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Can Washington compete nationally without 5 Star recruits?
DerekJohnson
Administrator, Swaye's Wigwam Posts: 60,233
DerekJohnson
Administrator, Swaye's Wigwam Posts: 60,233
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Although the 91 champs did have the highest ranked classes in school history. Funny how that works
We actually are in the midst of the next great bumper crop
Every 30 years UW wins a natty. Allegedly
I thought 88 was too
UW has done it as recently as three seasons ago. It wasnt overperforming 3* guys coming back down to earth against elite competition that derailed that team. Guys like King, Jones, Gaines, Vea, Pettis, and Gaskin held up fine. It was a couple of key injuries to a thin roster and a lack depth players with 4* physical characteristics surrounding the elite guys (most of whom had been 3* recruits). Plus a weak OL and QB.
A look the Huskies’ best recruiting classes of the past 30 years:
1988: Best of the best: Steve Emtman, Lincoln Kennedy, Mark Brunell, Mario Bailey, Dave Hoffmann and Jay Barry, to name a few, helped pave the way for the most dominant period in program history.
That's a great class
Hoff is going to get you
Yes stars matter, but this board gets too caught up in the four star guys. If those guys play up to their rankings, they would be late round NFL draft picks. We feel good about beating out Oregon, UCLA, and even USC, but some of those guys suck.
An example is Wattenberg. He was a low four star recruit that if he played to his exact ranking would be a 7th round pick. To almost everyone, he’s a disappointment, but he’s really close to the level he was rated as on 247, but we see the four stars and expect more.
We got worse at evaluating as time went on because we could get the good, but not elite four star recruits. The team now has better depth, but is not as talented as 2016. Our talent has decreased slightly despite higher ranked classes.
UW needs to always keep elite in state guys, have a great QB, and evaluate well. After the elite guys, you need to pick and get the others.
This post is scattered, but there is more nuance to simply thinking stars matter because the teams that win natties have the highest ranked classes.
The elite recruiting prospects are hard to get for a reason, they pan out much more often than lesser recruited guys. It's important we get as many if them as possible. But the difference between being USC/Tennessee/Texas and actually competing for a Natty is how well you evaluate and develop the back half of your recruiting class with guys that not every school wants.
This argument can drive me bat shit crazy at times because people will say "STARS DON'T MATTER!!! STAN EMPO!!!!" The reason the vast majority of drafted players are 3 star or less is because there are a shit ton more of them.
The instructions from James were for the assistants to get off their ass and verify everything that was said about a recruit including holding the stop watch. He was tired of fast guys that were slow and Bama really torched us with 80's SEC SPEED
If you look at that 88 class you can see the beauty of rankings and getting there in person to verify. Mario Baily was small, Stan was underrated. Kennedy was highly rated. The point is that the 88 - 90 classes were loaded with FOOTBALL PLAYERS who were mean and nasty and wanted to win
The 92 class look great on paper but ended up sucking
Its not an exact science by any means. Maybe we have a bad batch of chips. Maybe the coaches need to work harder on evaluation. We need football players not underwear models.
Everything matters
@Dennis_DeYoung @CokeGreaterThanPepsi
I get that the teams with the highest ranked classes win natties, but recruiting for fit is important. Chip at Oregon wasn’t getting good, but not top ranked classes, but was winning the conference almost every year because he recruited guys that fit what he wanted to do. We don’t do that at all because we didn’t have a offensive system under Pete.
Certain positions, mainly WR are so inflated. A ton of it has to do with 7 on 7 and their stats too. If the national guys develop a relationship with a kid, I think that can play a role in inflated rankings as well.
If you have a shitty high school QB, it’s hard to really produce as a WR. Spiker might turn out to be a good player, but he was an obvious guy that was ranked too high because his team threw the ball a ton and he had a D-1 QB throwing to him.
The story about Whittingham flipping out over Sidney Jones decommiting made me think that he must be pretty fucking good despite a low ranking.
If schools are dropping a guy, it probably is a sign that he’s overrated, but since he’s still ranked a 4 star, the team that ends up getting him gets excited. Oregon got the kid from Alabama that was dropped by them and they rose a couple spots in the rankings when Oregon signed him because he was still ranked fairly high. He very likely sucks.
Get elite guys and evaluate well to your scheme and fit after that. Pete did very good at that with his 2014 class. So many of those guys were lowly rated but ended up being great players. He was obviously amazing at it when he was at Boise. I wish he wouldn’t have changed except for get a couple elite guys here and there since he was at UW and now could.