A Deeper Look Into Average Recruit Ranking

[SalVolinus]

I keep seeing people reference our avg. recruit ranking in comparison to other teams, namely SEC teams South Carolina and Kentucky, as to reasons this class isn't very solid.

While keeping in mind that these ratings are highly subjective, but generally trend towards reliable, I wanted to look at just how much that metric skews based on 1 or 2 kids, and why it may be mostly useless number to look at.

For instance, our bottom 3 players are ranked:
86
84
77
This comes to an average of 82.

South Carolina's bottom 3 players are ranked:
85
84
82
This comes to an average of 84.
So let's say Tennessee drops the 77 ranked player. The average then soars from 82 to 85, surpassing South Carolina's. Yet, no one would argue that having that player committed is worse than having the scholarship unfilled.

Here are the lowest rated players on the SEC teams in the Top 25:
Florida - 76
Tennessee - 77
SCAR - 82
UGA - 83
Miss St- 84
KY - 85
aTm - 85
Auburn - 86
LSU - 87
Alabama - 88
Which basically means, if we took away the offers of our longsnapper and an OG out of Texas that our staff obviously likes, our lowest rated recruit would be an 86. Tied with Auburn and only behind Alabama and LSU. So should we drop them? Of course not. Similarly, Florida could drop their 76 rated punter and their lowest rated recruit would jump all the way to 84. Both of these players are heavily skewing the avg. recruit ranking.

So what would the median recruit rank look like?
Miss St- 87
SCAR - 88
KY - 88
Tennessee - 90
Florida - 90
Auburn - 90
aTm - 91
Alabama - 93
LSU - 94
UGA - 95
Starts to paint a little different picture.

Personally, I think all SEC teams, and most Power 5 teams have pretty good players across the field. The difference between 7 wins and 12 wins is the game changers. The freaks. The guys at the top. This is why I think a Top4,5, or 6 metric would be great to 247 to add. I'll do a Top 5 for sake of my own time.
Miss St - 91
Kentucky - 91
SCAR - 94
Tennessee - 94
Florida - 95
Auburn - 96
aTm - 97
Alabama - 98
UGA - 98
LSU - 98
Well, that order looks familiar. Roughly the current pecking order of the SEC - also very similar to the median rankings - but the gap between teams is a little more accurately reflected here in my opinion.

Anyway, as a final thought, this will obviously change a ton over the next few weeks. So this is just a snap shot of current date/time, but I thought it was worth exploring anyway. We shouldn't fall in love with one metric, or two, or whatever. It's also not 100% certain, otherwise we'd have won 2 SEC East titles under Butch Jones. All of these metrics are either a bust or diamond in the rough from flip flopping on other teams in a major way. And of course "don't worry about the ones we don't get. Worry about the ones we do". I finally have faith in a staff to make this truer than ever. Go Vols.

 

[jakez4ut]

good stuff.

 

[swampfoxfan]

You took a lot of time with this, good info.

 

[savannahfan]

Your numbers show what many on here say, they mean nothing/very little. It is interesting to see how one or two "needs" can skew a the final average for a class. So numbers mean little to nothing. That is until you get to your last set........
Good job.

 

[windrider]

I keep seeing people reference our avg. recruit ranking in comparison to other teams, namely SEC teams South Carolina and Kentucky, as to reasons this class isn't very solid.

While keeping in mind that these ratings are highly subjective, but generally trend towards reliable, I wanted to look at just how much that metric skews based on 1 or 2 kids, and why it may be mostly useless number to look at.

For instance, our bottom 3 players are ranked:
86
84
77
This comes to an average of 82.

South Carolina's bottom 3 players are ranked:
85
84
82
This comes to an average of 84.
So let's say Tennessee drops the 77 ranked player. The average then soars from 82 to 85, surpassing South Carolina's. Yet, no one would argue that having that player committed is worse than having the scholarship unfilled.

Here are the lowest rated players on the SEC teams in the Top 25:
Florida - 76
Tennessee - 77
SCAR - 82
UGA - 83
Miss St- 84
KY - 85
aTm - 85
Auburn - 86
LSU - 87
Alabama - 88
Which basically means, if we took away the offers of our longsnapper and an OG out of Texas that our staff obviously likes, our lowest rated recruit would be an 86. Tied with Auburn and only behind Alabama and LSU. So should we drop them? Of course not. Similarly, Florida could drop their 76 rated punter and their lowest rated recruit would jump all the way to 84. Both of these players are heavily skewing the avg. recruit ranking.

