How a person views a sport tends to be a function of his or her age. People who have been watching the game for decades tend to find more currency in tradition and performance in years long since passed, while kids might only know the sport based on what they've seen.

The upcoming 2016 recruiting class was born in the late 1990s, and for the most part, they probably only really know what's happened in the past 10 years or so. The program prestige they know is based on recent history.

F/+ is the ranking system used by Football Outsiders, a combination of the S&P+ metric by our own Bill Connelly and Brian Fremeau's Efficiency Index.

These are the 10-year F/+ averages for every FBS team, or approximately the time period in which today's recruits have been paying attention. For teams that have been competing at the FBS level for fewer than 10 years, their average simply includes all the years they've spent as an FBS program. Basically, a rating of 0.0 would mean a perfectly average team.

Rank School 10-year F/+ average 1 Alabama 49.3% 2 Ohio State 48.0% 3 Oklahoma 44.3% 4 LSU 43.3% 5 USC 42.0% 6 Oregon 41.9% 7 Florida 41.2% 8 Georgia 35.1% 9 Texas 34.6% 10 Boise State 32.7% 11 TCU 32.0% 12 Virginia Tech 31.8% 13 Wisconsin 28.7% 14 Florida State 28.2% 15 South Carolina 27.4% 16 Penn State 26.5% 17 Auburn 26.3% 18 Missouri 26.2% 19 Oklahoma State 25.6% 20 Clemson 24.9% 21 Notre Dame 24.9% 22 West Virginia 24.2% 23 Michigan 23.1% 24 Michigan State 22.2% 25 Nebraska 21.8% 26 Stanford 21.7% 27 Arkansas 21.6% 28 BYU 20.7% 29 Texas A&M 18.7% 30 Tennessee 17.5% 31 Georgia Tech 17.2% 32 Pittsburgh 16.8% 33 Miami (Fla.) 16.6% 34 Iowa 16.4% 35 Utah 15.2% 36 Louisville 14.9% 37 Arizona 13.9% 38 Arizona State 13.8% 39 Texas Tech 13.3% 40 Oregon State 13.3% 41 Cincinnati 12.3% 42 UCLA 12.1% 43 Boston College 11.7% 44 Kansas State 9.3% 45 Baylor 8.3% 46 Ole Miss 7.7% 47 Mississippi State 6.5% 48 California 5.5% 49 Rutgers 4.5% 50 North Carolina 4.3% 51 South Florida 4.3% 52 Georgia Southern 4.0% 53 Central Florida 3.0% 54 Washington 2.6% 55 Tulsa 2.6% 56 Houston 2.4% 57 NC State 0.2% 58 Minnesota -0.4% 59 Navy -1.3% 60 East Carolina -1.6% 61 Maryland -1.8% 62 Virginia -1.8% 63 Fresno State -1.9% 64 Northwestern -1.9% 65 Northern Illinois -2.5% 66 Nevada -4.4% 67 Wake Forest -4.5% 68 Illinois -4.8% 69 Connecticut -5.8% 70 Kentucky -5.9% 71 Purdue -6.0% 72 Southern Miss -6.1% 73 Air Force -6.3% 74 Vanderbilt -6.9% 75 Kansas -7.5% 76 Toledo -8.7% 77 Marshall -9.0% 78 Iowa State -9.9% 79 Syracuse -10.0% 80 Utah State -12.8% 81 Louisiana Tech -13.0% 82 Central Michigan -13.9% 83 Colorado -13.9% 84 Ball State -14.1% 85 Old Dominion -14.3% 86 Hawaii -14.7% 87 Bowling Green -14.8% 88 San Diego State -15.0% 89 Indiana -15.2% 90 Duke -15.4% 91 Western Michigan -15.8% 92 SMU -15.9% 93 Washington State -17.4% 94 Arkansas State -17.8% 95 Ohio -18.0% 96 South Alabama -18.2% 97 Troy -18.3% 98 Western Kentucky -18.6% 99 Colorado State -19.6% 100 Temple -21.1% 101 Wyoming -22.2% 102 Middle Tennessee -22.2% 103 Rice -22.4% 104 UL-Lafayette -23.1% 105 UTEP -23.1% 106 Memphis -23.4% 107 San Jose State -23.9% 108 UTSA -24.6% 109 Kent State -25.1% 110 UAB -25.7% 111 UL-Monroe -26.4% 112 New Mexico -27.2% 113 Appalachian State -28.0% 114 Miami (Ohio) -29.0% 115 Texas State -29.3% 116 Buffalo -29.8% 117 Akron -29.9% 118 Florida International -30.4% 119 Florida Atlantic -30.5% 120 UNLV -31.0% 121 Army -31.4% 122 Tulane -33.5% 123 North Texas -34.1% 124 Idaho -41.6% 125 Eastern Michigan -42.0% 126 Georgia State -43.2% 127 New Mexico State -48.9% 128 Massachusetts -50.0%

Observations:

The top 10 are all teams you would probably guess. Alabama and Ohio State are several percentage points ahead of the pack in the top two spots, and Nos. 3-7 Oklahoma, LSU, USC, Oregon, and Florida all slot in fairly tightly behind them before there's another big gap.

Boise State is the top team from outside the power conferences, at No. 10, as you could've predicted. The Big 12's TCU is right behind at 11, and they spent the majority of this 10-year period in the Mountain West. The next highest team from outside a power conference is BYU at 28th.

The worst power conference team over the last decade has been Washington State, which came in at 93rd, just edging out Duke and Indiana. But hey, top 100!

The lowest team, UMass, has found its first four seasons at the FBS level to be difficult. The Minutemen are not that far behind New Mexico State, though. I mean, somebody has to be last, but sheesh.