Future All-Americans not top recruits

[HuskerCarter]

For those of you that find highly touted and ranked recruits turn into great players, you wont like this.

But for those who believe that it has more to do with coaching and not basing their recruits on stars or recruting agencies, you will enjoy this.

http://www.usatoday....vers/52873474/1

This is what really stood out to me.

"A glance at this year's American Football Coaches Association's first team shows that two-thirds of the first-team players were not among Rivals.com's Top 100 coming out of high school."

 

[Danny Bateman]

Yeah, interesting point, but one that's been raised before multiple times.

Goes back to the fact that there's sooooooo many more guys that AREN'T in the Top 100 or what have you of the scouting services than the guys that are there. Larger number of lower ranked guys = more guys that could potentially develop into the best players.

 

[robsker]

Fair enough.

But what would be much more meaningful would be the % of all-Americans as a function of recruiting star rating. That is, of the 20 or so (how many ever there are per year) of 5-star recruits, what percentage of them became all-Americans? Of the 150-180 or so (how many ever there are in a given year) 4-star players, what percentage became all-Americans. Of the 1000 or so 3-star recruits (again, how many ever ther are)... what % become all-Americans. That would be a better reflection of how well recruiting correlates to on-field performance.

I have no idea what these numbers would be... but it would be interesting to know.

 

[kchusker_chris]

Fair enough.

But what would be much more meaningful would be the % of all-Americans as a function of recruiting star rating. That is, of the 20 or so (how many ever there are per year) of 5-star recruits, what percentage of them became all-Americans? Of the 150-180 or so (how many ever there are in a given year) 4-star players, what percentage became all-Americans. Of the 1000 or so 3-star recruits (again, how many ever ther are)... what % become all-Americans. That would be a better reflection of how well recruiting correlates to on-field performance.

I have no idea what these numbers would be... but it would be interesting to know.

This has been done by Rivals. It proves their ranking are far more accurate than people want to admit.

Rivals Star Distribution

All-Americans

The truth is there are 30 5* guys, and 1,000 3* guys. Which group do you think is going to have more all-americans? Duh. Articles like this are posted each year and are statistically irrelevent.

 

[kchusker_chris]

And in case All-American isn't a good enough indicator, you could use the NFL's first round.

5* = 1 in 6.5 (13 times better than the average)

4* = 1 in 22

3* = 1 in 110ish

2* = 1 in 300

4* and 5* players, which make up a little under 13 percent of all high school players evaluated....account for almost 60% of first round NFL picks.

 

[Scratchtown]

Still don't give two craps about ranking, I would rather see that the individual has offers from numerous great programs. Not just western kentucky, ucla, colorado, etc...

 

[robsker]

Fair enough.

But what would be much more meaningful would be the % of all-Americans as a function of recruiting star rating. That is, of the 20 or so (how many ever there are per year) of 5-star recruits, what percentage of them became all-Americans? Of the 150-180 or so (how many ever there are in a given year) 4-star players, what percentage became all-Americans. Of the 1000 or so 3-star recruits (again, how many ever ther are)... what % become all-Americans. That would be a better reflection of how well recruiting correlates to on-field performance.

I have no idea what these numbers would be... but it would be interesting to know.

This has been done by Rivals. It proves their ranking are far more accurate than people want to admit.

Rivals Star Distribution

All-Americans

The truth is there are 30 5* guys, and 1,000 3* guys. Which group do you think is going to have more all-americans? Duh. Articles like this are posted each year and are statistically irrelevent.

Pretty convincing that, generally speaking, the star ratings have value. Overstating the case (that the ratings are highly predictive with few exceptions) or understaing the case (that they have little value) are equally mistakes. It seems that a pretty reasonable correlation exists. generally, programs with high star classes perform better than those with lesser star classes --- not always.... but often enough to say that recruiting rankings have reasonable predictive value.

 

[NUance]

The thing is, a given highly ranked recruit is more *likely* to develop into an All American than a particular lower ranked recruit at the same position. But a lot of things can happen to derail a recruit's career--injuries, drugs, drinking, girls, grades, laziness, and an assortment of other distractions. If nothing ever happened to players to derail their careers, and they were allowed to develop into their full potential, then stars would be a better predicter than they are. But sh#t happens. That's why predicting the future is a very difficult thing to do.

 

[KJ.]

