Question

[DrZaius]

As recruiting season is about to be wrapped up I was wondering if Scout and Rivals existed back in the 70's and 80's where do you think the King's classes would have been ranked?

[KantoSooner]

I think it would have been almost impossible to tell. Things were so much more regional in those days. Very little national coverage of high school ball to the extent where comparative ratings could have been possible. Hell, it was hard enough to compare Div 1 colleges, with effete NE schools like Boston College actually thinking they were on a par with Nebraska, OU or USC. It was sickening.

[olevetonahill]

I think it would have been almost impossible to tell. Things were so much more regional in those days. Very little national coverage of high school ball to the extent where comparative ratings could have been possible. Hell, it was hard enough to compare Div 1 colleges, with effete NE schools like Boston College actually thinking they were on a par with Nebraska, OU or USC. It was sickening.

True, and we got to see what Maybe 3 OU games a year on TeeVee? If we were lucky?

[humblesooner]

True, and we got to see what Maybe 3 OU games a year on TeeVee? If we were lucky?
Only if you were in a bowl game.
Seems like you could only appear twice a year, besides the bowl game.
That is why you used to see OU/USC, OU/Ohio State, OU/ Alabama games. Everybody wanted their games to be high profile enough for the network (singular) to pick them up.
If OU had a marquee non-canference match-up, the Texas game or the Nebraska game would have to be sacrificed.
Doesn't seem possible today.

[8timechamps]

I've thought about this question a few times, and I think they would have been very similar to Stoops classes over the years. Maybe a little higher average, but close.

[OU_Sooners75]

I honest think they would have been higher thanks to the virtual limitless scholarships they could hand out in a year. Not to mention the very real limitless walk-on program that they had.

The blue bloods back then, battled each other over the recruits, and the top recruits generally went to one of the blue bloods (OU, USC, ND, Michigan, Nebraska, Alabama, etc).

[OU_Sooners75]

I think it would have been almost impossible to tell. Things were so much more regional in those days. Very little national coverage of high school ball to the extent where comparative ratings could have been possible. Hell, it was hard enough to compare Div 1 colleges, with effete NE schools like Boston College actually thinking they were on a par with Nebraska, OU or USC. It was sickening.


The coverage of high school football was a lot more regional, but college football recruiting was far from regional.

[jkm, the stolen pifwafwi]

I honest think they would have been higher thanks to the virtual limitless scholarships they could hand out in a year. Not to mention the very real limitless walk-on program that they had.

The blue bloods back then, battled each other over the recruits, and the top recruits generally went to one of the blue bloods (OU, USC, ND, Michigan, Nebraska, Alabama, etc).

If the same national bias existed back then as existed today, OU would have been ranked fairly low.

From 73-82, they took 15 Oklahoma players per year. Oklahoma has rarely had more than 4 highly ranked players in a season and then the rankings just fall off the cliff. From 83-89, I think his classes would have been higher because the number of Okies dropped to 8-9 and were replaced by Texas/Cali guys. That would have pushed his rankings up, but not as much as we have today.

[OU_Sooners75]

If the same national bias existed back then as existed today, OU would have been ranked fairly low.

From 73-82, they took 15 Oklahoma players per year. Oklahoma has rarely had more than 4 highly ranked players in a season and then the rankings just fall off the cliff. From 83-89, I think his classes would have been higher because the number of Okies dropped to 8-9 and were replaced by Texas/Cali guys. That would have pushed his rankings up, but not as much as we have today.



You have also got to remember, almost every team back then ran the ball 75% of the time it seemed. And being teams were a lot more run oriented back in the those days (hell even till the mid 90s really), that opened the door for a lot of the bigger OL from Oklahoma.

[SanJoaquinSooner]

the 75 class was a game changer.

Thomas Lott, George Cumby. Greg Roberts. Kenny King. Daryl Hunt. Victor Hicks. Billy Sims.

[jkm, the stolen pifwafwi]

You have also got to remember, almost every team back then ran the ball 75% of the time it seemed. And being teams were a lot more run oriented back in the those days (hell even till the mid 90s really), that opened the door for a lot of the bigger OL from Oklahoma.

