Oversigning and Bowl Wins

But man, I can do without all the Little Bro comments.  We're talking a difference of 4 between MSU and UM, and this Little Bro thing is getting hackneyed.

Isn't 125 the maximum number of legitimate offers over 5 years? Your 85+25 doesn't account for players like Greg Brown.

So if we had played Clemson or Stanford, we'd be the bad guy?

Odd that you state 110 is the max when we did 112 and then take a shot at msu despite them having a grand total of 4 more than us over 5 years.

Really interesting stuff. There's an obvious advantage to how a lot of the SEC recruits, which is the real reason why they've been so good

Oversigning is a real problem - and I hate to be the guy to do this - but this table isn't as meaningful or interesting as it seems.  In fact, I think this mostly reflects randomness.

Teams that benefit from oversigning benefit from it all season long and not just in the bowl game.  That means that they play tougher teams in better bowls because they've oversigned.  It might be that Oklahoma State had a much better season because of oversigning, but that oversigning led them to play a tougher Stanford team in a bowl as opposed to Washington or Cal or something.

Then again, the pattern here could be somewhat real (but exaggerated) if, for example, the SEC schools oversign like crazy, so they all have advantages no matter where they're slotted.

Hell, we'd probaly have a billion recruits if we also put coeds in our recruits' hotels before they get there (like some schools), but that's not how Michigan works. I've heard people say "UM just needs to start playing the game the way it's played today" or "We should be like Alabama, I don't care how we win national championships as long as we win them". But as our immortalized godfather of football said in his book: "It all boils down to basic honesty. Without that, you won't accomplish a single thing worthwhile." So let's beat the hell out of them this fall to show them hard work beats talent every time.

I watched all of the bowl games and a good portion of the sec during the season, and to be honest, there's no such thing as the SEC advantage. Out of the 12 teams in the league, 5 are legitimate punching bags: Mississippi State (Couldn't put away a 6-6 ACC squad whose best win was a reeling FSU squad), Ole Miss, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Vanderbilt. The other 7 are good, but not great, and their records are buyoed by these crap teams.

In the bowls, the SEC had 9 teams sent to the bowls, of which 7 have competed in bowls already. Of those 7, 4 were fair matchups, 1 was slightly negative, 1 was grossly unfair, and 1 was a favorable matchup. The SEC won 3/4 fair matchups, 1/2 negative matchups, and 1/1 favorable matchups. The Big 10 on the other hand had 10 teams sent to the bowls. Of those 10, 4 were fair matchups, 2 were slightly negative, 3 were grossly unfair, and 1 was a favorable matchup. The Big 10 won 2/4 fair matchups, 1/2 slightly unfair matchups, 0/3 grossly unfair matchups, and 1/1 favorable matchups. Wow, those percents are pretty comparable to the SEC! (If Ohio State hadn't given Florida 2 special teams touchdowns, the Big 10 would have had the upper hand there)

Give these good-but-not-great teams from the SEC bowl games against higher ranked and better record teams and see if they even come close to winning one of them. Vanderbilt was the only team that played an opponent with a better record than them and they got smashed... by a Big East team. 

Just sayin...

That is all.

Arkansas vs. Kansas State. Jesu,s Christ that is ridiculous.

....every four years apparently yields results in the SEC, for it seems to create some odd sort of parity if  at least most of a division or conference does it since then it is simply a matter of the quality of the talent you are in fact signing. Creating a massive talent backlog like Alabama and LSU have done seems like it dooms us to having at least one of these in the top five in every single poll for the foreseeable future. 

I find it interesting though - and thanks to the OP for bringing this up - that we were part of an exception like this rather than a rule this season.  

In any event, the site mentioned in the OP also has "The Oversigning Cup", where they keep track of a few stats. http://oversigning.com/testing/index.php/the-oversigning-cup/. These are 2011 numbers, but I wonder what  happens this year if they intend on doing it. It is an interesting format and I wonder what the 2012 numbers will be once classes are complete or the deadline passes (so we'll likely have to check back in August, right?). 

Basically, it keys in on the number of players a school should sign to meet the limit of 85 (scholarship players minus departures, then this number subtracted from 85), then compares this number to how many are actually signed to get "cup points". Of course, those who have oversigned have positive points. By their figures, we were at +1 in 2011. The top three as of the last update were Ole Miss (+12), Alabama (+11) and LSU (+10). 
 

The definitions and methods are at the top of the page. There's also some historical data here - http://oversigning.com/testing/index.php/recruiting-numbers/ regarding average class sizes by team and conference. 

Interesting  find, this site! Thanks OP!

At the risk of stating the obvious ...

How much would it help your team's competitiveness if, after every year, you could @#$% the gentleman's scholarship agreement and just drop the bottom 20% (in terms of production) of each recruiting class? *I* think that just might motivate (in an unfriendly way) everyone on the roster. Practices would be more competitive and so would the team.

How many chances does the B10 (and ND) take on players with character and/or academic issues? Less than half of that 37-player class Ole' Miss signed a few years ago is on campus, mostly due to academic and behavior issues. Certainly Ole' Miss is number one in legitimate oversigning offenses, but the willingness to take chances on some seedy dudes affects those numbers and I don't think that necesarily benefits those schools.

I think the difference can be seen when comparing the East and West divisions of the SEC. Of recently relevant class, Auburn has signed 25+ since 2006, Mississippi State 26+ since 2007, Arkansas  26+ since 2006, Alabama 25+ since 2007, LSU 26+ since 2006 (except 24 in 2009). All of these programs have been on the uptick over the past 5 or so years with the minor exception of LSU who was still strong before. Each school has added a premier coach whose recruited well and gotten the benefit of about/almost an extra class every four years.

The East meanwhile only South Carolina has recently been signing well over 25 on a regular basis, and they have obviously had an uptick recently. Meanwhile, Florida, Georgia, and Tennessee who were premier programs in the once vaunted East division during the early part of the decade have been below their normal level the last couple years. Coaching has a major impact also, but I think the shift of power within the SEC is significant and is at least in part due to oversigning.

Where the numbers are from:

http://oversigning.com/testing/index.php/recruiting-numbers/

Does the NCAA actually enforce any of these rules? Has there ever been an instance of a program getting punished for oversigning?