How Important is Recruiting?

[Augusta_Jacket]

Doesn't prove anything, but I found this stroll down memory lane written in 2017 about Tech's highest ranked recruits since 2000:

Georgia Tech Football: A Look Back at the Highest Rated Georgia Tech Recruits Since 2000 | FOX Sports

With the Georgia Tech coaching staff putting it's finishing touches on the 2017 recruiting class with just two weeks till national signing day, there's no better way to look at the Yellow Jackets top ten recruits since 2000.National Signing Day is just two weeks away which means soon 14 ...

www.foxsports.com

"Johnson, was a five-star recruit coming out of high school and considered the 23rd best prospect in the 2004 recruiting class. Johnson was also ranked as the fifth best wide receiver prospect and the third best in the state of Georgia."

Was from a fan site.

"FanSided via Yellow Jacked Up"

 

[bobongo]

What's my agenda? The truth? I've been following recruiting since I was kid, and Scout was one of the major recruiting services...why do you think 247 bought them out?

Like I said, look at the time stamp from the link I quoted in @RonJohn reply. It's from 2003. I have no skin in this game but letting the facts speak for themselves. It's always been known that CJ was a 5 star, but NOT a CONSENSUS 5 star.

FWIW, as I remember Calvin was a 4-star in every recruiting service except one where he was a 5-star. Can't remember which one.

 

[bobongo]

Calvin Johnson - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Name	Hometown	High school / college	Height	Weight	40‡	Commit date
Calvin Johnson WR	Tyrone, Georgia	Sandy Creek HS	6 ft 4 in (1.93 m)	213 lb (97 kg)	4.27	Jan 12, 2004
Recruiting star ratings: Scout: Rivals: 247Sports: N/A

Calvin Johnson, Detroit Lions, Wide Receiver

Calvin Johnson is a Wide Receiver from Tyrone, GA.

247sports.com

 

[Augusta_Jacket]

Well we ALL know he should have been a unanimous 5-star, can you agree on that?

Absolutely. Him and Jahmyr Gibbs both.

 

[VRTechFan]

Your post is actually a case in point providing some proof to my argument. People who stress recruiting ABOVE all else, ignore everything except recruiting. Are we discussion flexbone specifically, or a "scheme" in general? Yet, you go straight to all the reasons flexbone can't possibly succeed.

Cam Newton went to an RPO team. He won a national championship in a scheme offense. GT won the Orange Bowl, and was closer than we had been in 24 years to sniffing a national championship in 2014 with the flexbone AND what you consider far inferior talent. Miami has been a top 10 recruiting team for a long time, and hasn't done squat with all of that talent.

It does take more than just scheme. However, it takes more than just talent. If you don't believe that, look at Miami. They have had talent. They have changed coaches multiple times, but still are an undisciplined train wreck.

Preach!!

 

[VRTechFan]

He's not even the best recruiter in the Sun Belt according to the rankings. Do you really think 4 and 5 stars would choose him over Deion?

With that logic, Collins recruited better than CPJ and we all know how that turned out.

 

[jgtengineer]

We didnt actually recruit calvin. His grandma did that for us.

 

[Skeptic]

Doesn't prove anything, but I found this stroll down memory lane written in 2017 about Tech's highest ranked recruits since 2000:

Georgia Tech Football: A Look Back at the Highest Rated Georgia Tech Recruits Since 2000 | FOX Sports

With the Georgia Tech coaching staff putting it's finishing touches on the 2017 recruiting class with just two weeks till national signing day, there's no better way to look at the Yellow Jackets top ten recruits since 2000.National Signing Day is just two weeks away which means soon 14 ...

www.foxsports.com

"Johnson, was a five-star recruit coming out of high school and considered the 23rd best prospect in the 2004 recruiting class. Johnson was also ranked as the fifth best wide receiver prospect and the third best in the state of Georgia."

Right now I am laughing my rear end off. Calvin Johnson would not have been 23rd or 5th as a prospect had he played punter. He was a man among boys in HS, in college, and in the pros. Even today former defenders talking about taking on Calvin Johnson, themselves all-pro, speak with the tone of reverence as though he came down from a higher league.

