Average Recruiting Class of Playoff Teams

Submitted by MGoStrength on

TVH posted this on Twitter earlier.  I have to assume he's using the ESPN rankings.  Here are the average rank of the recruiting classes for the last 4 years of each playoff team.

 

Okla - 14.75

Clemson - 8.5

Georgia - 6.75

Bama - 1.25

Average of all 4 Teams - 7.81

(UM - 17.5)

(OSU - 5)

 

The bad news is UM is still well behind the current playoff teams average.  The good news is that Harbaugh's only two full classes to date average #6.  2015 and 2014 really dragged down our average, which means the vast majority of our talent is in the freshman and sophomore classes. 

 

Conclusions:  Going by recruiting alone, if UM continues to recruit at the pace Harbaugh has in his only two full recruiting classes, one could guess that's good enough to get into the playoffs.  The bad news is that might not be good enough to win the conference as OSU is still not only ahead of us, but also ahead of the average playoff team at #5.

Michifornia

December 6th, 2017 at 11:47 AM ^

Our recruting is going just fine.  We have and will continue to have enough talent to win and contend for B1G and CFP.  Just gotta do it on the field.  I think we can and next year will be the start of being in the conversation every year for the foreseeable future.

GO BLUE!!

Billy Ray Valentine

December 6th, 2017 at 12:01 PM ^

I've been reading this site for years, and it was so frustrating that no one, ever, posted something about how recruiting success typically correlates to on-field success.

 

Thanks for the novel work, OP and TVH.  And great job with the math stuff.  Doing complex math like "averages" is way above my skill level.

 

/s(!)

yossarians tree

December 6th, 2017 at 12:10 PM ^

Recruiting rankings can be a leading indicator of success, but there is so much more that goes into a successful team having a "great" season (I would consider making the playoff a "great" season), and that includes a healthy dose of intangibles such as leadership, toughness, playmaking ability, and, like it or not, a fortunate bounce of the ball here or there or what could otherwise be constued as just plain luck.

Bubba

December 6th, 2017 at 1:03 PM ^

This is kind of funny to read since I was just posting on QB recruits.

What were the rankings of the following Sparty NFL quarterbacks ?

-Drew Stanton
-Brian Hoyer
-Kork Coupons
-Connor Cook

Now tell me what the rankings were of our unsuccessful quarterbacks ?

We buy too much into hype. I'm sick of seeing low/non-ranked Sparty players out perform ours on an annual basis.

MGoStrength

December 6th, 2017 at 3:30 PM ^

Drew Stanton - 4-star #171 overall (247)

Brian Hoyer - 3-star #408 overall (247)

Kirk Cousins - 3-star 70 individual rating (247)

Connor Kirk - 3-star 76 individual rating (ESPN)

Brian Lewerke - 4-star 81 individual rating 270 overall (ESPN)

 

MSU has absolutely had better luck in recent years with developing their talent in their system.  This is both a credit to MSU's coaching staff and highlights the importance of continunity.  UM has been through 3 coaching changes in 8 years and Brandon Peters is the first projected starter(since Chad Henne) to play his entire career in the system he was recruited for if both he and Harbaugh make it that far.

SpilledMilk

December 6th, 2017 at 7:01 PM ^

Or would you say that player development is indicative of good coaching? Sure, luck can always help but when looking at player development, it's usually a reflection on coaching.

QB's - its hard to believe that we're going into year 4 of Harbaugh and we find ourselves praying that a transfer will come to our team and be able to play immediately. It's almost bizarre, as if we're living in a twilight zone version of reality

In reply to by SpilledMilk

MGoStrength

December 7th, 2017 at 2:49 PM ^

The way you word that "we're going into our 4th year of Harbaugh and we find ourselves praying that a transfer will come to our team" is a little misleading.  Another way of saying that is that Harbaugh is not even done with his third year yet and he's already signed three 4-star Top 150 QBs (Peters, McCaffrey, & Milton) and his first one, whose only a RS freshman, is undefeated in his career and looks promising to be our next starter so much that a returning starter is transferring away.

what would Bo do

December 6th, 2017 at 1:03 PM ^

I did an analysis that looked at the overall composite ranking of each player from the 4 previous classes.  No one (even Urban Meyer at OSU) is recruiting at Bama's level, but Clemson proved last year that you don't need to.  You need to have a roster full of talented players and it very much helps to have a great QB, but you don't need 5 stars at every position.  They were good enough at all other positions that having Deshaun Watson was enough for them to beat Bama.  Michigan is trying to follow a similar model.  By my analysis, Michigan this year was every bit as talented as Clemson was last year when the won the whole damn thing, albeit substantially younger.  If Brandon Peters (or Shea Patterson) can provide an upgrade at that position, we're closer to theoretically being able to compete with OSU and Bama athletically than some would have you believe.

DairyQueen

December 6th, 2017 at 8:43 PM ^

Wasn't there simply an unprecedented mass-exodus of like 6 or 7 highly touted OL recruits under Hoke and just as Harbaugh arrived?

Not to mention at MANY other positions? (which is STILL happening at this very moment)

Alsom UM's 2014 and 2015 class were horrendous by UM's standards. Does this speak to the strength of their 2016 and 2017 class bringing this overall average up?

I'd like to see much more data than this to draw a better conclusion.

 

MGoStrength

December 7th, 2017 at 7:08 PM ^

So, even though UM was just as talanted as Clemson on a per-player basis the majority of UM's talent was condensed in the fr/soph classes, whereas Clemson's talent was more spread out evenly allowing their jr/sr to contribute more than UM's.  We've all seen how important experience and returning starters are.  So, it's not quite the same thing even though the overall talent level is similar.

Alumnus93

December 6th, 2017 at 1:23 PM ^

We are currently fine to compete, but it's all about the QB now. Get the right QB, is the difference.

UMgradMSUdad

December 6th, 2017 at 1:35 PM ^

It's interesting that Oklahoma has the worst ranking among the four playoff teams, and also that one of the primary reasons they're even in the conversation is because of a player who doesn't count in recruiting rankings because he was a transfer.  And even if he were to count, as a 3 star walk-on at Texas Tech, Baker Mayfield's star rating would do more to pull down overall recruiting measures for top teams. Yet without Mayfield, Oklahoma almost certainly would have lost at least one more, and quite possibly two or three more games this year and wouldn't be in the title conversation at all.

MGoStrength

December 7th, 2017 at 6:55 PM ^

And OU has a Heisman candidate QB, just like Clemson did, Bama did, OSU did, Auburn did. More than not, the NC team has a Heisman candidate QB that was recruited for that system. We're on our 3rd string and just not in that situation yet.

uminks

December 6th, 2017 at 2:38 PM ^

Clemson's recruiting was much like ours, in the mid teens. Winning the ACC and getting into the playoffs and winning a NC has surely helped. Harbaugh had rankings of 6 and 5 the past two seasons. Lets say we are 14 this season but 8 in 2019, so about 8 on average, right in the Clemson and GA ball park. So, I'm expecting playoffs in 2019.

MGoStrength

December 7th, 2017 at 6:52 PM ^

Clemson got over the FSU hump (a historically better recruiting hotbed) like our in conference rival in OSU. But, Dabo has been there longer than Harbaugh. Check back in 2 more years to compare apples to apples.

Jordan2323

December 6th, 2017 at 10:04 PM ^

Is currently one of the leading candidates for the TN job and Bama has miraculously turned it on with defensive commits and crystal balls the last few days? Gee, wonder how they do that with rumors of the d coordinator possibly leaving?