tpilews
12-16-2008, 12:08 PM
Nice write up by Misopogon at mgoblog.com
The question was whether Positional Rating meant more than star (or Rivals' sliding scale) ratings in determining the value of a player toward success of his program.
To do this, I compared averages of recruits who entered college during the period of 2005 to 2008, and stacked that up against real results. In other words, I wanted to see if there was a greater correlation between the current BCS standings and any of several factors:
1. Star Rating
2. Rivals Rating
3. Positional rank in class
4. Number of ranked recruits
5. Team speed (40-yard dash)
6. Team size (height (in) times weight)
Since I can't figure out how to post the entire sheet, I've written out the Top 15 for each category.
Disclaimers:
For our purposes, I used only recruits that were ranked by Rivals.com. Rivals usually ranks only those recruits that it rated higher than 5.5 (which is a low 3-star).
For some positions, there were typically 90 or more ranked recruits each year, whereas for others, there was only 15 or so. I thus considered making recruiting rank a percentile, for a team that recruited a 4 star receiver ranked 70th (of 92) in his class would be penalized more than a team that recruited the 15th (last) fullback or kicker. However, I felt this -- the ability to recruit all positions -- was an important factor in the key differential between Star Rating and Positional Ranking. Plus, a successful team would be responsible for recruiting all of those positions. So instead of a percentile, I simply dropped from our list any team that did not bring in 20 or more ranked recruits in this period.
This eliminated a lot of Mid-Majors, but the only BCS conference teams to be cut were Cincy (7), Indiana (13) and Connecticut (15). It is assumed that these teams, which could not bring in more than five 3-star or higher recruits in four years, would perform below the teams included.
I also did not cover attrition (transfers, early leaving, etc.) Instead, I simply omitted the 2004 class altogether, figuring the good done by holdovers was roughly equivalent to the bad of attrition for the four following classes. I understand that this is very inexact, but I feel the results are still useful for our purposes.
Results Skewed by Southern Bias in Data
Particularly interesting was the SEC schools and their higher number of ranked recruits brought in. Among teams that had more than 85 recruits in this time, we get Florida (91), Alabama (95), Georgia (90), Florida State (88), LSU (88), Oklahoma (88), Tennessee (86) and Auburn (86). In other words, seven of nine over-recruiters were SEC schools, and all were in the South. Overrecruiting did seem to have a correlation with winning, but not as much as class rank or star rating. I posit that this represents not so much the ability of the SEC conference to recruit better talent, but Rivals.com's tendency to overrate recruits in the South. It's noteable that teams that recruited nationally like Notre Dame and Michigan were the most overrated by talent influx, while other Northern teams that had most northern recruits were largely underrated. If you look at the cut-off line for where Rivals stops their ranking, the picture becomes even more clear; the last few 5.6-rated players included in the rankings are normally from Southern states; the alphabetic list of unranked, 5.5-rated players is overrepresented by Northern players.
Rankings
Top 15 -- Current BCS Standings
1. Oklahoma
2. Florida
3. Texas
4. USC
5. Utah
6. Texas Tech
7. Penn State
8. Boise State
9. Ohio State
10. TCU
11. Cincinnati
12. Oklahoma State
13. Georgia Tech
14. Georgia
15. BYU
Top 15 -- Star Ranking Only
1. USC
2. Florida
3. Ohio State
4. Florida State
5. Miami
6. LSU
7. Oklahoma
8. Texas
9. Georgia
10. Michigan
11. Notre Dame
12. Penn State
13. Alabama
14. Tennessee
15. Auburn
Top 15 -- Rivals Ranking Only
1. USC
2. Florida
3. Miami
4. Florida State
5. Texas
6. LSU
7. Ohio State
8. Oklahoma
9. Georgia
10. Notre Dame
11. Michigan
12. Tennessee
13. Penn State
14. Alabama
15. Clemson
Top 15 -- Avg Positional Rank of Recruit in Year
1. USC
2. Texas
3. Florida
4. Florida State
5. LSU
6. Ohio State
7. Miami
8. Georgia
9. Oklahoma
10. Notre Dame
11. UCLA
12. Tennessee
13. Alabama
14. Michigan
15. Penn State
Top 15 -- Most Ranked Players
1. Alabama
2. Florida
3. Georgia
4. Florida State
5. LSU
6. Oklahoma
7. Tennessee
8. Auburn
9. Notre Dame
10. Michigan
11. Texas
12. Nebraska
13. South Carolina
14. USC
15. Miami
Top 15 -- Avg. 40-Yard dash time
1. Syracuse
2. USC
3. Texas
4. Texas A&M
5. Southern Miss
6. Clemson
7. Ohio State
8. Florida
9. Kentucky
10. Georgia Tech
11. Miami
12. Auburn
13. Kansas State
14. South Carolina
15. TCU
(Little brother is 16th!)