 

[85Escape]

"Johnson, was a five-star recruit coming out of high school and considered the 23rd best prospect in the 2004 recruiting class. Johnson was also ranked as the fifth best wide receiver prospect and the third best in the state of Georgia."

I'm not going to bother to check, but I'm guessing the four more highly ranked receivers didn't have quite the career that CJ did in the NFL.

 

[MountainBuzzMan]

Right now I am laughing my rear end off. Calvin Johnson would not have been 23rd or 5th as a prospect had he played punter. He was a man among boys in HS, in college, and in the pros. Even today former defenders talking about taking on Calvin Johnson, themselves all-pro, speak with the tone of reverence as though he came down from a higher league.

CJ should have been the only 6 star recruit. Once in a generation type athlete in all of college football.

 

[stigs02jrt]

Here you go. This is from 2021 so it’s one year dated, but you can see the point. The 5 year rolling averages of recruiting rankings from 2017-2021. This list includes the top 22 schools with the highest average recruiting rankings

College football recruiting rankings: Teams with the best classes over a five-year average entering 2021

TEAM	5-YEAR AVG.	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021
Georgia	2	3	1	2	1	3
Alabama	2.4	1	7	1	2	1
Ohio State	5	2	2	14	5	2
LSU	7	7	15	5	4	4
Clemson	8	16	6	10	3	5
Oklahoma	9	8	9	6	11	11
Texas A&M	9.2	12	17	4	6	7
Florida	10.8	10	14	9	8	13
Texas	11.6	26	3	3	9	17
Michigan	11.6	5	21	8	14	10
Oregon	12	19	17	7	12	6
Notre Dame	12.4	11	10	15	17	9
Auburn	13.2	9	12	11	7	27
Penn State	13.8	15	5	13	15	21
Miami	14.8	13	8	28	13	12
Tennessee	15	17	20	12	10	16
Florida State	15.6	6	11	17	22	22
USC	18.2	4	4	20	55	8
Washington	20.4	22	13	16	16	35
Nebraska	20.8	23	22	19	20	20
North Carolina	23	27	23	32	19	14
Mississippi State	25.4	24	27	24	27	25

Let’s see how many teams recruit in the top 20 but don’t finish there:

Texas A&M: 2 ranked finishes over 5 years. 16th in 2018 and 4th in 2020. Currently 3-5

Auburn: 2 ranked finishes over 5 years. 10th in 2017 and 14th in 2019. Currently 3-5.

Miami: 2 ranked finishes. 13th in 2017 and 22nd in 2020. Currently 4-4

Tennessee: ZERO ranked finishes. Currently undefeated and #1 or #3 in the country. Man, it’s unreal what getting a competent coach can do for you. Almost like recruiting isn’t everything

Florida State: ZERO ranked finishes. Currently 5-3

USC: 2 ranked finishes. 12th in 2017, 22nd in 2020. New coach has the at 7-1 currently looking to be CFP contenders

Washington: 2 ranked finishes in 2017 and 2018

Nebraska: ZERO ranked finishes. Currently 3-5

North Carolina: 1 ranked finish. 18th in 2020

Mississippi State: 1 ranked finish. 19th in 2017

So what do these numbers and figures tell us? Well, about half of the best recruiting schools in the country are not finishing their seasons ranked in the top 25 consistently. All of the teams I mentioned finished ranked in 2 or fewer of the 5 seasons looked at.

Three schools NEVER finished a seasons ranked over a 5 year period. With 22 schools listed, that’s about 14%.

Five schools finished ranked one time or less. That’s about 23%.

Let’s break it down a little further. Only 6 of those 22 have finished every season ranked: Georgia, Alabama, Ohio State, Notre Dame, Clemson, Oklahoma. At least 2 of those 6 have been featured in every single iteration of the CFP. But, 2 of those changed coaches this year and effectively have no shot to finish ranked this year. (Hmmmm seems to be so weird that when teams change coaches they get different trends. Almost like recruiting isn’t everything). Let’s also be very clear, 5 of those 6 are in the top 6 in average recruit rankings. There is a very clear distinction in the teams who recruit in the top 5 consistently and everybody else. Once you get outside the top 15, your recruiting ranking doesn’t really matter that much anymore.