I'm not disagreeing with you about on the field results. What I'm saying is that the current ranking systems (Scout, Rivals, ESPN) have a severe bias in rankings towards the big 3 states (FL, TX, CA). Over the last decade, the top Oklahoma player has landed somewhere between 1 and 25 on those states lists and typically #5 ranks around #100 on their lists. So assuming they kept the same model, Switzer would have been grabbing 0-1 5*, 1-2 4*s, 3-4 3*s and 8-10 2*s every year from Oklahoma. This would have meant that OU (and Nebraska, Mizzou, and Colorado) would have been 2nd tier behind quite a few of their state schools even though they were better than all of them. In Texas, we would have been behind UT, aTm, SMU and probably Baylor (at least under Tief) for most of that period. So roughly 18-30 every single year along with Nebraska, CU, Mizzou who would have thumped everyone of them pretty much every year.

[tulsaoilerfan]

IIRC in Switzer's book he said they got like 13 of the top 30 players in the state of Texas in that 75 class, including all 3 backfield starters(Lott, King, and Sims) from some Texas HS All Star game.

[KantoSooner]

The coverage of high school football was a lot more regional, but college football recruiting was far from regional.
You're totally correct, but I would lay money that the national, comparative evaluation of high school players was so primitive then as to be virtually unrecognizeable today.

[jkm, the stolen pifwafwi]

IIRC in Switzer's book he said they got like 13 of the top 30 players in the state of Texas in that 75 class, including all 3 backfield starters(Lott, King, and Sims) from some Texas HS All Star game.

I wonder what that was based off of? Actual college results or some list beforehand. Even with Earl Campbell, I can't see the veil of prejudice lifting that quickly to be objective.

[8timechamps]

You're totally correct, but I would lay money that the national, comparative evaluation of high school players was so primitive then as to be virtually unrecognizeable today.

No doubt about it, night and day difference.

Even as recently as 20 years ago, most high schools didn't have any coordinated recruiting effort in-house. Of course high school coaches had relationships with college coaches, but there was no organized effort on the part of the school to help the players. Now, it seems that every major high school (and many non-major ones) have in-house recruiting coordinators. So, the exposure kids get now is far greater than 20 years ago and previous.

Look at a kid like Derek Farniok. 20+ years ago, he wouldn't have ended up at a school like OU. He played high school ball in Sioux Falls South Dakota, and prior to the established services, programs depended on scouts and relationships. Farniok would have probably ended up playing at SDSU or some regional school. Times have definitely changed.

[SouthFortySooner]

the 75 class was a game changer.

Thomas Lott, George Cumby. Greg Roberts. Kenny King. Daryl Hunt. Victor Hicks. Billy Sims.

And me! Bottle of Canadian Mist in my back pocket and the announcer says over the loud speakers, "Ladies and Gentlemen, Billy Sims has entered the game. They handed the ball off to him up the middle and I remember being disappointed as it appeared he only made 3 yards. Looked up and the scoreboard says 2nd and 3? So I watched closer the next handoff I realized his stride was 7 YARDS!

I never saw AD play but I can only imagine it was a lot like Billy. You could see the difference in him even surrounded by great players. Thanks for the memory!

[OkieThunderLion]

I have some publications from the 1980s buried somewhere. I know OU was never 1st in any of them. I'll try and find them sometime.

[picasso]

Blue chips didn't need any stars. Boy.

[OU_Sooners75]

You're totally correct, but I would lay money that the national, comparative evaluation of high school players was so primitive then as to be virtually unrecognizeable today.

Would it have been primitive compared with today? Sure. There was no internet. There was no big satellite providers like today. There was no ESPN.

There was a max sports prep. It was broken in to regional areas. And Max Sports Prep (maybe was a different name) had rankings for each area, and a rating for nation wide. At least when I was coming out of High School. Seems like the magazine was around longer than that too.

You really had to be a recruiting nerd if you wanted to stay on top of the recruiting of athletes back before the internet became mainstream media.