26. Michigan
Top 15 -- Avg. size of recruits
1. Louisville
2. Penn State
3. Oklahoma
4. Arizona
5. Duke
6. Standford
7. Utah
8. Mississippi State
9. Texas Tech
10. Maryland
11. Nebraska
12. Georgia
13. Virginia Tech
15. Boston College
...
25. Michigan
Analysis:
Recruiting as a whole was shown to be a fair but imperfect predictor of overall success.
Team speed was the most overrated statistic; even removing teams without recruits at every position, the speed ratings made little mark on anything. In fact, Texas Tech (4.78) and Missouri (4.81), both of which employ speed-based offenses, were both near the bottom among teams in total team speed. This means that either speed makes little to no difference in a team's ability, or 40-yard-dash times are arbitary (or in Brian, "FAKE.")
No recruiting statistic stood out as a definitive predictor of team ability, but the positional rank of recruits did, in fact, prove to be a slightly better metric than star rating, and a much better predictor than other factors.
To look at Michigan in particular, it does in fact seem that positional ratings mattered a great deal.
Top 15 positional ratings of M recruits 2005-08:
1. Justin Boren (#1 Center, 2006)
2. Marques Slocum (#1 Guard, 2005)
3. Brandon Minor (#1 Fullback, 2006)
4. Zoltan Mesko (#2 Kicker/Punter 2005)
5. Brandon Graham (#2 Mack Linebacker, 2006)
6. Stephen Schilling (#2 Guard, 2006)
7. Ryan Mallett (#2 QB-Pro Style, 2007)
8. Donovan Warren (#3 Cornerback, 2007)
9. Jonas Mouton (#3 Safety, 2006)
10. Boubacar Cissoko (#4 Cornerback, 2008)
11. Kevin Grady (#4 Running Back, 2005)
12. Kevin Koger (#4 Tight End, 2008)
13. Antonio Bass (#5 Athlete, 2005)
14. David Molk (#5 Center, 2007)
15. Carlos Brown (#6 Running Back, 2006)
Look at all that attrition!
Among top recruits in high percentiles we include Mario Manningham, Stevie Brown, Greg Mathews, Michael Shaw and Terrance Taylor.
Then again, here's our lowest positional ratings:
1. Martavious Odoms (Receiver 81)
2. Mark Huyge (Tackle 76)
3. James Rogers (Athlete 71)
4. Chris Richards (Athlete 63)
5. Troy Woolfolk (Cornerback 59)
6. Obi Ezeh (Running Back 58)
7. Mark Ortmann (Tackle 55)
8. John Ferrara (Strongside DE 55)
9. Carson Butler (Strongside DE 55)
10. Perry Dorrestein (Tackle 53)
11. Quinton Woods (Strongside DE 53)
12. Greg Banks (Strongside DE 51)
13. Artis Chambers (Safety 51)
14. Roy Roundtree (Receiver 50)
15. Zion Babb (Receiver 49)
As you can see, these are obviously positions in which there were a lot of recruits. Percentile-wise, the lowest guys were Odoms, Huyge, Rogers, David Cone, Chambers, Brandon Logan, Quinton Patilla, Steve Watson, Woolfolk and Ezeh.
So it does seem that positional ranking means a lot, even if the player was projected at a different position. And if so, it is even more devastating that Michigan lost Bass, Slocum, Mallett and Boren before they could become top contributors. Equally devastating was Stevie Brown and Kevin Grady being busts, at least up until now.
In the future, as a fan, this shows me that my projections for future seasons needs to be looked at again, and that when evaluating recruits, their percentile means more than their ranking.
Other than that, plus the already well-established fact that the SEC badly needs to get over itself (i.e. Rivals scouts need to get over their fear of crossing the Mason-Dixon line), this analysis proves little.
