GT number 15 in lowest talent on roster

smokey_wasp

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No surprises there.

I will be very interested to see how Leach recruits at MS State. He hasn't ever been somewhere that you can really recruit before and I always felt his scheme had less baggage than CPJ's, due to being pass heavy. If he can maintain top 25 classes there, they may do quite well.
 

GTRX7

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There is some interesting disassociation between the alleged talent and record.

Kansas St. ranked with the 2nd worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 36-28 record during the relevant period.
Washington St. ranked with the 10th worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 43-22 record during the relevant period.
Minnesota ranked with the 11th worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 38-26 record during the relevant period.

Wake also had a winning record and a number of other teams were not that far off of .500. Either this is not particularly accurate or says as much or more about coaching than it does about talent.
 

BainbridgeJacket

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There is some interesting disassociation between the alleged talent and record.

Kansas St. ranked with the 2nd worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 36-28 record during the relevant period.
Washington St. ranked with the 10th worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 43-22 record during the relevant period.
Minnesota ranked with the 11th worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 38-26 record during the relevant period.

Wake also had a winning record and a number of other teams were not that far off of .500. Either this is not particularly accurate or says as much or more about coaching than it does about talent.
Strength of schedule
 

gtrower

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No surprises there.

I will be very interested to see how Leach recruits at MS State. He hasn't ever been somewhere that you can really recruit before and I always felt his scheme had less baggage than CPJ's, due to being pass heavy. If he can maintain top 25 classes there, they may do quite well.

I think CPJ and Leach are cut from the same cloth in a lot of ways. One of which is being rather brash when interacting with people. I have a feeling he’ll struggle to recruit very well there either. Which is not to say he still can’t have some success as he’s shown what he can do with minimal talent. Wish he had ended up in the SEC East instead as he’s sure to play spoiler to a couple teams every season.
 

slugboy

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There is some interesting disassociation between the alleged talent and record.

Kansas St. ranked with the 2nd worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 36-28 record during the relevant period.
Washington St. ranked with the 10th worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 43-22 record during the relevant period.
Minnesota ranked with the 11th worst talent in the country, yet had a winning 38-26 record during the relevant period.

Wake also had a winning record and a number of other teams were not that far off of .500. Either this is not particularly accurate or says as much or more about coaching than it does about talent.

Minnesota made a run at the Big 10 championship this year and ended ranked in the top 20. Fleck's reputation is as a sales guy, so you'd think he'd have talent--certainly had guys who look the part.

I'm not sure how they put this list together.

You also have to think about how the team is put together--you could have NFL-ready wide receivers and small linemen, and the receivers are never going to get the ball.
 

smokey_wasp

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I think CPJ and Leach are cut from the same cloth in a lot of ways. One of which is being rather brash when interacting with people. I have a feeling he’ll struggle to recruit very well there either. Which is not to say he still can’t have some success as he’s shown what he can do with minimal talent. Wish he had ended up in the SEC East instead as he’s sure to play spoiler to a couple teams every season.

Yeah. I think if their recruiting takes a hit, he will need to do better than their usual 6-6, 7-5. We've seen how quick the hook is there.
 

Novajacket

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Talent is based on 247 sports composite values. So really just based on what recruiting services think. You can interpret the better whichever way suits your story. Either they are better at finding unknown talent, better coaches, strategists, or developers. Too many variables for any one to be accurate. My pitch is that our talent doesn’t yet fit our long term system. I am excited to see the changes this year. The transfers and freshmen, I think will have a big impact.
 

GTRX7

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Talent is based on 247 sports composite values. So really just based on what recruiting services think. You can interpret the better whichever way suits your story. Either they are better at finding unknown talent, better coaches, strategists, or developers. Too many variables for any one to be accurate. My pitch is that our talent doesn’t yet fit our long term system. I am excited to see the changes this year. The transfers and freshmen, I think will have a big impact.

Interesting. Here is some more data from 247 team rankings over the exact same time period:
2015 - GT Recruiting ranked 8/14 in ACC
2016 - GT Recruiting ranked 11/14 in ACC
2017 - GT Recruiting ranked 9/14 in ACC
2018 - GT Recruiting ranked 8/14 in ACC
2019 - GT Recruiting ranked 9/14 in ACC

Average 2015-2019 = 9th out of 14 in ACC

Not great, but seems better than bottom 15 in the country based on this data set.

I agree with your overall premise that GT lacked talent going into the transition, but I strongly disagree that Tech was bottom 15 in the country in talent. Even taking into account the system.

I totally agree that CGC is doing an amazing job raising the talent level (both through recruiting and transfers). I think there is an argument that this year we could have top half level ACC talent (if we can find a QB before game 5).
 

smokey_wasp

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Interesting. Here is some more data from 247 team rankings over the exact same time period:
2015 - GT Recruiting ranked 8/14 in ACC
2016 - GT Recruiting ranked 11/14 in ACC
2017 - GT Recruiting ranked 9/14 in ACC
2018 - GT Recruiting ranked 8/14 in ACC
2019 - GT Recruiting ranked 9/14 in ACC

Average 2015-2019 = 9th out of 14 in ACC

Not great, but seems better than bottom 15 in the country based on this data set.

I agree with your overall premise that GT lacked talent going into the transition, but I strongly disagree that Tech was bottom 15 in the country in talent. Even taking into account the system.