So @stigs02jrt in order for Georgia Tech to achieve the success you’re looking for based solely on recruiting, we’re going to have to recruit consistently in the top 15. We’ve never signed a top 15 class, yet you think our best path forward is to somehow start doing that on a consistent basis? Based on the figures, you have just as much of a chance to only be ranked once over a 5 year period as you are to be ranked all 5 years. And nobody outside a select group has even been ranked for 5 consecutive years anyway.

Interesting data but faulty analysis.

Ideally, you'd take the top 25 recruiting schools over, say, 5 years (not just 22 teams like you did), and see how those teams fare in the top 25 final AP poll over 5 years ON AVERAGE.

Searching the interwebs, here's the closest I can find. Below is 5-year snapshot of the top 25 teams in America based on final AP finish, from 2015 to 2019 seasons. 25 points for a #1 finish, 1 point for a #25 finish.

1. Clemson (120)
2. Alabama (116)
3. Ohio St. (109)
4. Oklahoma (106)
5. LSU (76)
6. Georgia (65)
6. Notre Dame (65)
8. Penn State (63)
9. Wisconsin (56)
10. Florida (52)
11. Michigan (50)
12. Washington (45)
13. Stanford (43)
14. USC (40)
15. UCF (37)
16. TCU (36)
17. Oklahoma St. (33)
18. Michigan St. (31)
19. Auburn (30)
19. Florida St. (30)
21. Iowa (28)
21. Oregon (28)
23. Baylor (26)
24. Miami (19)
25. Houston (18)
25. Texas (18)

And below is a link to the top 25 RECRUITING teams from 2015 recruiting class to 2019 recruiting class.

College football recruiting: Schools with best class rankings on average over the past five years

These 25 programs have averaged a top-25 class across the last five years

www.cbssports.com

Summary: Of the top 25 teams over the 2015-2019 seasons, 17 or nearly 70% were also top 25 recruiters. If that's not a good enough correlation, I can't help you.

And again, coaching matters also; can't have incompetence. But unless you get lucky finding the next Kiffin or Heupel, you better get a competent guy who can get the PLAYERS. Like Deion.

 

[JacketFan137]

Interesting data but faulty analysis.

Ideally, you'd take the top 25 recruiting schools over, say, 5 years (not just 22 teams like you did), and see how those teams fare in the top 25 final AP poll over 5 years ON AVERAGE.

Searching the interwebs, here's the closest I can find. Below is 5-year snapshot of the top 25 teams in America based on final AP finish, from 2015 to 2019 seasons. 25 points for a #1 finish, 1 point for a #25 finish.

1. Clemson (120)
2. Alabama (116)
3. Ohio St. (109)
4. Oklahoma (106)
5. LSU (76)
6. Georgia (65)
6. Notre Dame (65)
8. Penn State (63)
9. Wisconsin (56)
10. Florida (52)
11. Michigan (50)
12. Washington (45)
13. Stanford (43)
14. USC (40)
15. UCF (37)
16. TCU (36)
17. Oklahoma St. (33)
18. Michigan St. (31)
19. Auburn (30)
19. Florida St. (30)
21. Iowa (28)
21. Oregon (28)
23. Baylor (26)
24. Miami (19)
25. Houston (18)
25. Texas (18)

And below is a link to the top 25 RECRUITING teams from 2015 recruiting class to 2019 recruiting class.

College football recruiting: Schools with best class rankings on average over the past five years

These 25 programs have averaged a top-25 class across the last five years

www.cbssports.com

Summary: Of the top 25 teams over the 2015-2019 seasons, 17 or nearly 70% were also top 25 recruiters. If that's not a good enough correlation, I can't help you.

And again, coaching matters also; can't have incompetence. But unless you get lucky finding the next Kiffin or Heupel, you better get a competent guy who can get the PLAYERS. Like Deion.

thank you for quantifying what many of us have been saying. recruiting is the name of the game in power 5 football. if you can’t recruit you can’t succeed over a sustained period that’s the bottom line

this doesn’t mean you don’t have to coach but the second you say that too many users assume you don’t care about coaching and just want collins again

 

[slugboy]

Recruiting is about 36% of the game. Large factor, but not the dominant factor

Why Football Recruiting Rankings Matter

By examining 17 years of recruiting rankings for college football programs, researches have determined that recruiting rankings are predictive of team success.

athleticdirectoru.com

 

[Skeptic]

I'm not going to bother to check, but I'm guessing the four more highly ranked receivers didn't have quite the career that CJ did in the NFL.

