Signing Day, uh, stats?

[Prediction? Pain.]

So, I logged on during my lunch break to see how things shook out today and found us all in the throes of what appeared to be an unmitigated disaster. Moorhead's as good as fired, the state's high school players have turned against MSU as an institution, fire and brimstone coming down from the skies, human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together . . . mass hysteria.

Well, balls. So I go over to 24/7 to see what the hell happened. Confusion sets in. I don't follow this stuff very closely and I don't mean to make light of whatever legitimate failures the staff had, but don't the "rankings," such as they are, reflect at least some degree of success? I mean, here are MSU's 24/7's composite rankings for the past decade:

2009 - 18th
2010 - 30th
2011 - 41st
2012 - 22nd
2013 - 24th
2014 - 36th
2015 - 18th
2016 - 28th
2017 - 24th
2018 - 27th
2019 - 23rd

So by the composite ranking, this year's the 4th highest in the past 11 years.

But if you look past that composite and go to what appears to be the metric of the quality of the individual players -- i.e. our players' average rating -- this is actually the best class we've had in those 11 years. As of 1:45 p.m. (eastern), the average rating of a player in our class is 88.64. That's the highest player average we've had in the past 11 years. Until now, we'd never had that number hit above 87.69, and that was in 2015, the year after Dak and Co. took the world by storm. In fact, only three times in Mullen's tenure did we even hit the 87 mark. Here are the numbers and their corresponding national rank:

2009 - 86.96 (19th)
2010 - 84.41 (46th)
2011 - 83.23 (44th)
2012 - 85.99 (29th)
2013 - 86.22 (24th)
2014 - 84.84 (33rd)
2015 - 87.69 (20th)
2016 - 87.08 (24th)
2017 - 86.11 (27th)
2018 - 87.20 (26th)
2019 - 88.64 (19th)

Given that 89/90 is the cuttoff where composite 4-star rankings begin and that having a roster with more 4+ star dudes than 3-star dudes is apparently necessary to get us where we want to go, getting an 88.64 average seems to be an okay first step. It's not good enough, obviously, but I'm thinking it's not quite yet the end of times. I think . . . .

TL;DR:

[msstate7]

Mullen proved he could outperform his recruiting rankings in conf. How many sec coaches have done that? Should we assume joe will too just bc Mullen did?

[bluelightstar]

Mullen proved he could outperform his recruiting rankings in conf. How many sec coaches have done that? Should we assume joe will too just bc Mullen did?

At this point, I think we should assume the opposite. #IOWA

[Gutter Cobreh]

Mullen proved he could outperform his recruiting rankings in conf. How many sec coaches have done that? Should we assume joe will too just bc Mullen did?

How exactly did he prove that? By being #1 for a couple weeks? Does that offset the losses in games we should have won?

Just trying to understand your shifting goalposts, as I would think what Prediction Pain points out for you would be right up your alley.

[ShotgunDawg]

Good post but IMO any evaluation of this recruiting class MUST include an acknowledgment of the amount of talent in Mississippi this year.

This year's effort with next year's instate talent pool could equal a 30+ ranked class.

[Rick Danko]

Mullen proved he could outperform his recruiting rankings in conf. How many sec coaches have done that? Should we assume joe will too just bc Mullen did?

Mullen in his first year tried Tyson Lee up the middle against LSU on the goal line. Were you ready to run him off then? Coaches need time to learn, yet there are so many on here that have already decided to write Moorhead off after one year. Give the guy a damn chance, if next year we regress more than what is already expected after what we lost, then yes let?s push the panic button. But my god ever since he lost to Kentucky he hasn?t stood a chance with some of y?all.

[msstate7]

How exactly did he prove that? By being #1 for a couple weeks? Does that offset the losses in games we should have won?

Just trying to understand your shifting goalposts, as I would think what Prediction Pain points out for you would be right up your alley.