I totally agree that CGC is doing an amazing job raising the talent level (both through recruiting and transfers). I think there is an argument that this year we could have top half level ACC talent (if we can find a QB before game 5).

It is bottom 15 in power 5, not the whole country. And yes, it is believable. Looking at year by year rankings is not the same as looking at the 85 man rosters in total. Rankings can be skewed by having a larger or smaller class than usual any given year. The bottom line is we have been down there with Wake, Syracuse and BC. Also note no other coastal teams on this list, which made us the least talented in our division by the metrics used (which may not be perfect, but broadly illustrate a valid point).
 

GTRX7

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It is bottom 15 in power 5, not the whole country. And yes, it is believable. Looking at year by year rankings is not the same as looking at the 85 man rosters in total. Rankings can be skewed by having a larger or smaller class than usual any given year. The bottom line is we have been down there with Wake, Syracuse and BC. Also note no other coastal teams on this list, which made us the least talented in our division by the metrics used (which may not be perfect, but broadly illustrate a valid point).

Personally, I don't think these rankings are particularly accurate or meaningful (other than to say that we were certainly below average talent last year).

However, if you do value those rankings, I guess you must think we have some really terrible coaching. After all, of the 14 teams on the list that supposedly have worse talent than us, only Rutgers had a worse record, and only Kansas had the same record last year. Everyone else had a better record with worse talent.

On top of that, of the 14 teams on the list with allegedly worse talent than Georgia Tech, 8 of the 14 went to a bowl last year and 5 of the 14 had winning records.

If the numbers are to be believed, pretty amazing how much better their coaching staffs must be than ours. Personally, I don't believe that, nor do I believe the numbers to be terribly accurate.
 

Skeptic

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No surprises there.

I will be very interested to see how Leach recruits at MS State. He hasn't ever been somewhere that you can really recruit before and I always felt his scheme had less baggage than CPJ's, due to being pass heavy. If he can maintain top 25 classes there, they may do quite well.
That was the most surprising hire in the SEC, including Kiffin, who was known to be high hurdling back to the big time. Apparently he was not run off by Washington State, but maybe like Mack Brown at UNC, got tired of playing second fiddle to basketball, or in this case, U. of Washington. But if he is not a good recruiter anyway -- and I am suspicious of such lists because games are played on the field -- good luck to him getting players to Starkville, Miss.
 

smokey_wasp

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Personally, I don't think these rankings are particularly accurate or meaningful (other than to say that we were certainly below average talent last year).

However, if you do value those rankings, I guess you must think we have some really terrible coaching. After all, of the 14 teams on the list that supposedly have worse talent than us, only Rutgers had a worse record, and only Kansas had the same record last year. Everyone else had a better record with worse talent.

On top of that, of the 14 teams on the list with allegedly worse talent than Georgia Tech, 8 of the 14 went to a bowl last year and 5 of the 14 had winning records.

I think the transition compounded the talent issue to make it look even worse than it was. And I'm not even gonna begin to look at the schedules of some of those teams compared to ours. But, we agree that the talent level is going up, that's what matters at this point.
 

smokey_wasp

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That was the most surprising hire in the SEC, including Kiffin, who was known to be high hurdling back to the big time. Apparently he was not run off by Washington State, but maybe like Mack Brown at UNC, got tired of playing second fiddle to basketball, or in this case, U. of Washington. But if he is not a good recruiter anyway -- and I am suspicious of such lists because games are played on the field -- good luck to him getting players to Starkville, Miss.

I think his success will depend a lot on whether he can somehow finally field a defense.
 

GTRX7

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I think the transition compounded the talent issue to make it look even worse than it was. And I'm not even gonna begin to look at the schedules of some of those teams compared to ours. But, we agree that the talent level is going up, that's what matters at this point.

I agree the transition made it worse, as well as injuries, but I also put some of that blame on the coaching staff for not utilizing the talent we did have more effectively.

That said, we totally both agree that the talent is going up dramatically and I am very optimistic that the staff will do better in year 2 and beyond. This year, we have something like 11 eligible players that were 4* recruits. Most high end talent we have had since..........? We also dramatically improve our O-line depth. Just need to figure out the QB in pre-season and go with it.
 

YJMD

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Where they only going based on # of stars for a player? There is an enormous difference between the best 3* and worst 3*. FWIW, I don't think we have had great talent lately, but not bottom of P5. I'd wager our ratings are more tightly grouped than several others who may be higher than us on the list. Academic hurdles had mattered, but while being in a recruiting hotbed provides access to a lot of local top talent, it means we're facing a whole lot more competition for those guys, and a lot of other places are geographically similar so location itself wasn't likely to win out. CGC is proving we can do a lot better.
 
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So if you are going strictly by 247 recruiting rankings to do this....We have been in the bottom 15 since they started ranking this back in 2001. 2001 we were 19th, then 51st, 57,71 etc. On average we rank about 50 when you average out each year. That being said then there must be more to a talent ranking. And as said....funny how we didn't rank in final W and Ls in the bottom 15 those years.
 

nod

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I think this is using recruiting rankings and titled wrong using talent. It would be better to rank by All-American, 1st team all conference, 2nd team all conference, 3rd team all conf on a scale over a period of time.



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