I’ve mentioned here before that I firmly believe Paul Chryst wants to turn our football team into Wisconsin East and I think we’ve seen that so far in his recruiting methods. But, I’m not one to casually look at something. I’m a numbers guy; I like cold hard stats. What would recruiting classes look like if Chryst successfully builds Wisconsin East?
Let’s just say hypothetically Chryst achieves the same level of success Wisconsin had during his time as Offensive Coordinator. That would mean 7 straight bowl appearances (3 victories), 2 conference championships, and an overall record of 69-22 (75.8% victories). All but one season in that time frame had at least 9 wins. In 2010 and 2011 they were a little luck away from going undefeated and possibly earning a chance at a national championship. That’s a level of success that no Pitt fan who has endured the past 10-30 years could complain about.
The main difference between Pitt from 2005-2011 and Wisconsin in that time frame is coaching. Why do I say that? It certainly wasn’t a recruiting advantage so it had to be coaching. Wisconsin (according to Rivals) recruited one 5-star recruit and nineteen 4-star recruits while Chryst was there. Pitt had twenty-eight 4-star recruits and one 5-star recruit in the same span. Wisconsin’s only 5-star recruit during that time frame, Josh Oglesby, didn’t come close to his status thanks to an injury-riddled career. Pitt’s 5-star guy, Jon Baldwin, was a 1st round NFL Draft pick. Obviously the star system is not a perfect system to judge the quality of a recruit, but it’s the best we’ve got. Here’s what Wisconsin recruiting classes looked like from 2005-2011, with Pitt’s 2012 class at the bottom:
As you can see, roughly 87% of Wisconsin recruits were 2 and 3-star players. While obviously the success Wisconsin had the first few years was due to recruits before then, it’s important to note they went 31-8 from 2009-2011 with 2 Big Ten championships. They did this with a majority of starters that were 2 and 3-star players. How does this compare to Chryst’s first full class (not counting 2012 since it was a salvage operation, not a recruiting class)? It’s kind of scary how close the numbers are. Wisconsin had roughly 13% of their players as 4/5-stars and 87% 2/3-stars. Chryst’s first class? About 11% 4/5-star and 89% 2/3-stars.
The reason I’m going over this isn’t to say we’re going to be more successful under Chryst because we have recruits with fewer stars; that’s asinine. I’m pointing out that we can’t focus heavily on the rating sites like Rivals and Scout give the players we recruit. 2/3-star players like Kevin Zeitler, Gabe Carimi, John Moffitt, Matt Shaughnessy, and Travis Frederick were all NFL draft picks. Give Chryst and company some time to build up the program with their type of players. These players aren’t always flashy nor are they highly rated by recruiting sites. But it seems like anywhere from 75-85% of our recruits will be 2/3-star players. Chryst wants to take guys who will buy into the system and I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t make the top recruits his highest priority if he doesn’t believe they’ll buy in. Chryst will take 85 Mike Caprara-type players over 85 Deaysean Rippy-types.
To summarize in classic too long;didn’t read (tl;dr) internet fashion: give Chryst some time, don’t judge classes by the stars and don’t judge 2 and 3 star guys. They may be a 1st round pick in 5 years.
I posted some NFL Draft thoughts on ScoutsNotebook and as always, follow me on Twitter.
But I think it is important to look at the whole recruiting issue and not just stars. Snide comments above aside the character of recruits is a big deal as we have seem writ larger how discipline issues can affect the football program.
PITT has had a team leadership void for sometime now and with it accompanying locker room and on-field problems. I also think its too easy to say “boys will be boys” or “every team has these problems” because that just isn’t true and masks the real need to build a solid program from the inside out.
Even though I wrote those “star” articles last year I truly believe that college football fans don’t have a real grasp on just how the ‘star’ rankings are given out.
For instance, Rivals allocates a set number of 5* and 4* slots regardless of how good the recruits actually are. This means that they have to fill a quota for 5* players. If it is a down year in HS recruiting they are still going to have X# of 5* recruits. Same holds true with the requisite number of 4* kids needed.
Additionally there is no real bright line separation between 4* players and 3* players as there is no set criteria for the individual rankings. This is why we see many 3* kids succeed and some 4* kid who don’t. Then, any player who hasn’t been observed in-person (vast majority of HS seniors) by a staff writer automatically defaults to a two* star ranking.
ESPN is probably the most detailed as they award stars based on a numerical grade given:
So that makes it a little more understandable but in reality it is all a crap shoot.
Remember also that these star rankings are supposed to be given on how well a player will do in college, not as a reward for how well they played in HS, but we all know that is a bunch of malarky. If that was true half of the players who can’t hardly spell their own names would all be two* players.
Finally, we also have to remember that all this is done mostly by staff members where this is a second job type of deal and on the whole they are not much more able to scout a HS player than you or I are.
I tend to believe that coaching staffs are telling the truth when they say they don’t recruit by stars awarded and that the stars are mainly fodder for fan’s discussion. Where we PITT fans might want a local WPIAL player over an out of state guy or want a 3* over a 2* kid I don’t think the staff cares about that much at all. They are looking at what skills the player actually has and how well that player will fit in and adapt to college life and college football.
I will give you a specific example. The son of an in-law of mine camped at Notre Dame after his H.S. freshman year and had the best age group (pro-style) QB performance at that camp leading his team to the age group championship. His subsequent soph H.S. season was a statistical disaster because his constantly losing H.S. team was so bad on the OL that it was impossible for him to play well (total inability of OL to provide any protection, a center whose every shotgun snap bounced on the turf in front of him or hit him in the ankles, etc. No one would ever know this kid has high potential under the circumstances and he would never get a decent star rating. (Note: His parents are transferring him to a private school where he will be surrounded by better players and get better coaching.) I am sure there are plenty of H.S. football players like this out there that would be totally overlooked if we only depended on these star-rating systems.
Its really all about marketing your kid. Some parents rely solely on the HS HC. Wrong choice in my opinion.
Some kids parents take it upon themselves to market their kid and develop them (off season conditioning).
Your in-law is doing the right thing.
Go to as many college camps as possible and get exposure as well as other camps, 7v7, etc. Contact college coaches and visit as early as sophmore season. Develop a website with game film, etc ie. hudl. Sometimes it’s not possible for a parent to transfer their kid to another HS but there are lots of other things you can do.
Chryst wins big when Pederson leaves with Nordy!