So what would the median recruit rank look like?
Miss St- 87
SCAR - 88
KY - 88
Tennessee - 90
Florida - 90
Auburn - 90
aTm - 91
Alabama - 93
LSU - 94
UGA - 95
Starts to paint a little different picture.

Personally, I think all SEC teams, and most Power 5 teams have pretty good players across the field. The difference between 7 wins and 12 wins is the game changers. The freaks. The guys at the top. This is why I think a Top4,5, or 6 metric would be great to 247 to add. I'll do a Top 5 for sake of my own time.
Miss St - 91
Kentucky - 91
SCAR - 94
Tennessee - 94
Florida - 95
Auburn - 96
aTm - 97
Alabama - 98
UGA - 98
LSU - 98
Well, that order looks familiar. Roughly the current pecking order of the SEC - also very similar to the median rankings - but the gap between teams is a little more accurately reflected here in my opinion.

Anyway, as a final thought, this will obviously change a ton over the next few weeks. So this is just a snap shot of current date/time, but I thought it was worth exploring anyway. We shouldn't fall in love with one metric, or two, or whatever. It's also not 100% certain, otherwise we'd have won 2 SEC East titles under Butch Jones. All of these metrics are either a bust or diamond in the rough from flip flopping on other teams in a major way. And of course "don't worry about the ones we don't get. Worry about the ones we do". I finally have faith in a staff to make this truer than ever. Go Vols.

Looks like you put a lot of work and thought into your analysis. Good Job!

 

[Pride85]

Please someone correct me if I am wrong, but do these rankings only use the top 20 recruits in a class? I seem to remember that, at least in the past, any recruit in the bottom 5 of a full class do not count toward the rankings. That would mean once we reach the 21st commitment, the bottom 77 would drop off by default. Please, one of the recruiting ranking formula gurus validate this statement. If incorrect, I apologize in advance for wasting this board's time.

 

[Sleegro]

Please someone correct me if I am wrong, but do these rankings only use the top 20 recruits in a class? I seem to remember that, at least in the past, any recruit in the bottom 5 of a full class do not count toward the rankings. That would mean once we reach the 21st commitment, the bottom 77 would drop off by default. Please, one of the recruiting ranking formula gurus validate this statement. If incorrect, I apologize in advance for wasting this board's time.

I think rivals used to do that. Not sure if they still do though.

 

[jakez4ut]

Your numbers show what many on here say, they mean nothing/very little. It is interesting to see how one or two "needs" can skew a the final average for a class. So numbers mean little to nothing. That is until you get to your last set........
Good job.

well, it's basic statistics, and as usual, the truth lies somewhere in the middle. this has been one of those things that most of us "know", but it is nice to see it laid out like this.

the only problem we really have right now, numbers wise, is just getting more volume at the top.....lol.

this class, a lot like last year's class, will have a really, really solid core of guys, some of which will contribute right away. and there'll be some others that just need some development.

there's a lot of moving parts right now, so i'm not going to guess on how it finishes. except to say that i feel confident in saying we'll be able continue to build a pretty solid football team, and hopefully we'll get that "splash" class that can "relaod" the roster in the next year or so....i have a feeling we're gonna be back on the "leaving for the NFL early" train with some kids in the next couple years.......

 

[RollerVol]

geez, very nicely done...that's some heady dissection...so we need more 5 stars...

PS. hey, you didn't waste anyone's time...the way I understand it is that they only use a certain amount (just don't remember exactly how many), but top 20 sounds about right..seems I read that on Rivals or 24/7...wished I could be of more help but I'm old...

GO BIG ORANGE...BEAT THE HOOSIERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[norrislakevol]

Great job with this. I have argued for years that to be competitive in this league you need to average around 3.5 stars per recruit or better.

 

[Vols410]

Awesome info, context is so massively important.

It’s also good to keep in mind that we have steps to take. If we want to compete with the UGAs/Bamas of the world we need to recruit like them eventually. But we start by out-recruiting who we can, out-coaching the teams that have passed us up in the last couple years, and working our way up, which is exactly what Pruitt is doing with wins over MSU, Mizz, UK, USC, Vandy.