Speaking of numbers that add up but don't make sense -- Calvin Johnson was the No. 1 prospect in his class from the get-go; forget the recrujting servifces -- Ray Guy has died. Guy was maybe the best punter who ever kicked the ball, even though he averaged only about 43 yards a kick. There is the curse of numbers. Guy kicked the ball so accurately to any point on the field within 45 yards, and so high that any kick returner who tried to catch it and run was, in the paraphrased words of Butch Cassidy warning a wannabee off the Sundance Kid. "No, Sundance would not kill you. Why. you'd be shooting yourself." Most guys kicked it further and some harder. But nobody ever hit such a majestic kick and imperiled so many kick returners as Ray Guy. They all prayed fpr a fair catch.

 

[JacketOff]

Interesting data but faulty analysis.

Ideally, you'd take the top 25 recruiting schools over, say, 5 years (not just 22 teams like you did), and see how those teams fare in the top 25 final AP poll over 5 years ON AVERAGE.

Searching the interwebs, here's the closest I can find. Below is 5-year snapshot of the top 25 teams in America based on final AP finish, from 2015 to 2019 seasons. 25 points for a #1 finish, 1 point for a #25 finish.

1. Clemson (120)
2. Alabama (116)
3. Ohio St. (109)
4. Oklahoma (106)
5. LSU (76)
6. Georgia (65)
6. Notre Dame (65)
8. Penn State (63)
9. Wisconsin (56)
10. Florida (52)
11. Michigan (50)
12. Washington (45)
13. Stanford (43)
14. USC (40)
15. UCF (37)
16. TCU (36)
17. Oklahoma St. (33)
18. Michigan St. (31)
19. Auburn (30)
19. Florida St. (30)
21. Iowa (28)
21. Oregon (28)
23. Baylor (26)
24. Miami (19)
25. Houston (18)
25. Texas (18)

And below is a link to the top 25 RECRUITING teams from 2015 recruiting class to 2019 recruiting class.

College football recruiting: Schools with best class rankings on average over the past five years

These 25 programs have averaged a top-25 class across the last five years

www.cbssports.com

Summary: Of the top 25 teams over the 2015-2019 seasons, 17 or nearly 70% were also top 25 recruiters. If that's not a good enough correlation, I can't help you.

And again, coaching matters also; can't have incompetence. But unless you get lucky finding the next Kiffin or Heupel, you better get a competent guy who can get the PLAYERS. Like Deion.

How is the analysis faulty because it only includes 22 teams instead of 25? Those 22 were the only ones who averaged a top 25 class. Something you’re saying we have to do to compete.

If anything your analysis is faulty. Your data can be heavily skewed by just one “lightning in a bottle” season. For example, Florida State finished ranked 14th in 2015 and 8th in 2016. Then from 2017-19 they went a combined 18-20. Were they really the 19th best team in the country over that period?
Baylor finished 13th in both 2015 and 2019, and went 15-23 between 2016-‘18.

If this 5 year period were from 2014-2018, Georgia Tech would’ve had 17 “points” on this scale. I’m sure the numbers would’ve changed a little bit, but that would put us just outside the top 25 best programs based on one single year. Can you not see how flawed that is?

If you want to talk about finishing in the top 25 consistently then applying a weighted scale to ranked finishes is not how you measure consistency. In my post we established that basically nobody recruiting outside the top 5 consistently even has a chance at a national title. So everyone else is more or less equal, especially outside the top 15. We aren’t going to recruit in the top 5, and we’ve never recruited in the top 15, but you want to continue to harp on that being the goal.
That’s not a realistic goal. It’s not happening. Not with Deion. Not with Chadwell. Not with Lincoln Riley. Not with Kirby Smart. Georgia Tech will not consistently be a top 15 destination. It won’t. Deion won’t fix that. And the numbers show that anybody recruiting outside the top 15 has just as much of a chance to finish ranked as the schools recruiting at 16-25.

