I asked @coachchadmorris how much recruiting rankings or other scholarship offers play into his recruiting philosophy. He responded with a heck of an answer. Take the ~2 minutes and listen to what he says #WPS pic.twitter.com/zqyQ4ZLz8O — Gene Dumont (@meangene413) February 8, 2018

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The phrase "quality over quantity" is a good way to describe the signing class head coach Chad Morris was able to throw together in his first 61 days on the job.

Arkansas was never going to sign a large class in 2018 because it had a limited number of scholarship available due to a lack of attrition. It was something the previous staff acknowledged long before their fate was sealed and Morris embraced soon after being hired.

"Some people see it as, 'Wow, that's a negative. You don't have the amount of numbers,'" Morris said Wednesday. "I see it as a positive. We can be selective. We can be very choosy in who we want to take."

That is precisely what he did, as he kept four previous commitments - all of whom likely would have signed with Arkansas regardless of the coach - and added 12 of his own. However, the 16-member class, which has the potential to grow to 17, is dead last in the SEC and ranked 55th nationally - well below the 10-year average ranking of 28.8

Needing to click the "load more" button at the bottom of the 247Sports Composite team rankings page may be concerning to fans, but they must look beyond the ranking to see the value in the class.

Connor Noland and Bumper Pool are the lone four-star players, but nine of the other 14 signees are high three-star prospects with 247Sports Composite grades of at least 86. Even the five "low" three-star prospects aren't too much of a stretch.

Rakeem Boyd (84.67) is a JUCO running back who was a high three-star recruit (87.52) when he signed with Texas A&M out of high school in 2016. Ryan Winkel (84.53) and Andrew Parker (82.87) were diamonds in the rough discovered by the Razorbacks, who had to fight off Tennessee and Texas, respectively, down the stretch to keep them. Silas Robinson (81.75) was a quarterback before moving to the offensive line in high school.

"The only thing that matters to me is, 'Are we going to get better today?' And we are," Morris said. "Those 16 guys are going to come in and they're going to make people uncomfortable. They're going to push people that maybe have gotten comfortable on this roster."

Even with those five players, Arkansas' signees have an average grade of 86.16. That is slightly above the Razorbacks' 10-year average of 85.94 and also better than last year's class, which was ranked 27th nationally with the players' average grade being 86.02.

If rankings were determined by this metric, Arkansas would move ahead of 17 teams and be No. 38 - with a chance to move ahead of two more schools if it lands Valencia (Calif.) College of the Canyons defensive end Dorian Gerald on Friday. Included among the teams the Razorbacks' would jump are Kentucky, Vanderbilt and Missouri, meaning they would rank 11th in the SEC.

That still isn't something to brag about, but it is much better than the rankings being written about on message boards and discussed on sports talk radio shows. It is also important to note that Morris had only 61 days to do it for a team coming off a 4-8 season, all while dealing with the first ever early signing period.

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