I’d much rather have a coach that slowly builds up a program with consistent improvement, over a guy like Kiffin who has a wonder class that turns into nada. Recruits will follow, 2021 class gonna be big for us.

 

[LittleVol]

Great job with this. I have argued for years that to be competitive in this league you need to average around 3.5 stars per recruit or better.

That's not much of an argument.
We can sign 12 OL at 3 star and 12 DL at 4 star every year and win Championships?

So if we signed
Bryce Young ( 5 star)
Jordan Burch (5 star)
2 star long snapper ( 2 star)

12 star/3= 4 star average.

Bryce Young and Jordan Burch are now 4 stars by that logic...
Do you see how..." unreliable " that is.
That's putting it nicely.
It's stupid is what it is!!

Our recruits aren't numbers on a damn spreadsheet. They play actual positions that fill a need on a team!

 

[WarMachine]

My statistics prof in college told us, "there are lies, damn lies, and statistics."

 

[RAVOL]

The simple thing is just take Punters Kickers and Long snappers out of total since they all get low scores. But I can tell you many a game was lost this year because of snapping and kicking. Just ask Bama over the years.

 

[VolBricks]

You are correct that the difference in classes lies in the "difference" makers. That is where I feel this class is missing just a few pieces. Those pieces could arleady be soft commits that we know nothing about. I trust this coaching staff to bring in players and teach them up. That is why I am not at all disappointed in this class. I expect this class will finish between 12-15 in the final rankings.

 

[norrislakevol]

That's not much of an argument.
We can sign 12 OL at 3 star and 12 DL at 4 star every year and win Championships?

So if we signed
Bryce Young ( 5 star)
Jordan Burch (5 star)
2 star long snapper ( 2 star)

12 star/3= 4 star average.

Bryce Young and Jordan Burch are now 4 stars by that logic...
Do you see how..." unreliable " that is.
That's putting it nicely.
It's stupid is what it is!!

Our recruits aren't numbers on a damn spreadsheet. They play actual positions that fill a need on a team!

It's not stupid at all. Name one team dating back to the BCS era till now that has had a less than a 3.5 star average in a 4 year period and won a natty. Answer: It hasn't happened (at least not that I recall). Every coach will have a variety of players to fill their needs. The overall quality of those players, and of course the development of that talent separates the pretenders from the contenders.

 

[2xVol]

I keep seeing people reference our avg. recruit ranking in comparison to other teams, namely SEC teams South Carolina and Kentucky, as to reasons this class isn't very solid.

While keeping in mind that these ratings are highly subjective, but generally trend towards reliable, I wanted to look at just how much that metric skews based on 1 or 2 kids, and why it may be mostly useless number to look at.

For instance, our bottom 3 players are ranked:
86
84
77
This comes to an average of 82.

South Carolina's bottom 3 players are ranked:
85
84
82
This comes to an average of 84.
So let's say Tennessee drops the 77 ranked player. The average then soars from 82 to 85, surpassing South Carolina's. Yet, no one would argue that having that player committed is worse than having the scholarship unfilled.

Here are the lowest rated players on the SEC teams in the Top 25:
Florida - 76
Tennessee - 77
SCAR - 82
UGA - 83
Miss St- 84
KY - 85
aTm - 85
Auburn - 86
LSU - 87
Alabama - 88
Which basically means, if we took away the offers of our longsnapper and an OG out of Texas that our staff obviously likes, our lowest rated recruit would be an 86. Tied with Auburn and only behind Alabama and LSU. So should we drop them? Of course not. Similarly, Florida could drop their 76 rated punter and their lowest rated recruit would jump all the way to 84. Both of these players are heavily skewing the avg. recruit ranking.

So what would the median recruit rank look like?
Miss St- 87
SCAR - 88
KY - 88
Tennessee - 90
Florida - 90
Auburn - 90
aTm - 91
Alabama - 93
LSU - 94
UGA - 95
Starts to paint a little different picture.

Personally, I think all SEC teams, and most Power 5 teams have pretty good players across the field. The difference between 7 wins and 12 wins is the game changers. The freaks. The guys at the top. This is why I think a Top4,5, or 6 metric would be great to 247 to add. I'll do a Top 5 for sake of my own time.
Miss St - 91
Kentucky - 91
SCAR - 94
Tennessee - 94
Florida - 95
Auburn - 96
aTm - 97
Alabama - 98
UGA - 98
LSU - 98
Well, that order looks familiar. Roughly the current pecking order of the SEC - also very similar to the median rankings - but the gap between teams is a little more accurately reflected here in my opinion.

