Jaron Dukes and Deveon Smith Get 3 Stars from Rivals
Jaron Dukes and Devon Smith both received 5.7 3-star rankings from Rivals. 5.7 is the highest ranking for a 3-star on Rivals. Dukes is the #43 WR and Smith is the #32 RB.
Gareon Conley and Khalid Hill are not yet ranked.
Hopefully we see all of thier rankings improve throughout their senior seasons, because as we all know, recruiting stars are everything.
Link: http://rivals.yahoo.com/michigan/football/recruiting/commitments/2013
Deveon Smith is so underrated its ridiculous. The kid runs people over. He may not have that break away speed but I'll take him anyday.
He is a great addition to the team. Rivals isn't discounting that but merely stating they do not think he has elite potential as an NFL prospect. Remember Rivals does their rankings based on NFL potential and, although he might be able to truck kids at the high school level, maybe Rivals does not think that his size is valuable enough to overcome his lack of speed in the NFL. Speed has been becoming more of a commodity these days.
Also, he still has his entire SR year. As someone mentioned below, there is plenty of opportunity to rise just like Pipkens did (I don't think he is a 5 star talent though). Several Ohio recruiting guys are very high on him. He could be a valuable asset at RB for years but not be much of a contributor in the NFL, which is what Rivals attempts to measure. Plenty of kids have careers like that.
NFL potential is only one component of Rivals' ranking. It is a college recruiting service after all. I do agree that people are getting too worked up about rankings when there are 11 months til signing day.
March 20th, 2012 at 12:16 AM ^
So I wouldn't go so far to say it's ridiculous!
We have a few guys that, it seems, one or two sites love, but one or another just aren't that high on, which should make for an interesting senior season. I am guessing Michigan will have more guys be universal four stars, than universal three stars .. by signing day, and the fun for us, bein' our class will be basically full before the season starts, is watching the rise and fall - though I expect more to rise - of our recruits in said ratings. I read what scout.com has to say about Patrick Kugler, by the way, and it makes me think that 247Sports just doesn't get it or see it ---- yet, though I think they will. Scout.com isn't as high as the other two on guys like Taco Charlton, Jourdon Lewis, and David Dawson, just like Rivals and 247 aren't as high on guys like DeVeon Smith and Gareon Conley ... maybe they don't like kids with "EON" in their first name, I don't know, though I suspect these rankings to be more the same by signing day, one way or another. Signing Day for 2012 was last month, we have 16 commits now, and can easily be at 20 by the end of spring practice, no later than the end of summer/beginning of the season, that's ridiculous. I bet we have more that'll rise.
I'm not sure how Smith is only 3 stars. He already has the size of a D1 back and runs with some pissed off authority. His speed isn't bad either.
He's kinda slow.
Dont worry he still has his Sr year to show off his talents let us not forget how low Ondre Pipkins was rated then he became 5 star ...
hahaha deveon smith (-_-)
He is a scout 4 star anyway.
I know you can't judge someone just from his highlight tapes, but after watching all them, I don't know how this kid can be anything less than a 4 star.
Plus the way Dukes blew up OSUs prize recruit, how is he not getting any love?
When Jaron's team played Burrows team, he lit them up for 170 yards and 2 TD's. He's tall with excellent hands -- kinda reminds me of Hemingway ...
He had 170 yards and 2 TD's on Cam Burrows this pass year in a game
March 20th, 2012 at 11:28 AM ^
Dukes is a good player, but really he didn't light any defensive player up in that game. I was there and Trotwood sent at least 8 guys into the box the entire game. Burrows was crashing on the run 90% of the time. Dukes was able to sit in the holes of the zone matched up against Bam Bradley (safety) for the majority of his catches. He was too tall for Bam to handle on jump balls, but the Trotwood coaches were obviously not worried about losing in the passing game. Duke's QB is not a world beater and missed on a ton of throws. Hence the reason while Trotwood still won even with Dukes going off.
March 20th, 2012 at 11:31 AM ^
This is also why Burrows is still considered a 4-5 star player on all of the services and Dukes is a consensus 3 star. He's a good player, but he doesn't light up any competent secondary. He doesn't have the speed or agility to be a real game breaker. Great red zone target or possession receiver.
