Chris Low Dissects Football Recruiting Rankings

Year in year out the talent discrepency between Kentucky and teams like Alabama and Florida is drastically apparent.  While it’s certainly true that Kentucky is moving up in recruits eyes (shown by Joker having a class in the low thirties thus far this year,) it’s still really tough to out recruit the major SEC schools (shown by Joker having around the 11th ranked class in the SEC.)  Still, Joker is known for being a good recruiter, and the classers should continue to get better.

But Chris Low asks, does recruiting ‘well’ equal on field success?  The numbers would indicate that they do not.

You have to remember, football isn’t the same beast that basketball is.  In basketball you can get a John Wall and become instantly relevant, but in football you have to have talent at every position – including down the depth chart.  It’s about depth and balance.  Unless you have Cam Newton of course.

But back to Low.  Low has taken the current BCS rankings and compared them with the recruiting rankings from 2007, 2008, and 2009 and found that no teams in the top ten in the BCS were in the top ten every year in recruiting, and only one team (Alabama at number 7) ranked in the top twenty every year.

Summary of the thesis: Five stars a great.  But they aren’t necessary to win big.  Which is good news for Kentucky.

Check out the full analysis here if you want.

In a related note, Joker picked up a verbal from CB E.J. May from McGill-Toolen supposedly a two weeks ago after a visit.  It was confirmed today.  He is a two star according to Scout according to Beisners twitter.