Hope you were entertained.
The question was whether Positional Rating meant more than star (or Rivals' sliding scale) ratings in determining the value of a player toward success of his program.
To do this, I compared averages of recruits who entered college during the period of 2005 to 2008, and stacked that up against real results. In other words, I wanted to see if there was a greater correlation between the current BCS standings and any of several factors:
1. Star Rating
2. Rivals Rating
3. Positional rank in class
4. Number of ranked recruits
5. Team speed (40-yard dash)
6. Team size (height (in) times weight)
Since I can't figure out how to post the entire sheet, I've written out the Top 15 for each category.
Disclaimers:
For our purposes, I used only recruits that were ranked by Rivals.com. Rivals usually ranks only those recruits that it rated higher than 5.5 (which is a low 3-star).
For some positions, there were typically 90 or more ranked recruits each year, whereas for others, there was only 15 or so. I thus considered making recruiting rank a percentile, for a team that recruited a 4 star receiver ranked 70th (of 92) in his class would be penalized more than a team that recruited the 15th (last) fullback or kicker. However, I felt this -- the ability to recruit all positions -- was an important factor in the key differential between Star Rating and Positional Ranking. Plus, a successful team would be responsible for recruiting all of those positions. So instead of a percentile, I simply dropped from our list any team that did not bring in 20 or more ranked recruits in this period.
This eliminated a lot of Mid-Majors, but the only BCS conference teams to be cut were Cincy (7), Indiana (13) and Connecticut (15). It is assumed that these teams, which could not bring in more than five 3-star or higher recruits in four years, would perform below the teams included.
I also did not cover attrition (transfers, early leaving, etc.) Instead, I simply omitted the 2004 class altogether, figuring the good done by holdovers was roughly equivalent to the bad of attrition for the four following classes. I understand that this is very inexact, but I feel the results are still useful for our purposes.
Results Skewed by Southern Bias in Data
Particularly interesting was the SEC schools and their higher number of ranked recruits brought in. Among teams that had more than 85 recruits in this time, we get Florida (91), Alabama (95), Georgia (90), Florida State (88), LSU (88), Oklahoma (88), Tennessee (86) and Auburn (86). In other words, seven of nine over-recruiters were SEC schools, and all were in the South. Overrecruiting did seem to have a correlation with winning, but not as much as class rank or star rating. I posit that this represents not so much the ability of the SEC conference to recruit better talent, but Rivals.com's tendency to overrate recruits in the South. It's noteable that teams that recruited nationally like Notre Dame and Michigan were the most overrated by talent influx, while other Northern teams that had most northern recruits were largely underrated. If you look at the cut-off line for where Rivals stops their ranking, the picture becomes even more clear; the last few 5.6-rated players included in the rankings are normally from Southern states; the alphabetic list of unranked, 5.5-rated players is overrepresented by Northern players.
Rankings
Top 15 -- Current BCS Standings
1. Oklahoma
2. Florida
3. Texas
4. USC
5. Utah
6. Texas Tech
7. Penn State
8. Boise State
9. Ohio State
10. TCU
11. Cincinnati
12. Oklahoma State
13. Georgia Tech
14. Georgia
15. BYU
Top 15 -- Star Ranking Only
1. USC
2. Florida
3. Ohio State
4. Florida State
5. Miami
6. LSU
7. Oklahoma
8. Texas
9. Georgia
10. Michigan
11. Notre Dame
12. Penn State
13. Alabama
14. Tennessee
15. Auburn
Top 15 -- Rivals Ranking Only
1. USC
2. Florida
3. Miami
4. Florida State
5. Texas
6. LSU
7. Ohio State
8. Oklahoma
9. Georgia
10. Notre Dame
11. Michigan
12. Tennessee
13. Penn State
14. Alabama
15. Clemson
Top 15 -- Avg Positional Rank of Recruit in Year
1. USC
2. Texas
3. Florida
4. Florida State
5. LSU
6. Ohio State
7. Miami
8. Georgia
9. Oklahoma
10. Notre Dame
11. UCLA
12. Tennessee
13. Alabama
14. Michigan
15. Penn State
Top 15 -- Most Ranked Players
1. Alabama
2. Florida
3. Georgia
4. Florida State
5. LSU
6. Oklahoma
7. Tennessee
8. Auburn
9. Notre Dame
10. Michigan
11. Texas
12. Nebraska
13. South Carolina
14. USC
15. Miami
Top 15 -- Avg. 40-Yard dash time
1. Syracuse
2. USC
3. Texas
4. Texas A&M
5. Southern Miss
6. Clemson
7. Ohio State
8. Florida
9. Kentucky
10. Georgia Tech
11. Miami
12. Auburn
13. Kansas State
14. South Carolina
15. TCU
(Little brother is 16th!)
