In reply to: Star ratings are useless once the players get to college posted by Jvan
and, in particular, the correlation between our recruiting rankings (typically between 8 and 11) and our NFL draft production (between 8 and 11 over the course of the Kelly era) is almost exactly the same. The R-squared between programs with top tier recruiting and programs with top tier NFL draft and on field production has to be very high.
The fact that we can’t compete with OU and Clemson (who are also in our range in both stats) on the field is a culture and coaching problem, not a talent problem. And they also have kids transfer, lose kids for whatever reasons, etc.
A great recruiter like Urban Meyer would be able to consistently pull in top 4 - 5 classes every year at ND, but we’ll never repeat what Alabama just did.
Furthermore, the ND fans aren’t powerful enough in the market for this stuff to move rankings on individual players and haven’t been for at least a decade. OSU, Michigan, LSU, Alabama, SC, Texas, UGA fans and so forth are all just as voracious consumers of that recruiting stuff as ND fans are.
The bottom line is ND nearly always underperforms relative to its recruiting rankings, and good programs do not. The most likely explanations are institutional softness and poor coaching, not over-ranking by recruiting services (which would gain little by pumping up ND's classes).
As mentioned by others, the academic/self-selection angle/excuse is largely debunked by Stanford's extended period of success, and making matters worse, our recruiting performance has slowly but surely deteriorated since the Weis days.
We have become a shittier version of Stanford with a far more delusional fan base under the stewardship of our megalomaniacal and mercenary leadership.
That’s not so accurate. Our top recruit, Barnett, gave us the bird for Alabama. It’s not like Alabama was going to sign Wimbush instead of or in addition to Barnett. Almost certainly, they, like ND, evaluated Barnett more highly than Wimbush.
I do not recall what QB Ohio State was recruiting or where Wimbush stood on their pecking order.
I don’t think “offer lists”are as probation as they once were, because I think schools extend more and emptier “offers” and I think kids also exaggerate with the proliferation of recruiting service harassment.
who, you may recall, first committed to PSU.
His recruitment was well covered by Ohio State beat writers at the time (see the link at bottom), as was his flip to Notre Dame in the fall of 2014.
Their interest wasn't unreasonable. He'd be a good fit in Urban Meyer's system.
It was obvious to me that Wimbush was not the best choice for ND quarterback, after watching last year's spring game. Book is a better choice. Perhaps Wimbush's development is on Kelly. He is a great athlete who would make an excellent running back, wide receiver, or H back. I hope he stays!
It is Kelly's job to use the talent he has wisely.