Anyway, as a final thought, this will obviously change a ton over the next few weeks. So this is just a snap shot of current date/time, but I thought it was worth exploring anyway. We shouldn't fall in love with one metric, or two, or whatever. It's also not 100% certain, otherwise we'd have won 2 SEC East titles under Butch Jones. All of these metrics are either a bust or diamond in the rough from flip flopping on other teams in a major way. And of course "don't worry about the ones we don't get. Worry about the ones we do". I finally have faith in a staff to make this truer than ever. Go Vols.

I totally agree with the difference maker angle. That is why Pruitt targets 5 stars and other reach guys even though people say it’s a waste of time. It’s also one of the biggest differences between butch’s early classes and Pruitt’s. Pruitt has already brought in more 5 stars (including transfers) than butch did in his entire tenure.

 

[TheMagnificantOne]

I keep seeing people reference our avg. recruit ranking in comparison to other teams, namely SEC teams South Carolina and Kentucky, as to reasons this class isn't very solid.

While keeping in mind that these ratings are highly subjective, but generally trend towards reliable, I wanted to look at just how much that metric skews based on 1 or 2 kids, and why it may be mostly useless number to look at.

For instance, our bottom 3 players are ranked:
86
84
77
This comes to an average of 82.

South Carolina's bottom 3 players are ranked:
85
84
82
This comes to an average of 84.
So let's say Tennessee drops the 77 ranked player. The average then soars from 82 to 85, surpassing South Carolina's. Yet, no one would argue that having that player committed is worse than having the scholarship unfilled.

Here are the lowest rated players on the SEC teams in the Top 25:
Florida - 76
Tennessee - 77
SCAR - 82
UGA - 83
Miss St- 84
KY - 85
aTm - 85
Auburn - 86
LSU - 87
Alabama - 88
Which basically means, if we took away the offers of our longsnapper and an OG out of Texas that our staff obviously likes, our lowest rated recruit would be an 86. Tied with Auburn and only behind Alabama and LSU. So should we drop them? Of course not. Similarly, Florida could drop their 76 rated punter and their lowest rated recruit would jump all the way to 84. Both of these players are heavily skewing the avg. recruit ranking.

So what would the median recruit rank look like?
Miss St- 87
SCAR - 88
KY - 88
Tennessee - 90
Florida - 90
Auburn - 90
aTm - 91
Alabama - 93
LSU - 94
UGA - 95
Starts to paint a little different picture.

Personally, I think all SEC teams, and most Power 5 teams have pretty good players across the field. The difference between 7 wins and 12 wins is the game changers. The freaks. The guys at the top. This is why I think a Top4,5, or 6 metric would be great to 247 to add. I'll do a Top 5 for sake of my own time.
Miss St - 91
Kentucky - 91
SCAR - 94
Tennessee - 94
Florida - 95
Auburn - 96
aTm - 97
Alabama - 98
UGA - 98
LSU - 98
Well, that order looks familiar. Roughly the current pecking order of the SEC - also very similar to the median rankings - but the gap between teams is a little more accurately reflected here in my opinion.

Anyway, as a final thought, this will obviously change a ton over the next few weeks. So this is just a snap shot of current date/time, but I thought it was worth exploring anyway. We shouldn't fall in love with one metric, or two, or whatever. It's also not 100% certain, otherwise we'd have won 2 SEC East titles under Butch Jones. All of these metrics are either a bust or diamond in the rough from flip flopping on other teams in a major way. And of course "don't worry about the ones we don't get. Worry about the ones we do". I finally have faith in a staff to make this truer than ever. Go Vols.

Extremely well done

 

[VolBricks]

I totally agree with the difference maker angle. That is why Pruitt targets 5 stars and other reach guys even though people say it’s a waste of time. It’s also one of the biggest differences between butch’s early classes and Pruitt’s. Pruitt has already brought in more 5 stars (including transfers) than butch did in his entire tenure.

I did not believe you so I did my own checking and Butch brought in(1) 5* and Pruitt already has (3) 5* talent guys according to 247sports. Not that I am a star gazer but the 5* guys tend to not be busts and some turn out to be huge difference makers.