26. Michigan
Top 15 -- Avg. size of recruits
1. Louisville
2. Penn State
3. Oklahoma
4. Arizona
5. Duke
6. Standford
7. Utah
8. Mississippi State
9. Texas Tech
10. Maryland
11. Nebraska
12. Georgia
13. Virginia Tech
15. Boston College
...
25. Michigan
Analysis:
Recruiting as a whole was shown to be a fair but imperfect predictor of overall success.
Team speed was the most overrated statistic; even removing teams without recruits at every position, the speed ratings made little mark on anything. In fact, Texas Tech (4.78) and Missouri (4.81), both of which employ speed-based offenses, were both near the bottom among teams in total team speed. This means that either speed makes little to no difference in a team's ability, or 40-yard-dash times are arbitary (or in Brian, "FAKE.")
No recruiting statistic stood out as a definitive predictor of team ability, but the positional rank of recruits did, in fact, prove to be a slightly better metric than star rating, and a much better predictor than other factors.
To look at Michigan in particular, it does in fact seem that positional ratings mattered a great deal.
Top 15 positional ratings of M recruits 2005-08:
1. Justin Boren (#1 Center, 2006)
2. Marques Slocum (#1 Guard, 2005)
3. Brandon Minor (#1 Fullback, 2006)
4. Zoltan Mesko (#2 Kicker/Punter 2005)
5. Brandon Graham (#2 Mack Linebacker, 2006)
6. Stephen Schilling (#2 Guard, 2006)
7. Ryan Mallett (#2 QB-Pro Style, 2007)
8. Donovan Warren (#3 Cornerback, 2007)
9. Jonas Mouton (#3 Safety, 2006)
10. Boubacar Cissoko (#4 Cornerback, 2008)
11. Kevin Grady (#4 Running Back, 2005)
12. Kevin Koger (#4 Tight End, 2008)
13. Antonio Bass (#5 Athlete, 2005)
14. David Molk (#5 Center, 2007)
15. Carlos Brown (#6 Running Back, 2006)
Look at all that attrition!
Among top recruits in high percentiles we include Mario Manningham, Stevie Brown, Greg Mathews, Michael Shaw and Terrance Taylor.
Then again, here's our lowest positional ratings:
1. Martavious Odoms (Receiver 81)
2. Mark Huyge (Tackle 76)
3. James Rogers (Athlete 71)
4. Chris Richards (Athlete 63)
5. Troy Woolfolk (Cornerback 59)
6. Obi Ezeh (Running Back 58)
7. Mark Ortmann (Tackle 55)
8. John Ferrara (Strongside DE 55)
9. Carson Butler (Strongside DE 55)
10. Perry Dorrestein (Tackle 53)
11. Quinton Woods (Strongside DE 53)
12. Greg Banks (Strongside DE 51)
13. Artis Chambers (Safety 51)
14. Roy Roundtree (Receiver 50)
15. Zion Babb (Receiver 49)
As you can see, these are obviously positions in which there were a lot of recruits. Percentile-wise, the lowest guys were Odoms, Huyge, Rogers, David Cone, Chambers, Brandon Logan, Quinton Patilla, Steve Watson, Woolfolk and Ezeh.
So it does seem that positional ranking means a lot, even if the player was projected at a different position. And if so, it is even more devastating that Michigan lost Bass, Slocum, Mallett and Boren before they could become top contributors. Equally devastating was Stevie Brown and Kevin Grady being busts, at least up until now.
In the future, as a fan, this shows me that my projections for future seasons needs to be looked at again, and that when evaluating recruits, their percentile means more than their ranking.
Other than that, plus the already well-established fact that the SEC badly needs to get over itself (i.e. Rivals scouts need to get over their fear of crossing the Mason-Dixon line), this analysis proves little.
Hope you were entertained.