In memoriam: The Epic Recruiting Meltdown of 2011

[engie]

http://maroonandwhitenation.com/2013...meltdown-2011/

Thoughts?

I'm still looking for a simple way to determine total contribution of recruiting classes. Any thoughts? This is pretty easy at skill positions -- but very hard in the trenches, and practically impossible on the OL.

[War Machine Dawg]

Mississippi completely busted in the trenches. From that list, only 1 guy plays, the others have been non-factors.

We were a little better. PJ, Preston Smith, and Malone are all very good players. Trapp, Maiden, & Redmond were all big busts. Don't think any of them are even on the team anymore.

The truth is that other than CJ & Snoop, we kicked their asses in crootin in 2011. And I feel very confident in saying that if Snoop had played his cards right and actually come to State, he'd be our best offensive player right now, maybe even leaving for the Draft this season.

[smootness]

It's going to be very difficult to come up with a way to measure it via stats/quality of performance. My best suggestion would be to do it based on the number of players that showed up, how many years they stayed, how many games they played in, and how many were starts.

It will hurt if some guys left early, since they will be shown as having less impact than someone who wasn't as good but started more games, but if you're mostly comparing Ole Miss and State, that won't be much of an issue.

Very good write-up, btw. I enjoyed reading it, and you made some great points. I do think that class will be looked back on as one of the most underrated classes we've ever had; great lesson in not freaking out on signing day no matter if it's positive or negative.

[Political Hack]

upvote.

The problem with doing a comparison after the fact is that it's not a level playing field for the list part. comparing Troy's 2 star's starts, stats, and contribution there isn't the same as comparing State's 3 star's starts, contributions, and stats at State.

What is possibly doable, although incredibly difficult, would be to compare recruits against similar competition. Ole Miss vs State in SEC west games. Starts, snaps played, stats, etc... but even then you'd have to look position by position. It would be pretty difficult for a direct player to player comparison, but you could "score production" from 3 star WRs at OM vs 3 star WRs at State.

[MarketingBully01]

Good job on this Engie. Great write up!

[RougeDawg]

I was just talking about a list of attrition and players that have actually contributed. No deep statistical breakdown needed

[messageboardsuperhero]

Damn, I've never really looked through a list of our 2011 signing class. How many of those "two star nobody" players are big contributors for us? Calhoun, Market, Malone, P. Smith, McKinney, etc. Dak, Cox, and Slay were all underrated too (I believe Slay was even a two star out of high school.)

What's really funny is that UM's best players from 2011 (outside of Moncrief) were all three stars or lower (Prewitt, Bryant, Nkemdiche, Morris, etc.). I'm not a big recruiting guy, but it's pretty evident to me that, while stars definitely do help, they aren't the end-all-be-all.

[engie]

What's funny is -- in Mullen's career at MSU -- our "hit rate" on no/low-offer 2 and 3* guys is crazy high. I mean CRAZY high. While, we've had some notable underperformance from the high-offer/4* guys...

[State82]

What's funny is -- in Mullen's career at MSU -- our "hit rate" on no/low-offer 2 and 3* guys is crazy high. I mean CRAZY high. While, we've had some notable underperformance from the high-offer/4* guys...

Yes. That is very telling. Don't know if it boils down to ego/work ethic/character of some of the higher stars or what, but its kind of uncanny how it has worked out. Good article, btw.

[smootness]

What's funny is -- in Mullen's career at MSU -- our "hit rate" on no/low-offer 2 and 3* guys is crazy high. I mean CRAZY high. While, we've had some notable underperformance from the high-offer/4* guys...

Especially when you include what guys were rated when we offered and when they committed:

Chris Jones - no recruiting profile
Dak Prescott - 2-star
Justin Cox - 2-star
De'Runnya Wilson - 2-star
Chris Hughes - 2-star

I'm pretty sure Clayborn was initially a 2-star, too.

[Goat Holder]

You have some facts wrong in there. Zach Jackson was one of our first commitments and a Dandy Dozen himself, he was highly recruited no matter what Johnson did. C.J. was a huge loss, and one that I lay on the feet of our coaches. There's no covering that up. Brassell and Singleton were never coming to MSU. But Johnson was, and we blew it. I know people close to this situation.

I'd say at best, the classes are about even now, with ours being better than expected and theirs not quite as good. They signed a good class that year, but like someone else said, OL is killing them. We obviously did something wrong that year, not sure if we got lazy or what. Sort of carried over into Mullen's demeanor the following season.