My reaction to Deveons Smith's ranking:
ಠ_ಠ
It's obvious that Mike Farrell is just trying to screw with Michigan fans.
I don't know if they have an anti-Michigan bias, but I do think that Rivals and Scout dig in their heels big time over recruits for whom there is an early rankings discrepancy (e.g., Deveon). It's like they decide, "oh, Deveon Smith, he's Scout's boy." Each service has to create the impression that they're original and aren't following the other's step.
You are exactly right. Also if a player attends one of the combines hosted/attended by a recruiting service they tend to show him more love. ESPN has the sparq combines, and I have seen Ferrell promoting rivals combines on twitter. I think if a player attends then they become "their guy." They also base a lot of their initial rankings before the senior season on these combine results.
I'm okay with these guys getting high 3-star initial ratings. The difference between a high 3-star and a low 4-star on these sites isn't earth-shattering, the 5-star system is merely an arbitrary way to grade recruits. Not everyone Michigan recruits that has a nice highlight tape will be a 4 or 5-star, and not every impact player on Michigan is a 4 or 5-star. We've taken skilled players across the board (5-stars or 3-stars), and with the depth that we should have in the coming years, the top guys will rise to the top and Michigan will be Michigan again, period.
Gareon Conley's position hasn't been ranked yet, that's why he's still unranked on Rivals. Also, ESPN's Jared Shanker interviewed him.
Hopefully this isn't a Wormley situation where rivals chooses to give a monster talent who could step on a college field today a 3 star, but it very well could be
How many stars did THE PARTY ROOM give them?
Poggi is committing today, per TPR
March 19th, 2012 at 10:36 PM ^
DON'T feed the trolls!
Are you crazy? If you say his name three times, he appears (fresh off a conversation with the coaches in which they told him Jesus McAwesomebacker just committed to Michigan)
Mike Hart was a 3* that ran people over all day long. So whatevs.
Mike Hart was a 3-star who was in essence "trying to tackle water" in high school. Hes an entirely different RB
Both of those guys are relatively close to getting 4-star rankings when you look at their position rankings. Smith is the #32 RB and they have 26 RBs with 4 stars. Dukes is the #43 WR and they have like 35 WRs with 4 stars. Especially since Rivals usually increases the number of 4-stars over the course of the year, both of these guys could be in 4-star territory before it's all said and done.
Also, I feel like a RB with early offers from both M and OSU should get 4-stars on that alone. Especially in a year like this when both schools are so hot on the recruiting trail.
EDIT: Offers are a good way to determine which site's ranking to trust. Look at the last few 4-stars on Rivals' RB list and who has offered them. The last 4-star has one offer, from Arizona, and he's a SoCal kid from a school that pumps out talent. Another crazy one is the #21 RB, Alvin Kamara, barely a 4-star and not a Rivals 250 member, has offers from Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Georgia and USC (Southern Cal), among others. He should probably be higher than he is.
I have been thinking about this for a while, but if we could ever get to a place in recruiting where we had 100% accurate data on who had what offers, it would be possible to put together some kind of ranking system that is based solely on the quality of offers.
Coaches are the best possible evaluators of talent, and that makes offers a better inidication of talent than the opinion of some guru for scout, rivals, etc.
You would have to find a way to quantify the "quality" of each offer. But it is something that I am sure someone on here *cough* Mathlete *cough* could probably pull off in a weekend.
Just an idea I had.
Heisenberg's Recruiting Uncertainty Principle states that the more precisely we can evaluate a player's talent, the more FAKES added to the 40 time.
Wouldn't that place Shane Morris down pretty low,? There is a strong correlation between offers and mutual interest. I don't know how you would factor that in.
Yeah, I think this is the biggest problem. There are other issues, too, like the fact that equally good recruits in two different areas won't get equally good offers. For example, a good recruit in Florida might have offers from UF, FSU, Miami, Alabama, Auburn, LSU, etc., while an equally good recruit in Colorado could have a really modest list.
I don't see the problem here, since even though the recruits would appear to the untrained eye to be equally good, the one from SEC country would actually be better. The bonus points for living in the south are already factored into the current system. You really can't have an accurate ranking system without this.