Is our recruiting ranking ceiling at 16?

[Jack Lambert]

Seems like we would need to sign more out of state recruits to get any higher. Am I'm wrong on that assumption?

I'm talking football.

[dawgday166]

Seems like we would need to sign more out of state recruits to get any higher. Am I'm wrong on that assumption?

I'm talking football.

Our best was 2015 I believe and close to half of those came from Alabama. So I'm thinking what you say must be so.

[ShotgunDawg]

Small class, so the rankin will probably be in the 30s. It's a quality over quantity class.

Without having more players drafted, it's tough for us to make real headway in the recruiting rankings because scholarships are locked up for 4 or 5 years thus limiting the amount of guys we can sign. Conversely, LSU and Bama sign full classes every year because guys leave, thus leaving less top talent for anyone else to sign.

[Johnson85]

Seems like we would need to sign more out of state recruits to get any higher. Am I'm wrong on that assumption?

I'm talking football.

The ceiling for our four year average is somewhere in the teens unless we go on a tear where our recruits get bumps just for getting an offer from us.

Basically, you have ten to fifteen blue blood schools that barring an atrocious year, are going to be ranking in the top 15. We can have a good year that is better, but we're not going to consistently get inside the top 12-15 unless we perform well enough for long enough that recruiting sites start to assume the classes we sign are better than 12-15 just because we signed them.

Realistically, with Mullen developing our QBs, all we need is to consistently be in teh top twenty and have enough balance across positions to not have devastating weak links.

[SouthMSDog]

"The ceiling is the roof."

[Political Hack]

Bama, FSU, Clemson, Ohio State, LSU, Texas, USC, A&M, UGA, Michigan, Oklahoma, Auburn, Notre Dame, and maybe a few others are typically going to be ahead of us. That puts us in the teens at best, but we'll pull ahead of some of those in some years. Ole Miss not being able to pay out the ying yang for players in MS right now shoukdnhelp, but we'll still be behind those others for the most part.

That said, recruiting rankings are garbage. Dak was a 3*. BMac was a 2*. Chris Jones was a 2*. Snoop and Tobias were 4/5*. People get all worked up over recruiting site rankings, but I can promise you we did better with our 3* QB, 2* DT, and 2* LB than most did with their 4* kids.

[Todd4State]

Bama, FSU, Clemson, Ohio State, LSU, Texas, USC, A&M, UGA, Michigan, Oklahoma, Auburn, Notre Dame, and maybe a few others are typically going to be ahead of us. That puts us in the teens at best, but we'll pull ahead of some of those in some years. Ole Miss not being able to pay out the ying yang for players in MS right now shoukdnhelp, but we'll still be behind those others for the most part.

That said, recruiting rankings are garbage. Dak was a 3*. BMac was a 2*. Chris Jones was a 2*. Snoop and Tobias were 4/5*. People get all worked up over recruiting site rankings, but I can promise you we did better with our 3* QB, 2* DT, and 2* LB than most did with their 4* kids.

Of course on draft day the recruiting web sites talk about how "right" they were because they rank commits for the schools you mentioned higher so it makes it look like they "mean something". But I would be willing to bet that for what our guys get rated MSU probably produces some of the best talent above what our players are ranked coming out of high school as far as production in the NFL.

[dawgs]

Bama, FSU, Clemson, Ohio State, LSU, Texas, USC, A&M, UGA, Michigan, Oklahoma, Auburn, Notre Dame, and maybe a few others are typically going to be ahead of us. That puts us in the teens at best, but we'll pull ahead of some of those in some years. Ole Miss not being able to pay out the ying yang for players in MS right now shoukdnhelp, but we'll still be behind those others for the most part.

That said, recruiting rankings are garbage. Dak was a 3*. BMac was a 2*. Chris Jones was a 2*. Snoop and Tobias were 4/5*. People get all worked up over recruiting site rankings, but I can promise you we did better with our 3* QB, 2* DT, and 2* LB than most did with their 4* kids.

Recruiting rankings aren't garbage. The % of 4* and 5* kids that becomes quality starters/all-conf/all-American/NFL draft picks/quality NFL players is much higher than the % of 3* and 2*. Basically, you have to be the absolute best talent evaluator to sign 25 3* and find the number of quality players that bama signs every year. Even for very good talent evaluators (and I do think dan is one of them), a majority of our 3* signees never become quality starters. Some may start because they are who we have, but they wouldn't start for most other sec programs.

