Every year around the NFL Draft, a battle emerges on twitter, "Do recruiting rankings matter?".

Those in the "Stars Matter" group (myself included) will point out that 70+% of the draftees in 2016 and 2017 were rated with four-stars or five-stars coming into college. The camp that doesn't believe the stars are an indicator of NFL talent will use three-star prospects like Marcus Mariota and two-star JJ Watt as examples to why the system is flawed.

If stars are an accurate indicator of future success, how could Marcus Mariota only have three-stars?

The heisman and No. 2 pick in the 2015 NFL Draft, it's really easy to use Mariota as an example of how the recruiting rankings missed a future star. Rivals and Scout both had Mariota as a three-star and 247 had the Hawaiian as a four-star, bringing his 247Sports composite to a three-star ranking. Mariota becomes one of those handful of outliers in every NFL draft class, a prospect ranked lower for multiple reasons or over performed what the high school experts saw.

In Mariota's case, a combination of very little game film from his Junior season at St. Louis and only a handful of opportunities to see the quarterback throw led to the three-star ranking. But while a three-star may seem low for a player of Mariota's accomplishments, the rankings still place Mariota in the top 50% of high school prospects. Mariota's composite ranking has him in the 82nd percentile of the 2600+ recruits who earned a star ranking in the 2011 class.

Since 2011, players from Hawaii are given many more opportunities to get to the mainland for recruiting camps and college events. Aside from Mariota's influence bringing more exposure to the islands, multiple foundations have been set up to help Hawaiian athletes with their recruitments. For the 2011 cycle, Mariota's year, only 15 football prospects from Hawaii received Division 1 scholarships. In the 2018 cycle, 48 prospects from Hawaii had two or more stars on 247Sports and over 30 received Division 1 offers.

Moving to this year's draft and beyond. The star rating systems have benefited from increased technology, the rise of HUDL, more camps and a growth in the industry. Throughout this spring, there is one major 7v7 event, combine camp or other event that recruiting experts can view prospects and give a more indepth and accurate evaluation.

There will always be outliers, such as Josh Allen in this year's draft class but as the recruiting system continues to grow, every year there will be fewer and fewer.

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