I threw out LSU and Bama bc we aren't on par with them. I threw out ark bc we outrecruited them. Here's the rest of the west's record the last 5 years and avg recruiting ranking of the 5 years leading up to this stretch...

aTm = 20-20 (11th)
Auburn = 21-19 (8th)
Om = 17-23 (15th)
State = 21-19 (26th)

[bluelightstar]

Mullen in his first year tried Tyson Lee up the middle against LSU on the goal line. Were you ready to run him off then? Coaches need time to learn, yet there are so many on here that have already decided to write Moorhead off after one year. Give the guy a damn chance, if next year we regress more than what is already expected after what we lost, then yes let?s push the panic button. But my god ever since he lost to Kentucky he hasn?t stood a chance with some of y?all.

Are we comparing Mullen blowing it against #7 LSU in his first season to Moorhead putting up five croomish offensive performances in one year...?

[Gutter Cobreh]

I threw out LSU and Bama bc we aren't on par with them. I threw out ark bc we outrecruited them. Here's the rest of the west's record the last 5 years and avg recruiting ranking of the 5 years leading up to this stretch...

aTm = 20-20 (11th)
Auburn = 21-19 (8th)
Om = 17-23 (15th)
State = 21-19 (26th)

So you're counting OOC games into your numbers? You're also using Ole Miss when we know they were cheating to inflate their recruiting rankings?

I just want to make sure I'm following along...

[Rick Danko]

Are we comparing Mullen blowing it against #7 LSU in his first season to Moorhead putting up five croomish offensive performances in one year...?

I?m simply saying give him a chance to install his system with his players, not crucify him for mistakes he made year one. But I know I?m wasting my time, there are people who have simply made up their mind and will never give him a chance. I?m just glad my boss didn?t expect perfection year one in my job and allowed a learning curve...

[msstate7]

So you're counting OOC games into your numbers? You're also using Ole Miss when we know they were cheating to inflate their recruiting rankings?

I just want to make sure I'm following along...

No, that's why there are only 40 games over 5 years (8 conference games x 5 years = 40 games).

[Bass Chaser]

Mullen proved he could outperform his recruiting rankings in conf. How many sec coaches have done that? Should we assume joe will too just bc Mullen did?

Did he or did other schools not play to their recruiting rankings?

[Ari Gold]

Good post but IMO any evaluation of this recruiting class MUST include an acknowledgment of the amount of talent in Mississippi this year.

This year's effort with next year's instate talent pool could equal a 30+ ranked class.

First off Charles Cross wasn’t even ranked this time last year. If he was it was the token 3 star
There will be more 2020 guys Ranked once they get looked at
It was known 2 years ago this class was going to be a roller coaster and it was
Also the juco class was extremely weak this year in state . That could change next year as well
And finally and I have stated this before WE HAVE TO RECRUIT OUTSIDE THE STATE BETTER... you saw a little of that this year with this staff... landed a couple of big time guys and swung and missed on others. Keep swinging and we might land a few of these guys .. hopefully that will continue to be a trend

[the_real_MSU_is_us]

First off Charles Cross wasn’t even ranked this time last year. If he was it was the token 3 star
There will be more 2020 guys Ranked once they get looked at
It was known 2 years ago this class was going to be a roller coaster and it was
Also the juco class was extremely weak this year in state . That could change next year as well
And finally and I have stated this before WE HAVE TO RECRUIT OUTSIDE THE STATE BETTER... you saw a little of that this year with this staff... landed a couple of big time guys and swung and missed on others. Keep swinging and we might land a few of these guys .. hopefully that will continue to be a trend

Good post and I'd like to add that with out of state kids, I think we need to find a way to be more discerning in who we target. Shrader and King Ani, as far as i know, didn't really have a college team they liked, and so we had a shot. But guys like James and Washington did, and they used us as placeholders till they got that instate offer they wanted. Well Washington did, James apparently thought a lot of out of state options were better than us.

Point is we spend all this effort on a kid that's far away an unfamiliar with our school, only to lose him because he's partial to other schools ahead of us and if he's worth a damn they eventually come calling. If there's a way to find the impartial out of state guys and target them alone i think we'd get more bang for our buck than we did this class

[Ari Gold]

Good post and I'd like to add that with out of state kids, I think we need to find a way to be more discerning in who we target. Shrader and King Ani, as far as i know, didn't really have a college team they liked, and so we had a shot. But guys like James and Washington did, and they used us as placeholders till they got that instate offer they wanted. Well Washington did, James apparently thought a lot of out of state options were better than us.

