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Recruiting is the lifeblood of a program. Because of this importance, it never rests. There are no dead periods even when the NCAA says there’s a dead period. Because the first sentence is true, even in a pandemic recruiting persists.

Four-year eligibility means there’s a constant rotation of players through a program. In come promising freshmen and seemingly in the blink of an eye, they’re on their way out, making room for a new group of freshmen. For numerous reasons, many won’t fulfill the promise they came in with. The main driver of individual disappointment is poor development, poor fit, and poor scheming. Sometimes it’s just a lousy evaluation.

We’ll run down the basics of recruiting by starting with an oft-forgotten factor. It’s amazing it needs to be repeated over and over, but coaching matters.

Yes, coaching matters

If only I had a dollar for every time I heard stars don’t matter because Mack Brown and Charlie Strong recruited well and still didn’t fare well in the 2010s. (The verdict is still out on Tom Herman in that regard. This year will tell the tale as his highly rated class of 2018 enters its third year in his program.)

A lot is embedded in the word ‘coaching.’ Coaching entails development through S&C (including instilling culture), development through teaching fundamentals and technique, teaching concepts beyond a player’s position thus improving overall football IQ, and deployment of talent in an optimized scheme. The degree to which these factors are in place will directly affect whether or not a player is maximized.

(Players who normally ‘bust’ are either to blame due to low football character or were terrible evaluations, otherwise every player should contribute in some fashion. At blue-bloods it’s normally the former)

Stars do matter on a macro level

You want as many five- and high four-stars as you can get. In my view, a five-star is someone who is guaranteed to get drafted in the first few rounds as long as he receives just average development. Most five-stars go to schools where they receive quality development and turn into stars.

The most obvious evidence that stars do matter is by looking at the results of the teams that land them in the highest number. These teams recruit the best and they also put the most players in the NFL.

Dabo Swinney did win his first national title at Clemson with a bit of an outlier team that averaged a #13 ranking in the four recruiting classes that took part in the National Championship. Outliers typically help make the original point as much as the standard examples do. There’s a reason they’re an outlier. Clemson’s recruiting has skyrocketed since the 2016 National Championship, so apparently Swinney thinks stars matter.

My intuition is, on average there is very little difference between three-stars rated .88 and four-stars rated .92. There is typically a more noticeable difference in raw ability and upside between a .96 and .92 than a .92 and .88.

This tight range between three- and four-stars is typically where you’ll find your star gazers who don’t really watch film. They’ll celebrate a .90 four-star! while wondering why the coaches are having to “settle” for a .89 three-star. That’s a bit hyperbolic, but only a bit.

Stars don’t matter on a micro level

The proof here is how many good players slip through the cracks and end up at smaller schools, or how many lower rated players come into a highly rated class and out-perform their more highly touted teammates.

There are many more three-stars and lower than there are five- and high four-stars. Sheer numbers dictate you’re going to have a lot of ‘feel good, Colt McCoy is better than Ryan Perrilloux’ stories. The takeaway isn’t just Perrilloux was overrated, though, it’s that McCoy was underrated. The takeaway is also that mental evaluation is as important as anything else.

A big factor in individual players exceeding expectations is growth potential. Players develop at different rates, which makes evaluation all the more difficult. What a player is today isn’t what he’s going to be tomorrow. Or, if he is, he’s likely not a player you want.

Perhaps a player came into a program with underdeveloped skills, an underdeveloped frame, or wasn’t playing the same position he projected to in high school that he does in college. These are not the players coaching staffs and recruiting networks should run from, but embrace.

Evaluation

The novice evaluator will look for hard hits or straight-line speed, but the two most important traits are initial quickness and fluidity. You have to get up and moving quickly if you’re a lineman, get to the hole quickly if you’re a running back, off the line of scrimmage quickly if you’re a wide receiver, etc.

With the modern game forcing players to defend the entire field, stiffness is a killer. Stiffness plays a big part in players spinning down a position (e.g., from corner to safety) and has put traditional middle linebackers on the endangered species list as they typically have no place to spin to. Players who can spin have huge upside, however. If they can keep 95% of their athleticism while moving up a size, that puts them in the highest percentile of athletes for the new position.

The first thing college evaluators will evaluate is how a player moves. If they like what they see, they’ll investigate further. Questions that need to be answered include: what are his grades, what will his build look like in a couple of years, how does he fit in our scheme, does he embrace the grind of football, and will he throw his body around?

There’s a whole lot more to evaluation than that, but this post will be long enough.

Finding the right fits

Evaluating for scheme fit is how schools with quality coaching often level the playing field. They might not own recruiting advantages, but these coaches are excellent on the whiteboard and know exactly what they’re looking for to unlock their playbook.

Oklahoma State is a good example, TCU has been as well, and so too was Kansas State under Bill Snyder. All three ran entirely different programs but each evaluated and recruited well for needs. Like Tiger Woods in his prime, they had a type and they went out and found them.

