
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Stars ARE Evaluations.

A really good evaluator can find low rated diamonds in the rough, and spot highly rated guys that shouldn't be. But that's also really hard to consistently do.

A large % of the highly rated players are highly rated because they're the better players. So I'd say stars matter more.

It's like - not every 1st Round Draft choice pans out - but 1st RD picks are infinitely more valuable than even 3rd RD picks because the hit rate is much higher. Same thing with stars.
 
the teams that get the stars, their fans will focus on stars
the teams that get mostly under the radar or lower ranked guys will have fans that focus on evaluation
 
Stars are national evals and likely right in aggregate.

Evals may rearrange the pecking order of recruits within the same tier, but finding hidden gems is something an eval might do for 3-5 players a class max. Gut feeling, no research done
 
pacusmc said:
You guys for the most part are correct. Yes the elite teams recruit blue chip 4 and five stars. However, there is a good chunk of those four and five stars that weren’t four or five stars when they were first being evaluated and recruited by those same frontrunner teams. Saban just doesn’t wake up late in the recruiting cycle and start offering kids based on their stars. So while the star system does appear from the outside to be factual that it works; some of these kids weren’t all five stars since they were in 10th grade.
Take for example the defensive tackle last cycle that was from Canada. We were all over him when he was a three star. He gets recruited by Bama and he becomes a high four-star.

The opposite can also be true. Take for example Nay’Quan. He got a Bama offer when he was a freshman and was crystal balled almost immediately to go there. Didn’t pan out that way.

And of course the biggest consideration when it comes to stars is that the star system doesn’t really measure discipline, dedication, commitment, work ethic, heart, patience and all the other intangibles that you can’t see unless you’ve been crew in the kid for the longest and been establishing a relationship with him and his family to see where that’s at.
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ive been doggedly following recruiting since Schnellenburger-- and have the magazines and newspapers to prove it.... and you, my friend, are impressively observant of realities of recruiting and stars.

I'll add that the main reason why people think the star ranking are more accurate today than in the old days is because the services now bump up recruits star rating when they're recruiting by Bama etc.

If they had also changed the stars due to which teams were recruiting whom in the old days, Miami's consistent dominance back then would have led to Ed Reed, Santana Moss, Russell Maryland, etc of the world being 4 star recruits instead of after thoughts.
 
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OrangeBowlMagic said:
How would they ever be separated? You think any coaching staff in the country doesn’t evaluate who they offer and pursue? What else would they do? Just call kids off a list and never go watch them play, watch their film, talk to their coaches, speak to people at their camps, bring them in for visits and workouts, etc etc etc?
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that's what Coker did... and we got our highest rated classes in our history in 2002, 2003 and 2004
 
Cane Tankerous said:
that's what Coker did... and we got our highest rated classes in our history in 2002, 2003 and 2004
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The game has changed a lot in 20 years. As in, it’s unrecognizable from what it was 20 years ago. Recruiting is a multi multi multi million dollar business now and absolutely exploding upwards with the inclusion on above the table NIL deals.
 
Stars matter, the ones who are actually stars. You cant look at the top 300 of whatever site and say yeah all them man gonna be all connference or all american i just need to go after them. That's why i keep harping back to our staff recruiting athleticism and body types. That means your evaluation is gonna match up with alot of the rankings for the most part and u go after Hicks and Wayne and Cormani. But sometimes it wont, so maybe u find 4 or 5 guys who are really athletic but are not being recruited as heavily as other guys. Like Rousseau or David Njoku, or Carver or Chris Johnson who is maybe the fastest RB in the class but is unpolished.

NFL teams have a salary cap so they have to find guys in the 5th,6th and undrafted who can be contributers all the while hitting on their 1st, 2nd and 3rd round picks.

That is kinda what we talking about here. You need a hybrid approach
 
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