[ShotgunDawg]

What's funny is -- in Mullen's career at MSU -- our "hit rate" on no/low-offer 2 and 3* guys is crazy high. I mean CRAZY high. While, we've had some notable underperformance from the high-offer/4* guys...

This does seem pretty funny when looking at it, but if you really think about it, it actually makes sense.

If Mullen accepts a commitment from a 2 star guy, it means that Mullen is completely sold, has no doubt, and could care less what anyone else thinks about that player. Therefore, players that Mullen is "convicted" about typically turn out to be good.

However, we don't know what the coaches really think about some of these 4 star guys. They may accept his commitment and recruit him on the basis of his talent level, but that doesn't mean they are completely sold on their makeup, work ethic, etc...

When Mullen accepts a 2 star's commitment, he is basically saying, "We have to have this guy"

When he accepts a 4 star's commitment, we aren't exactly sure what he saying or what he really thinks about the player.

Honestly, when you think about it this way, we should celebrate when we get a 2 star commitment early in the process. It's basically Mullen standing on stool and yelling, "I FOUND A REALLY GOOD PLAYER THAT PERFECTLY FITS OUR SYSTEM!!"

When this happens all the recruiting gurus would be smart to give him an automatic 3 star rating so they don't look dumb. Mullen has proven them wrong to often

[Goat Holder]

He has a specific 'business plan' if you will. It's not hard to execute it when it's laid out there for you. He actually watches film and evaluates players in a state with traditional raw, but above average, football talent. He's getting the athletes that small schools put at QB. He's getting big, tall, wide guys that can play a variety of positions. He's putting a big emphasis on those types of folks in MS, and thus he's finding them. He's taking alot of good players away from USM too.

It isn't rocket science.

[engie]

You're right on Jackson... I looked at some bad info on that one.

Either way, you could easily argue that McKinney filled that hole. And in doing so, he's accomplished literally everything that CJ has, if not more...

[smootness]

He has a specific 'business plan' if you will. It's not hard to execute it when it's laid out there for you. He actually watches film and evaluates players in a state with traditional raw, but above average, football talent. He's getting the athletes that small schools put at QB. He's getting big, tall, wide guys that can play a variety of positions. He's putting a big emphasis on those types of folks in MS, and thus he's finding them. He's taking alot of good players away from USM too.

It isn't rocket science.

As with much of recruiting, it's about hard work. Some are naturally better salesmen, but even they work like crazy to have success. And talent evaluation is definitely not a quick process if you want to make sure nobody falls through the cracks.

[Goat Holder]

You hit on an important point....the salesmanship. Mullen doesn't have it (or didn't have it at one time), but it's required to hook the big fish. Just like in any other business. Have to pack the quality with the bling to get the best. And I think we're figuring that out. We still don't go to the level Ole Miss does, but we're getting better talent than we used to for sure.

We can win with Mullen's evals, but we also have to have the high-level talent guys mixed in there too.

[smootness]

No doubt about that, but you don't have to be an uber-salesman to get top talent. Marlon Humphrey loves Mullen.

[Jack Lambert]

I say let wins and loss on the field be the judge.

[Interpolation_Dawg_EX]

http://maroonandwhitenation.com/2013...meltdown-2011/

Thoughts?

I'm still looking for a simple way to determine total contribution of recruiting classes. Any thoughts? This is pretty easy at skill positions -- but very hard in the trenches, and practically impossible on the OL.

Could you set criteria and create a weighting system to give more weight to elite accomplishments? You could set the weights to sum to either to 1 or 100. For instance on O-line, one of the criteria could be did they play as freshmen (.05), number of starts/mins played (.20), number of sacks allowed (.20), number of pancake blocks (.20), during season awards (.10), post season awards (.10), and were they drafted (.05). This would allow you to create a total contribution score for a player...just my 2 cents.

[smootness]

Could you set criteria and create a weighting system to give more weight to elite accomplishments? You could set the weights to sum to either to 1 or 100. For instance on O-line, one of the criteria could be did they play as freshmen (.05), number of starts/mins played (.20), number of sacks allowed (.20), number of pancake blocks (.20), during season awards (.10), post season awards (.10), and were they drafted (.05). This would allow you to create a total contribution score for a player...just my 2 cents.

You could...if you were a gigantic nerd.



Just kidding with you.