Urban Meyer is a blue blood coach who married quality schemes with elite talent. Dabo Swinney has been doing it too. This is the goal for Tom Herman and Texas. If the question is great schemes and fit or elite talent, the answer is ‘why not both?’

Not every recruit is a super star, but many can become very valuable role players that help you win big. These players are often underrated and don’t hold the same value at one school as they do at another. In the right system, they may find a fit that unlocks legitimate potential. Hunter Renfrow comes to mind.

Nick Saban doesn’t need Gary Patterson’s safeties-turned-linebackers. Saban cherry picks his offensive skill talent, rather than mining for it like Gundy. And he put himself in the fortunate position to put elite talent in a rigorous culture rather than recruiting the Kansas JUCO ranks like Snyder. But even Saban has utilized role players he put in the right fit to win at a high level, he just hasn’t had to make a career of it.

Mental eval is bigger than you think

Football character is different from choir boy character. Football character essentially means football is a major priority in life, you have goals in the sport, and you’re going to work very hard to achieve them. These can be choir boys but they can also be rough around the edges sorts where football serves as guard rails in life. You want hungry players.

Mental toughness is as important to evaluate as physical toughness. Being a college football player isn’t as easy as fans think. It requires discipline. It requires competitiveness. I’ve seen too many kids lacking competitiveness give up on themselves. They leave a lot of money on the table in the process. You want maximizers.

Lazy kids can be culture killers, too, especially when they’re talented and coaches find themselves at the intersection of instilling culture and playing favorites. That’s not a place they want to be. It’s how you lose locker rooms. It’s better to evaluate that from the beginning. Some players are so talented they can get away with things others can’t. That’s a dangerous game.

Tom Herman has already passed on more talented flakes than he’s taken. I rarely hear about lazy or unmotivated players. I think Texas has done well here but you’re still going to have to take chances here and there depending on a player’s upside. They did that with Javonne Shepherd. I’m sure they’ll do it again.

Football intelligence is different than mental eval

A player’s football intelligence is typically tied into the coaching he’s received and the amount of time that player studies. Some are born instinctive and have a naturally high football IQ, but most have to work to understand, similar to being in a classroom.

Football intelligence is probably the hardest thing for a non-coach to evaluate. Even still, NFL teams with millions invested in scouting departments often fail in evaluating a player’s mental capabilities.

Some kids make football intelligence impossible to miss, but for the most part it’s a question mark that will need to be answered over time.

This aspect of evaluation plays a big role in quarterback recruiting, as well as linebacker and safety.

Transferable traits are much more important than high school production

I often hear about how Player X put up gaudy stats in high school and should be widely recruited. Or on this site during televised high school playoff games I’ll read how Johnny All Star is a “player” and “Texas should take a look.” Texas probably did take a look — a 10-second look and saw Johnny F’n All Star didn’t pass the ‘initial quickness/fluidity’ test.

Transferable traits matter much more than stats. Al Bundy can’t take those 4 touchdowns for Polk High with him to college. High school players can’t take all the other external advantages with them either. On the positive side for a player in sub-optimal circumstances, they’re not going to be downgraded for external disadvantages.

Most college prospects were productive high school players, which comes as no surprise, but you have to understand the context of how the production comes about. Tape matters so much more than box scores.

Context matters. Is a player excelling at a school with a tougher lacrosse schedule than football? That’s an issue. Does the player have a huge team-wide advantage, like we’ve seen at Katy or Aledo in the past? Something made Andy Dalton at Katy different from the run of Bishops playing quarterback at Aledo. On the flip side, something makes Jase McClellan different than Kyle Porter. (It’s traits)

I’m not saying production doesn’t matter, but for the most part it’s a secondary consideration to traits.

Ceiling player versus floor player

I’ll use these terms a lot to describe how much growth potential a player has.

Shane Buechele is a great example of a high floor player. I said he’d likely start immediately as a true freshman because of that floor. But he also had limitations that were never going to change, either, and he was replaced by Sam Ehlinger who had a higher floor and ceiling, especially in the Herman offense (another reminder that fit matters).

Ja’Quinden Jackson and Hudson Card are also useful for this conversation. Jackson is an awesome force on the field, both an excellent runner with a powerful arm. That gives him a high ceiling. But he comes with extensive questions in the passing game, which lowers his floor. But but he’s such a good runner he’ll be easy to build an offense around which raises that floor a bit.

Card is much more experienced as a passer and also has a strong arm and is a good athlete. At the position his floor is higher than Jackson’s but his ceiling isn’t. Like with Buechele and Ehlinger, fit will likely play a part in deciding who the “best” quarterback is. Timing and circumstance are such important factors in all of this.

That’s not to rehash a stupid debate, it’s just to illustrate the floor versus ceiling point.

Much of a class is fungible

Nobody knows if Logan Parr or Aki Ogunbiyi will be the better player. Parr, a guard prospect, signed with Texas. Ogunbiyi, a guard prospect, signed with Texas A&M. They were both four-stars in a class with a lot of good offensive line options.

