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Welcome to The Crootletter. I'm Bud Elliott, SB Nation's National Recruiting Analyst, and in this space I'll be sharing news, rumors and musings on the world of college football recruiting.
An interesting topic came up on Twitter Wednesday after ESPN released its final recruiting rankings and had only nine five-star prospects. Other networks consistently give out 30 or 40 five-star ratings, but ESPN does it differently, grading prospects on a numerical scale and then matching that to a star system.
I don't always agree with ESPN's ratings, especially when it comes to prospects outside the Southeast, but I think the methodology is superior to a quota-based system. Not all recruiting years are created equal. Think about it in NFL Draft terms. You'll hear experts say that one draft has 20 first-round talents, while another might have closer to 40. The same thing applies in recruiting, though maybe not to that degree.
But a numerical rating system of 60-100 is not as intuitive as the star system, and makes comparing classes tougher. The rating services really are fan-facing, not being relied upon much by schools, and so making it fan friendly is the most important thing.
Quick game
- Alabama's ability to scare the daylights out of opposing staffs by expressing interest in their commitments is amazing. There are schools out there having to worry about committed prospects flipping to the Tide, while Alabama is not even sure it would accept a commitment at the moment if the player did try to flip. For instance, it's not certain that the Tide would green light Florida State running back commit Amir Rasul or Florida linebacker commit Vosean Joseph to commit unless it comes up short on some other targets.
- I really believed that if Torrance Gibson had focused on receiver and not quarterback for his high school career that he could have been a top-five receiver recruit in the 2015 class. He's blessed with great size, speed and rare acceleration for a tall prospect, and is not a natural thrower of the football. Gibson was dead set on playing QB out of high school, but is now realizing that receiver is the position that will allow him to make a living in this game. Smart move. Land Grant Holy Land's Matt Brown tells me that Gibson would probably be third string at QB but has a chance to start at receiver. If Gibson keep his head on straight, stops getting suspended and focuses on his craft, I expect to see him catching passes in the NFL. Ohio State really lucked out here as it sold Gibson on playing QB, yet he wasted only one year with the experiment and did take receiver reps in 2015 as well.
- This was a fun read from SB Nation's Kevin Trahan on the interesting stylistic splits of the two Big Ten divisions based on the availability of line or skill position recruits.
- With the commitment of Dwayne Haskins to Ohio State, LSU has realized it is not going to land an elite QB recruit and is moving on to lesser prospects to fill depth, like local QB Lindsey Scott Jr. Knowing when to cut bait is important in recruiting.
- I identified six teams that have a legitimate shot to dethrone Alabama for the No. 1 class. The Tide have had five in a row.