 

[keenobserver]

I keep seeing people reference our avg. recruit ranking in comparison to other teams, namely SEC teams South Carolina and Kentucky, as to reasons this class isn't very solid.

While keeping in mind that these ratings are highly subjective, but generally trend towards reliable, I wanted to look at just how much that metric skews based on 1 or 2 kids, and why it may be mostly useless number to look at.

For instance, our bottom 3 players are ranked:
86
84
77
This comes to an average of 82.

South Carolina's bottom 3 players are ranked:
85
84
82
This comes to an average of 84.
So let's say Tennessee drops the 77 ranked player. The average then soars from 82 to 85, surpassing South Carolina's. Yet, no one would argue that having that player committed is worse than having the scholarship unfilled.

Here are the lowest rated players on the SEC teams in the Top 25:
Florida - 76
Tennessee - 77
SCAR - 82
UGA - 83
Miss St- 84
KY - 85
aTm - 85
Auburn - 86
LSU - 87
Alabama - 88
Which basically means, if we took away the offers of our longsnapper and an OG out of Texas that our staff obviously likes, our lowest rated recruit would be an 86. Tied with Auburn and only behind Alabama and LSU. So should we drop them? Of course not. Similarly, Florida could drop their 76 rated punter and their lowest rated recruit would jump all the way to 84. Both of these players are heavily skewing the avg. recruit ranking.

So what would the median recruit rank look like?
Miss St- 87
SCAR - 88
KY - 88
Tennessee - 90
Florida - 90
Auburn - 90
aTm - 91
Alabama - 93
LSU - 94
UGA - 95
Starts to paint a little different picture.

Personally, I think all SEC teams, and most Power 5 teams have pretty good players across the field. The difference between 7 wins and 12 wins is the game changers. The freaks. The guys at the top. This is why I think a Top4,5, or 6 metric would be great to 247 to add. I'll do a Top 5 for sake of my own time.
Miss St - 91
Kentucky - 91
SCAR - 94
Tennessee - 94
Florida - 95
Auburn - 96
aTm - 97
Alabama - 98
UGA - 98
LSU - 98
Well, that order looks familiar. Roughly the current pecking order of the SEC - also very similar to the median rankings - but the gap between teams is a little more accurately reflected here in my opinion.

Anyway, as a final thought, this will obviously change a ton over the next few weeks. So this is just a snap shot of current date/time, but I thought it was worth exploring anyway. We shouldn't fall in love with one metric, or two, or whatever. It's also not 100% certain, otherwise we'd have won 2 SEC East titles under Butch Jones. All of these metrics are either a bust or diamond in the rough from flip flopping on other teams in a major way. And of course "don't worry about the ones we don't get. Worry about the ones we do". I finally have faith in a staff to make this truer than ever. Go Vols.

Is there a way freak can get this post to automatically reply when someone posts "these teams are killing us in recruiting"...."what is up with our recruiting?", etc etc

 

[golfballs]

Should be a sum of the player ratings

 

[RAVOL]

Well when it comes to specialty players our Long Snapper is a 5star. Not only get he snap as good as anyone in years but his Athletic Ability to cover Punts. Can be the difference in a Win or Loss.

 

[Devo182]

Could just follow rankings. Bottom guys hardly count in the class, so they sort of fall off anyway with the formula.

 

[Devo182]

I did not believe you so I did my own checking and Butch brought in(1) 5* and Pruitt already has (3) 5* talent guys according to 247sports. Not that I am a star gazer but the 5* guys tend to not be busts and some turn out to be huge difference makers.

Pruitt has 2 so far in 3 classes:
Wright
Morris

Butch had 3 in 5 classes:
Trey
Kmac
Phillips

Using the Composite

 

[2xVol]

Pruitt has 2 so far in 3 classes:
Wright
Morris

Butch had 3 in 5 classes:
Trey
Kmac
Phillips

Using the Composite

I mean composite isn’t necessarily the best metric but that’s still two recruiting classes vs 4. Aubrey Solomon counts (based on my criteria) so it would be equal 3-3. Also splitting hairs here but there is no way in hell Crouch would have finished a 4 star if he hadn’t gotten injured for most of his senior season. He was the number one player in the country over the summer. No matter how you dice it Pruitt has brought in way more big time recruits