When bama signs 20+ 4-5* guys every cycle, even if half of them never amount to anything, they have 10+ guys that could start for almost anyone in the country in every class. We sign mostly 3* guys, and we might have 1-2 per class that could start for almost anyone in the country, and maybe another 7-8 that are decent sec starters that would struggle to see the field for bama/lsu/uga/Florida most seasons.

Chris jones went from being an unknown that was told by C-USA coaches that he didn't have what it takes to get a scholarship the summer before his senior season to a freak that ended his senior season the #2 rated player in the country. That's an exception, not a rule.

Think big picture when looking at recruiting. There's always an exception (tom Brady in the 6th round), but when you look around the NFL, almost all of the quality or promising QBs are 1st round picks.

[Dawg-gone-dawgs]

Seems like we would need to sign more out of state recruits to get any higher. Am I'm wrong on that assumption?

I'm talking football.

I would say so. And we have a ready-made excuse every year why it's not higher. Several years ago the line was "Mullen turns 2 and 3 stars into 5 stars before they leave. Trouble with that is when they get to that level, they are gone. This year's excuse is it's a small class.
The real reason is simply that top out of state talent just don't want to come to Mississippi when there are top tier championship programs battling it for them as well.
The real question is there ever going to be enough talent in Mississippi to win a SEC and beyond championship AND if so can we take advantage of the mess our friends up north are in and get those players.

[Dawg61]

This is misleading. Yes there's a higher percentage of 4-5* that make the NFL than 3* but you also have to consider there's way more guys rated 3* than there are 4-5* guys. So if 10 outta 100 4-5* make the NFL and 19 outta 200 3* make the NFL guess what. The 4-5* have a higher percentage. There should be a higher percentage anyways unless every recruiting site sucks total ass and can't identify the best 100-300 players despite being able to just piggyback off of ESPN, Nike, Under Armour, Adidas etc.. and watching who every top football coach recruits.

[confucius say]

Recruiting rankings aren't garbage. The % of 4* and 5* kids that becomes quality starters/all-conf/all-American/NFL draft picks/quality NFL players is much higher than the % of 3* and 2*. Basically, you have to be the absolute best talent evaluator to sign 25 3* and find the number of quality players that bama signs every year. Even for very good talent evaluators (and I do think dan is one of them), a majority of our 3* signees never become quality starters. Some may start because they are who we have, but they wouldn't start for most other sec programs.

When bama signs 20+ 4-5* guys every cycle, even if half of them never amount to anything, they have 10+ guys that could start for almost anyone in the country in every class. We sign mostly 3* guys, and we might have 1-2 per class that could start for almost anyone in the country, and maybe another 7-8 that are decent sec starters that would struggle to see the field for bama/lsu/uga/Florida most seasons.

Chris jones went from being an unknown that was told by C-USA coaches that he didn't have what it takes to get a scholarship the summer before his senior season to a freak that ended his senior season the #2 rated player in the country. That's an exception, not a rule.

Think big picture when looking at recruiting. There's always an exception (tom Brady in the 6th round), but when you look around the NFL, almost all of the quality or promising QBs are 1st round picks.

Stars don't matter unless they are accurately rated. True story.

And on your first point, of course that's the case bc there are only 300 combined four and five star kids a year. There are tens of thousands three stars and below. The overwhelming majority of all conference/all American/NFL players were 3 star or below. And, if you were a pro bowler this year, you were just as likely to be a 3 star or below as you were 4-5 star.

[CadaverDawg]

Stars don't matter unless they are accurately rated. True story.

And on your first point, of course that's the case bc there are only 300 combined four and five star kids a year. There are tens of thousands three stars and below. The overwhelming majority of all conference/all American/NFL players were 3 star or below. And, if you were a pro bowler this year, you were just as likely to be a 3 star or below as you were 4-5 star.

Boom

[You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to confucius say again.]

[dawgs]

Stars don't matter unless they are accurately rated. True story.

And on your first point, of course that's the case bc there are only 300 combined four and five star kids a year. There are tens of thousands three stars and below. The overwhelming majority of all conference/all American/NFL players were 3 star or below. And, if you were a pro bowler this year, you were just as likely to be a 3 star or below as you were 4-5 star.