Point is we spend all this effort on a kid that's far away an unfamiliar with our school, only to lose him because he's partial to other schools ahead of us and if he's worth a damn they eventually come calling. If there's a way to find the impartial out of state guys and target them alone i think we'd get more bang for our buck than we did this class

I think the biggest learning curve not only for Joe but other teams and coaches outside of Bama / Clemson ect is they have to find a way to make the DJ James and Washingtons sign in the early signing period
That IMO should be our objective next year. Do everything possible to get these kids Signed and December and push them to enroll early if possible.

[IMissJack]

Good post but IMO any evaluation of this recruiting class MUST include an acknowledgment of the amount of talent in Mississippi this year.

This year's effort with next year's instate talent pool could equal a 30+ ranked class.

Not to mention that we still are not recruiting against OM at full strength. We should have done better, and the let down season affected it.

[ShotgunDawg]

Good post and I'd like to add that with out of state kids, I think we need to find a way to be more discerning in who we target. Shrader and King Ani, as far as i know, didn't really have a college team they liked, and so we had a shot. But guys like James and Washington did, and they used us as placeholders till they got that instate offer they wanted. Well Washington did, James apparently thought a lot of out of state options were better than us.

Point is we spend all this effort on a kid that's far away an unfamiliar with our school, only to lose him because he's partial to other schools ahead of us and if he's worth a damn they eventually come calling. If there's a way to find the impartial out of state guys and target them alone i think we'd get more bang for our buck than we did this class

One major issue we have with out of state recruiting is that we are next door neighbors with the two states in which the their instate kids have the most loyalty to the in-state schools as any states in the entire country.

Seriously, is there more loyalty to the instate schools more than Alabama & Louisiana. If we could take some of the players they want, it would be fine losing ours, but we don't have that stroke for whatever reason

[Todd4State]

First off Charles Cross wasn’t even ranked this time last year. If he was it was the token 3 star
There will be more 2020 guys Ranked once they get looked at
It was known 2 years ago this class was going to be a roller coaster and it was
Also the juco class was extremely weak this year in state . That could change next year as well
And finally and I have stated this before WE HAVE TO RECRUIT OUTSIDE THE STATE BETTER... you saw a little of that this year with this staff... landed a couple of big time guys and swung and missed on others. Keep swinging and we might land a few of these guys .. hopefully that will continue to be a trend

It's going to very rare that we find and sign a four star out of state player. Our best chance to land four and five stars is to recruit in state better. I'm not sure that I can recall us signing a 5 star OOS player. I think we need to show a little more effort to recruit certain in state players a little bit better. Do more things like give scholarships to friends. If we give one to Norsworthy odds are high that we would have gotten Ealy. Or it forces Ole Miss to give a scholarship to Norsworthy which causes them to lose out on someone else. Just an example. It just seems like we don't do those types of things enough.

[Todd4State]

I think the biggest learning curve not only for Joe but other teams and coaches outside of Bama / Clemson ect is they have to find a way to make the DJ James and Washingtons sign in the early signing period
That IMO should be our objective next year. Do everything possible to get these kids Signed and December and push them to enroll early if possible.

I do agree with this. I'm inclined to say that if someone doesn't sign in the early signing period we need to make sure that we have some back-up plans ready to go.

[Todd4State]

One major issue we have with out of state recruiting is that we are next door neighbors with the two states in which the their instate kids have the most loyalty to the in-state schools as any states in the entire country.

Seriously, is there more loyalty to the instate schools more than Alabama & Louisiana. If we could take some of the players they want, it would be fine losing ours, but we don't have that stroke for whatever reason

That's because we have two SEC schools in this state and poor state pride in general. In other words players want to go out of state. Alabama, Auburn, and LSU have all played for National Titles within the last 10-15 years. That's a factor in wanting to stay too. If we ever go 12-0 even that may change things for us too. Getting our ass kicked by Alabama every year and losing consistently to LSU and Auburn also effects things as well. Those states also have boosters that make damn sure that the players that they want stay in state as well. Our boosters for whatever reason are not able to do it as consistently for in state players.