The secret is there are so many good options throughout the country that schools that recruit at a good to great level should have no problem creating a big board where the #4-10 options at a position are basically interchangeable. You don’t want to go any further down your big board than you have to, but in a 25 man class, 17-18 guys are fungible. I pulled that number out of a hat but you get the point. What decides the differences between those 17-18 players at schools with similar resources is development. Coaching matters, imo.

The real recruiting battles to pay attention to are when the players are more uncommon. Where Texas hurt A&M is by landing Vernon Broughton (though the Aggies landed a great D-line haul). Where the Aggies hurt Texas is by landing Jaylon Jones.

That’s why you have to land elites

Since classes are largely fungible, you have to land elites to differentiate. Sometime in July I wrote if Texas landed Bijan Robinson, Vernon Broughton, and Alfred Collins, things would be just fine. Things were just fine.

Texas has long been landing good, fungible options, but in addition to other issues, it hasn’t landed enough elite difference makers. The evidence, or lack thereof, is in the NFL draft.

Here’s where the star-gazers are on better footing. At least usually. I’ve seen some horrendously overrated players in the past.

Under Tom Herman, Texas is landing better players than it has in a long time. I believe they’re receiving better development, too. That needs to continue so the four-year rolling average has Texas reloading rather than rebuilding.

Scarcity and dirty programs

Scarcity affects just about everything else in life, so why not recruiting? The better, more rare the prospect, the greater lengths schools will go to land him.

There are dirty programs. Counter to the talking point, no, not all schools are dirty. If you pay attention to recruiting long enough, and watch fact patterns develop, these facts won’t need to be stated. They’ll be obvious.

If your favorite school misses on a blue-chip prospect it “should” have had, maybe it was really doomed from the start. Context matters. We’ll usually let you know what’s up there, you just kind of have to pay attention.

Recruiting witches

These are largely figments of the recruitnik’s imagination. Recruiting witches almost always stem from schools who are on the upswing, are dirty, or are both. Put that same guy at even a good, but clean school, and he isn’t the same.

There are a lot of good recruiters out there, and you want as many as you can get, but witches are unicorns who only appear when things are going really well, or the school has buying power. Not coincidentally, they lose their magical powers when circumstances change.

Volume recruiters

These are engaging, energetic coaches who can handle a large number of recruits regardless of position or region. They don’t have to be “proven” they just need a chance to prove. Jeff Traylor was a volume recruiter for Texas. Chris Vaughn and Chris Rumph were pretty good too.

Texas may have one or two volume recruiters on staff, but I’m waiting to see how the cycle plays out.

Committable offers

A committable offer means you can commit to the offer. That’s easy enough, but the question then becomes, what is an offer that isn’t committable? That would be an Alabama offer. Or a Georgia offer. Or an LSU offer.

These fake offers are really just a sign of interest. The problem with them, beyond the obvious, is they put schools like Texas on the spot. Texas doesn’t want to offer in-state kids early in case the player tries to commit. Telling a player ‘no’ is bad business, especially when you’re somewhat dependent on having good relationships within the Texas high school coaches sewing circle.

Non-committable offers are an invitation to visit or participate in a camp where the real evaluation begins. Non-committable offers are bull****, and a seedy side of the recruiting process that stems from the region that embraces the seedy side of the game.

New car smell versus stagnation

Recruiting is a leading indicator of a program on the rise and a leading indicator of one on the decline.

New coaches typically recruit very well in their first full cycle. They come in with fanfare, enthusiasm, and the promise of a new day. It’s easy to capitalize on early which creates momentum. From there, the new coach is off and running. As Tom Herman struggled with his transition 2017 class I mentioned he was going to kill the 2018 class. I knew that because the new car smell is real.

Stagnation is also real, and it aided Tom Herman in his first year as Kevin Sumlin’s tenure at A&M was essentially a rotting fish. That just added to Herman’s recruiting tailwind.

Once recruiting takes a real step back for a school, its head coach has lost his fastball and should have already been replaced. Recruits tend to know before athletic directors that it’s over for a coach and there’s no coming back. Once recruiting goes, so too should the coach. It’s the way of things, otherwise you’re just putting off the inevitable and making things even more difficult for the next coach.

Relationships/proximity

Recruiting is largely about relationships, and relationships are aided by proximity and the ease with which a recruit and his family can visit campus. This is a huge advantage for a school like Texas that sits in the middle of a recruiting hotbed.

The earlier a relationship is built, the better a school’s chances for landing the recruit. This is why it’s important to be early on evaluations. You want to weigh all your options as soon as possible and begin to cultivate the type of relationship that will end with a signature. When a staff loses a kid to another school, the recruit should be in tears as he tells you he’s going in a different direction. If a kid can casually tell a coach he’s going to their rival, the coach did a poor job cultivating the relationship.

Proximity also helps because most players want to play at a school that is an easy trip for their family and friends to come watch them play.