Sure maybe half the pro bowlers any given year were former unranked/2*/3* guys and half were 4*-5* guys. But if you think there being only ~300 4-5* kids compared to 1000+ 3* and lower kids disproves my point, then you are wrong. I said the %. The point being, if you sign 4-5* guys exclusively and do some good scouting of your own and backgrounds on the 4-5* guys, you probably have a better than 50% chance of landing a quality CFB starter that'll help you win games. If you have a bunch of 3* guys, then you have to identify the right 3* guys, and even then, having a 50% success rate on 3* guys would be crazy good. And a lot of those 3* successes we've found under Mullen still wouldn't start for bama or lsu or f$u or whoever else is consistently signing top 10 classes. Many of those guys are still good for us and decent college players, but this idea that you can repeatedly nail the <5% of 2-3* guys that perform like 50% of the 4-5* is a pipe dream. The reality is that it's such a low % that become studs and that most college programs are filling a majority of their classes with 2-3* guys, that the ones that do become studs are spread across so many different programs, those programs relying on 2-3* guys still don't have the firepower to win a title despite their 1-2 3* studs in a class when bama and lsu and the like have a much higher hit rate on their 4-5* laden classes.

if someone tells you that (a) you can pick 25 guys out of 1000+ player pool and of that 1000+ player pool, ~10% will end up performing like 4-5* guys in college, or alternatively (b) you can pick 25 guys from a 300 player pool, of which ~50% will end up performing like 4-5* guys in college, which choice do you make? That's not to say it's impossible for choice (a) to end up with better results than choice (b), but it's against the odds that (a) consistently outperforms (b). even if in the macro sense, there are more total players from pool (a) that end up performing like 4-5* guys than in pool (b), your odds are better with player pool (b).

[dawgs]

This is misleading. Yes there's a higher percentage of 4-5* that make the NFL than 3* but you also have to consider there's way more guys rated 3* than there are 4-5* guys. So if 10 outta 100 4-5* make the NFL and 19 outta 200 3* make the NFL guess what. The 4-5* have a higher percentage. There should be a higher percentage anyways unless every recruiting site sucks total ass and can't identify the best 100-300 players despite being able to just piggyback off of ESPN, Nike, Under Armour, Adidas etc.. and watching who every top football coach recruits.

Unless a coach is just way better at identifying talent than every other coach, the odds of landing all 9 of the 3* guys that develop into NFL caliber players in your hypo is very slim. Especially considering that way more programs are filling a majority of their classes with 3* guys than 4-5* guys. So while a 4-5* guy may have 5 blue blood programs battling over him, many non-elite programs aren't even wasting their time unless they have an in (local, parent alumni, etc). But with 3*, you maybe have 50 programs that feel like they have a realistic shot, so those guys get spread pretty thin.

[Dawg61]

Unless a coach is just way better at identifying talent than every other coach, the odds of landing all 9 of the 3* guys that develop into NFL caliber players in your hypo is very slim. Especially considering that way more programs are filling a majority of their classes with 3* guys than 4-5* guys. So while a 4-5* guy may have 5 blue blood programs battling over him, many non-elite programs aren't even wasting their time unless they have an in (local, parent alumni, etc). But with 3*, you maybe have 50 programs that feel like they have a realistic shot, so those guys get spread pretty thin.

Yup and that's exactly why it is imperative that we are able to develop our players into NFL caliber players and we are actually doing a pretty decent job at that imo.

[sleepy dawg]

Seems like we would need to sign more out of state recruits to get any higher. Am I'm wrong on that assumption?

I'm talking football.

I have a hard time saying 16 is our ceiling, although it does appear to be a very difficult number for us to get to. What was our top 25 ranking ceiling a few years back? Was it #1? If it wasn't, then whatever ceiling you had in mind was wrong and 16 for recruiting is probably wrong too.

The recruiting rankings, like top 25 rankings are done by people and are completely subjective, so who knows where we could potentially end up. Looking back, we were very unlikely to be the best team in the country that year, but for a little while it seemed like we were.... So I see the question more like this: Will there ever be a day where the people who happen to be reporting recruiting rankings for a given website, most of who only watch some highlights and clips of highschool games and watch very few actual games, ever think it seems like maybe we signed the 15th best or better group of guys? I would have to say it seems possible.

[TUSK]

Stars don't matter unless they are accurately rated. True story.

And on your first point, of course that's the case bc there are only 300 combined four and five star kids a year. There are tens of thousands three stars and below. The overwhelming majority of all conference/all American/NFL players were 3 star or below. And, if you were a pro bowler this year, you were just as likely to be a 3 star or below as you were 4-5 star.

This begs the query.... "Does anything matter unless accurately rated?"

