jkm, the stolen pifwafwi
12/12/2013, 02:47 PM
This will be a lot of numbers and pictures:
Conclusions
Recruiting Rankings are not so much an evaluation of all high school candidates as a comparison of certain power schools. Basically, if a kid comes out of high school and commits to Harvard, he isn't going to be evaluated - no matter how good he is. There are multiple guys drafted who were on all decade teams for states that chose to go to a small school for one reason or another and weren't even in the rivals database. A good example is Terron Armstead taken in the 3rd round 2013 by the Saints from Arkansas Pine Bluff. He chose APB out of high school because they were the only school that would let him throw shotput in college.
The rivals rankings have a bias in them -> "You are bad, thus your players must be bad". The following points are illustrate this, but the basic problem is this -> Recruiting Rankings should be a LEADING indicator of success, but what we see (in most cases) is that they are a TRAILING indicator of success. In most cases, rankings go up after the team has achieved some success with lower level recruits. Like everything this isn't absolute as there are some cases of leading (such as Auburn with Cam Newton).
There were 242 0 and 2* recruits drafted in the 3 drafts (out of 761 drafted). 177 of them were from Non-Power and Mid-Major conferences. Basically, the further down the totem pole you go, the less likely your guys get ANY evaluation. This is important to understand because it means that players only get thorough examinations IF they are being recruited by most Major Conference teams.
Even within the Power teams, there are colleges with guys that are consistently underrated. Wisconsin had 14 players taken in the 3 drafts (tied for 8th) and 10 of them were 3*s or lower (including guys like JJ Watt and his 2* self). Other teams include Stanford, Iowa, Illinois, and Baylor. Notice that these are considered "lower tier" recruiting schools.
State Rankings tend to be fairly accurate with the exception of the big states (CA, TX, GA) and the extended Northeast. FL is fairly accurate at more than 70% ranked in the top 100
NY - 6 out of 9 UR
NH - 2 out of 2 UR
CT - 4 out of 8 UR
OH - 15 out of 37 UR
PA - 8 out of 20 UR
CA - 43 out of 88 UR
TX - 32 out of 79 UR
GA - 20 out of 45 UR
Rivals doesn't give any kind of position or state rankings for Hargrove (VA) or for Jucos. This is just absolutely ridiculous especially since the majority of them come from CA, KS, MS, and TX.
In the next post, I'll give the pictures of what is happening.
Conclusions
Recruiting Rankings are not so much an evaluation of all high school candidates as a comparison of certain power schools. Basically, if a kid comes out of high school and commits to Harvard, he isn't going to be evaluated - no matter how good he is. There are multiple guys drafted who were on all decade teams for states that chose to go to a small school for one reason or another and weren't even in the rivals database. A good example is Terron Armstead taken in the 3rd round 2013 by the Saints from Arkansas Pine Bluff. He chose APB out of high school because they were the only school that would let him throw shotput in college.
The rivals rankings have a bias in them -> "You are bad, thus your players must be bad". The following points are illustrate this, but the basic problem is this -> Recruiting Rankings should be a LEADING indicator of success, but what we see (in most cases) is that they are a TRAILING indicator of success. In most cases, rankings go up after the team has achieved some success with lower level recruits. Like everything this isn't absolute as there are some cases of leading (such as Auburn with Cam Newton).
There were 242 0 and 2* recruits drafted in the 3 drafts (out of 761 drafted). 177 of them were from Non-Power and Mid-Major conferences. Basically, the further down the totem pole you go, the less likely your guys get ANY evaluation. This is important to understand because it means that players only get thorough examinations IF they are being recruited by most Major Conference teams.
Even within the Power teams, there are colleges with guys that are consistently underrated. Wisconsin had 14 players taken in the 3 drafts (tied for 8th) and 10 of them were 3*s or lower (including guys like JJ Watt and his 2* self). Other teams include Stanford, Iowa, Illinois, and Baylor. Notice that these are considered "lower tier" recruiting schools.
State Rankings tend to be fairly accurate with the exception of the big states (CA, TX, GA) and the extended Northeast. FL is fairly accurate at more than 70% ranked in the top 100
NY - 6 out of 9 UR
NH - 2 out of 2 UR
CT - 4 out of 8 UR
OH - 15 out of 37 UR
PA - 8 out of 20 UR
CA - 43 out of 88 UR
TX - 32 out of 79 UR
GA - 20 out of 45 UR
Rivals doesn't give any kind of position or state rankings for Hargrove (VA) or for Jucos. This is just absolutely ridiculous especially since the majority of them come from CA, KS, MS, and TX.
In the next post, I'll give the pictures of what is happening.