TTB poll results: Best recruiting site?
I have seen this argument/discussion pop up quite a bit recently with 247 Sports making some advancements, offering free trial memberships, etc. They came out of nowhere a couple years ago to make a splash after some guys split with Rivals.
Anyway, I posted a poll asking: Which recruiting site do you prefer overall? If you follow the link, you'll see the results of the poll, and I included some pros and cons about each of the sites. Obviously, there's no magic bullet for picking the "right" recruiting site, but I thought the results were interesting and might provoke some discussion. (LINK)
http://touchthebanner.blogspot.com/2013/07/poll-results-which-recruitin…
I agree that this message board is the best. Those sites could learn a thing or ten from MGoBlog...
The problem with most of the sites is that if they have a writer that I love, they also have a writer that I hate. For example, I'd love to throw all my money into Sam Webb's pockets, but I don't want Beaver to get a nickel.
I have no idea if this is true or not, but somebody said that Tom Beaver has been demoted/de-emphasized or something and they're giving more of the site over to Sam Webb. From what little I've seen of Beaver's antics, that seems like a good idea.
Well give Sam credit. Threatening people with a ban isn't his first course of action every time someone has a small disagreement with his game analysis.
One of them has to go out of business or merge with another one within the next couple years, right? I mean, if the US can't support 4 major legacy airlines, how can we support 4 paid recruiting sites?
I think it's going to be fine for now as a wide following of recruiting like this is fairly new. Plus, isn't each service linked to a higher up? Scout: Fox, Rivals: Yahoo, 247: CBS Sports, and ESPN. As long as those big players have an interest in college football, I think someone will be proping up these four sites at the very least
I could see Scout going away soon. With Fox dumping all of their money into their FS1 and probably FS2 networks and the rights and talent fees its going to take to get those up and running, they might look to dump their relationship with Scout to save a few million. And if that happens, I could see them just folding, or getting bought out by a competitor.
Scout also seems to be falling behind in the arms race. Along with their poor site design, Rivals is hooked up with Yahoo! and the 5-star Challenge. ESPN has its own network(s), the Under Armour game, The Opening, the NFTC tour, etc. And 247 Sports (backed by CBS Sports) is the new affiliate of the U.S. Army game.
Scout's affiliated with Fox, which is working on its own sports network but doesn't have any other marquee events. If you go to Scout's website, you're basically looking at the entirety of the company.
How long has Scout.com been around? I seem to recall surfing around on their page when I was in law school, which puts it at least in the late '90s.
I feel like the newer sites are better-designed and have a lot more features, but I've always respected Scout for being kind of the bridge between when recruiting was something you could only follow through print magazines and newsletters to the modern internet era.
I think Sam Webb's advantage is his contacts inside the program. I agree that his relationships with recruits are probably on par with the other insiders but he seems to have a better read on what the coaches are thinking than others do.
has only been doing the recruiting work for a couple years, dating back to his free site. I used to read his stuff, and he would always "happen" to post interviews with recruits a day after Scout or others would post inside information about them being of interest. I have no doubt in my mind that he was reading other sites to determine where he should go next for content. I wouldn't be surprised if it's still happening, as there's no way he can become one of the top "insiders" in the Michigan market without a little "help" from Sam, TomVH, and Tim Sullivan.
I recently joined 247 with their free offer, and Lorenz works his butt off. He provides a ton of Michigan specific information on many recruits. He seems pretty ethical and I don't see him taking other guys info.
Sam Webb is still the king, however, for anything that requires insight from the Michigan program. Nobody else is even remotely as connected to the coaching staff and Sam is a pretty straight shooter. I don't subscribe to Scout, but I regularly catch the WTKA podcast.
Eh, I see Lorenz reporting some stuff before ESPN and Rivals do. If he did it when he first started his site, then everybody needs to start somewhere. It's not like he can go from nowhere to being the insiderest of insiders. Everyone who starts a career is somewhat derivative of their mentors, heroes, etc.
Now it seems like other guys are playing catch-up with him a lot of times. I don't have a subscription to Scout, but Sam Webb seems to have set the bar for recruiting info. Everyone else is playing from behind, but I think it's TomVH/Lorenz tied for second and Rivals running fourth.
This is so far from the truth.
The ironic thing about Tremendous is that when it started, I didn't even have any interest in recruiting, let alone have a subscription of any kind.
Still, it's clear you're making an uninformed blanket statement without following my body of work. Haters always gonna hate.
If Scout would pull their website layout out of the late 90's they might have something, but everytime I go there, their website is unnavigable. Spend some money and update it, Scout! Everyone else is leaving you in the dust. They must see this, right?
Tim's Nightly Recruiting Notebook is a great idea in itself, but it's often rehashed information...and frankly, it's not really "insider" stuff. Tim's also a little too emotional to trust completely. He lets stuff get to him, and it comes across in his writing and his responses to readers/commenters on the site. Between him and Balas, The Fort isn't exactly a pleasant place to have a conversation.
Well, thanks.
ESPN sorta does, but Rivals has more insider practice report info.
You are correct about 247, the insider reports and articles are all strictly recruiting.
I agree with you but could care less about the non-revenue sports (other than wishing us well in all of them). So i like both
I generally visit 3 sites: Scout, Rivals, and this one. Scout has the best, most reliable inside information. Rivals has the most content. Mgoblog is the most fun.
I don't think Scout's website is particularly nice, but I don't find it any harder to navigate than Rivals or 247. What I like is that everything is generally accessible from the forum.
And in terms of overall information and content of the message board, I still think Scout is far better than any of the others. I'd put Rivals second, and 247 a distant third because its info is much weaker than Scout or Rivals.
but I'm not a paid subscriber to Scout, or Rivals, or 247, and never will be, so I can't really say what the full user experience is.
Given that I don't pay for online recuiting content, then Sam Webb (primarily on WTKA but also the occasional Det News article he writes), plus TTB and the occasional free stuff on Scout or Rivals, and MGoBlog satisfy any conceivable recruiting info need.
However, if I had only one source of recruiting info on Michigan football and basketball, then MGoBlog would by my choice. There are enough people here to routinely report on what Webb and other analysts say, Magnus supplies his opinions often enough, so I don't know why I'd need anything more.
Thanks for throwing TTB in there. The poster above you really hurt my feelings...
I know you'll just walk it off and get back in there for the next series of downs.
I would say that outside of pay sites, I find WTKA to be one of the most informative places for news. Sam's recruiting roundups and their weekly content in-season and their specials they do throughout the year are very knowledgeable and offer a lot of insider-type information.
I've had a subsciption a few times over the years there and I agree the layout is very outdated and not user-friendly. Anyways, are they planning to update it anytime soon? Because I swear I've been reading for the last 2-3 years about them updating it.
On a side note to this thread, I quite enjoy my ESPN subscription as besides Michigan Recruiting Nation /M-Den, I use it a lot for fantasy info (Karabell, Keith Law), Buster Onley's pay-walled blog (very solid writer if you ask me), and the ESPN the Mag that comes with it (everyone of courses bashes the mag here but it's gotten better than what it was 5-10 years ago). Quite good value even if you missed out on the deal that was posted here and just paid the 1 or 2-year subscritpion through ESPN.
thing. They tried updating several months ago, and it the new site was such a disaster that they went back to the old one. Still, they keep warning that a new site is coming.