Am I saying recruiting is not important? NO. Absolutely not. Recruiting is definitely important. But it is not the end-all-be-all. Once again, look at Tennessee. They have recruited in the top 20 forever and had losing records. A turnover on their coaching staff and now they’re Natty contenders. Recruiting is DEFINITELY important, but hiring a coach based solely on his recruiting abilities is an exercise in futility.

 

[CEB]

How is the analysis faulty because it only includes 22 teams instead of 25? Those 22 were the only ones who averaged a top 25 class. Something you’re saying we have to do to compete.

If anything your analysis is faulty. Your data can be heavily skewed by just one “lightning in a bottle” season. For example, Florida State finished ranked 14th in 2015 and 8th in 2016. Then from 2017-19 they went a combined 18-20. Were they really the 19th best team in the country over that period?
Baylor finished 13th in both 2015 and 2019, and went 15-23 between 2016-‘18.

If this 5 year period were from 2014-2018, Georgia Tech would’ve had 17 “points” on this scale. I’m sure the numbers would’ve changed a little bit, but that would put us just outside the top 25 best programs based on one single year. Can you not see how flawed that is?

If you want to talk about finishing in the top 25 consistently then applying a weighted scale to ranked finishes is not how you measure consistency. In my post we established that basically nobody recruiting outside the top 5 consistently even has a chance at a national title. So everyone else is more or less equal, especially outside the top 15. We aren’t going to recruit in the top 5, and we’ve never recruited in the top 15, but you want to continue to harp on that being the goal.
That’s not a realistic goal. It’s not happening. Not with Deion. Not with Chadwell. Not with Lincoln Riley. Not with Kirby Smart. Georgia Tech will not consistently be a top 15 destination. It won’t. Deion won’t fix that. And the numbers show that anybody recruiting outside the top 15 has just as much of a chance to finish ranked as the schools recruiting at 16-25.

Am I saying recruiting is not important? NO. Absolutely not. Recruiting is definitely important. But it is not the end-all-be-all. Once again, look at Tennessee. They have recruited in the top 20 forever and had losing records. A turnover on their coaching staff and now they’re Natty contenders. Recruiting is DEFINITELY important, but hiring a coach based solely on his recruiting abilities is an exercise in futility.

 

[JacketFan137]

Recruiting is about 36% of the game. Large factor, but not the dominant factor

Why Football Recruiting Rankings Matter

By examining 17 years of recruiting rankings for college football programs, researches have determined that recruiting rankings are predictive of team success.

athleticdirectoru.com

that isn’t THE dominant factor by that definition but one third of something is a very significant amount. far too much to put on the back burner in favor of “scheme”

 

[kittysniper101]

that isn’t THE dominant factor by that definition but one third of something is a very significant amount. far too much to put on the back burner in favor of “scheme”

Where do you think the other 64% of the variance of team’s performance is coming from? Not to mention other posters already demonstrated that it’s quite easy to end up unranked even with highly ranked recruits.

If you believe that Deion is a really good coach and brings more to the table than just recruiting that’s fine. That belief just isn’t based in a lot of evidence. While we’re playing hypotheticals, what happens if we don’t win in Deions first year? How much does that derail recruiting hype?

 

[JacketFan137]

Where do you think the other 64% of the variance of team’s performance is coming from? Not to mention other posters already demonstrated that it’s quite easy to end up unranked even with highly ranked recruits.

If you believe that Deion is a really good coach and brings more to the table than just recruiting that’s fine. That belief just isn’t based in a lot of evidence. While we’re playing hypotheticals, what happens if we don’t win in Deions first year? How much does that derail recruiting hype?

and how many teams that recruit like **** also end up unranked? that cuts both ways

absence of evidence isn’t the evidence of absence. watch jackson state play and you’ll see what you need to know.

if he loses year 1 he loses. not much else to say.

 

[IEEEWreck]

Below is 5-year snapshot of the top 25 teams in America based on final AP finish, from 2015 to 2019 seasons. 25 points for a #1 finish, 1 point for a #25 finish.

Seriously?

"If you take a measure with a low signal to noise ratio and then amplify it, you'll see that..."

C'mon.