[TUSK]

Sure maybe half the pro bowlers any given year were former unranked/2*/3* guys and half were 4*-5* guys. But if you think there being only ~300 4-5* kids compared to 1000+ 3* and lower kids disproves my point, then you are wrong. I said the %. The point being, if you sign 4-5* guys exclusively and do some good scouting of your own and backgrounds on the 4-5* guys, you probably have a better than 50% chance of landing a quality CFB starter that'll help you win games. If you have a bunch of 3* guys, then you have to identify the right 3* guys, and even then, having a 50% success rate on 3* guys would be crazy good. And a lot of those 3* successes we've found under Mullen still wouldn't start for bama or lsu or f$u or whoever else is consistently signing top 10 classes. Many of those guys are still good for us and decent college players, but this idea that you can repeatedly nail the <5% of 2-3* guys that perform like 50% of the 4-5* is a pipe dream. The reality is that it's such a low % that become studs and that most college programs are filling a majority of their classes with 2-3* guys, that the ones that do become studs are spread across so many different programs, those programs relying on 2-3* guys still don't have the firepower to win a title despite their 1-2 3* studs in a class when bama and lsu and the like have a much higher hit rate on their 4-5* laden classes.

if someone tells you that (a) you can pick 25 guys out of 1000+ player pool and of that 1000+ player pool, ~10% will end up performing like 4-5* guys in college, or alternatively (b) you can pick 25 guys from a 300 player pool, of which ~50% will end up performing like 4-5* guys in college, which choice do you make? That's not to say it's impossible for choice (a) to end up with better results than choice (b), but it's against the odds that (a) consistently outperforms (b). even if in the macro sense, there are more total players from pool (a) that end up performing like 4-5* guys than in pool (b), your odds are better with player pool (b).

While I know this is correct... I will defer to Boom for "statistical" confirmation...*

[HSVDawg]

Recruiting rankings aren't garbage. The % of 4* and 5* kids that becomes quality starters/all-conf/all-American/NFL draft picks/quality NFL players is much higher than the % of 3* and 2*.

The question isn't whether recruiting rankings are mostly accurate (they are). The question is are players rated highly because of high profile offers or do players get high profile offers because they are rated highly? I happen to think it's the former of those two scenarios. Your statement above, put another way, could say "the % of kids from Alabama, LSU, FSU, OSU, Clemson, etc. that receive accolades and becone NFL players is much higher than the percentage of kids from Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, and Temple". And anyone's response would be "well, duh". But those statements are basically synonymous because kids get rated highly when those big time schools offer (not the other way around). Chris Jones is an absolutely perfect example. He was a two star nobody that no one had seen, and we picked him up. Suddenly, he gets a Bama offer then an OM offer and all the sudden he's a 5-star and the #2 player in the country despite being the exact same player as when he was a 2-star.

The ultimate truth is recruiting rankings are accurate, but not on their own merit. They are simply a retroactive assessment of data that already exists in the form of who wants these kids. People who think there is a special skill to ranking recruits probably also think that Joe Lunardi has a psychic ability to predict NCAA tournament teams (which is something literally anyone can do). And of course there are exceptions and contingencies with the "diamond in the rough" types of guys that get limited exposure. But those are called exceptions and contingencies for a reason. You can't build whole classes or groups of classes around those types of players and expect success.

[confucius say]

The question isn't whether recruiting rankings are mostly accurate (they are). The question is are players rated highly because of high profile offers or do players get high profile offers because they are rated highly? I happen to think it's the former of those two scenarios. Your statement above, put another way, could say "the % of kids from Alabama, LSU, FSU, OSU, Clemson, etc. that receive accolades and becone NFL players is much higher than the percentage of kids from Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, and Temple". And anyone's response would be "well, duh". But those statements are basically synonymous because kids get rated highly when those big time schools offer (not the other way around). Chris Jones is an absolutely perfect example. He was a two star nobody that no one had seen, and we picked him up. Suddenly, he gets a Bama offer then an OM offer and all the sudden he's a 5-star and the #2 player in the country despite being the exact same player as when he was a 2-star.

The ultimate truth is recruiting rankings are accurate, but not on their own merit. They are simply a retroactive assessment of data that already exists in the form of who wants these kids. People who think there is a special skill to ranking recruits probably also think that Joe Lunardi has a psychic ability to predict NCAA tournament teams (which is something literally anyone can do). And of course there are exceptions and contingencies with the "diamond in the rough" types of guys that get limited exposure. But those are called exceptions and contingencies for a reason. You can't build whole classes or groups of classes around those types of players and expect success.

If recruiting rankings were accurate, all players in the NFL would be 4/5 stars (there are 300 of them per year). It's like bobby Bowden said, he started going down at FSU when he started signing "stars" instead of football players.