The thing is, a given highly ranked recruit is more *likely* to develop into an All American than a particular lower ranked recruit at the same position. But a lot of things can happen to derail a recruit's career--injuries, drugs, drinking, girls, grades, laziness, and an assortment of other distractions. If nothing ever happened to players to derail their careers, and they were allowed to develop into their full potential, then stars would be a better predicter than they are. But sh#t happens. That's why predicting the future is a very difficult thing to do.

On an individual basis. But who really cares about that? There's 85 guys on a football team, and if you know all the probabilities based on the stars, you can probably predict how many all americans the team will have pretty well.

 

[BigRedFred]

What might also be interesting, were somebody so inclined, would be to see if recruiting-class ratings (over a 2-3 year period) correlated to a team's final ranking. We all know that Mack Brown is notoriously unable to ride a top-rated recruiting class to the national championship, but in general, does having a bunch of 4/5-star (prima donnas?) translate into team success? And conversely, are 2/3 star teams doomed to fail?

 

[NoLongerN]

Enjoyed the article and the input by you guys. Debate away ... I'll enjoy the read.

 

[kchusker_chris]

The thing is, a given highly ranked recruit is more *likely* to develop into an All American than a particular lower ranked recruit at the same position. But a lot of things can happen to derail a recruit's career--injuries, drugs, drinking, girls, grades, laziness, and an assortment of other distractions. If nothing ever happened to players to derail their careers, and they were allowed to develop into their full potential, then stars would be a better predicter than they are. But sh#t happens. That's why predicting the future is a very difficult thing to do.

I'd argue a 2* guy has an equal chance to take drugs, get injured, or knock up some corn fed porker as a 5*. So since the same variables apply to a recruit regardless of ranking it has no impact on the outcome. If you can prove to me 3* recruits are less likely to get injurred, or are better students then you might have an argument. But I highly doubt there's any date to back that up...so I'm going to go w/ the fact that a team full of 4-5* recruits is much more likely to be successful than a team of 2-3* recruits. Not sure how you can argue that when looking at the success of programs in correlation to their star rankings. There are outliers (as with any sample), but the general correlation is impossible to disprove.

 

[FrankWheeler]

I'd argue a 2* guy has an equal chance to knock up some corn fed porker as a 5*

They all like big women!

 

[kchusker_chris]

What might also be interesting, were somebody so inclined, would be to see if recruiting-class ratings (over a 2-3 year period) correlated to a team's final ranking. We all know that Mack Brown is notoriously unable to ride a top-rated recruiting class to the national championship, but in general, does having a bunch of 4/5-star (prima donnas?) translate into team success? And conversely, are 2/3 star teams doomed to fail?

Texas reg season 2001-2009...11-2,11-2,10-3,11-1,13-0,10-3,11-1,13-0,10-3,10-3,12-1,13-1....yeah that would just suck...

Don't let 1-2 bad years (when they were in transition regarding QBs) cloud the fact that Texas has been (and will be again) one of the most dominant programs over the long haul we've seen...likely since Nebraska in the 80's, 90's. Not a single person on this board would be the least bit upset if they were told that would be the Huskers' record for the next 10 years...

 

[NUance]

The thing is, a given highly ranked recruit is more *likely* to develop into an All American than a particular lower ranked recruit at the same position. But a lot of things can happen to derail a recruit's career--injuries, drugs, drinking, girls, grades, laziness, and an assortment of other distractions. If nothing ever happened to players to derail their careers, and they were allowed to develop into their full potential, then stars would be a better predicter than they are. But sh#t happens. That's why predicting the future is a very difficult thing to do.

On an individual basis. But who really cares about that? There's 85 guys on a football team, and if you know all the probabilities based on the stars, you can probably predict how many all americans the team will have pretty well.

I am not exactly sure what your point is. But looking at the graphic in kchusker_chris’s post above, if we recruit a 5* guy he has a 1/13 chance of becoming an All American. A 4* guy has a 1/53 chance. And a 3* guy has a 1/172 chance. Sure, you could use those odds to figure out how many guys on the team should eventually become All Americans. Since we don’t care about individuals or anything.

But the OP’s post is correct also: two-thirds of the first-team All Americans were not among Rivals.com's Top 100 when they were recruited. This is mostly because the pool of 3* players (4,982) is so much larger than the pool of 4* players (1805) or 5* players (171). But it's also because evaluating talent, projecting a guy's improvement, and predicting whether he will shoot himself in the foot and derail his career are difficult things to do. In other words, predicting the future is a difficult thing to do.