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.
The big recruiting media outlets (247Sports, Rivals, Scout, ESPN) are all finishing up their final rankings for the 2016 class. This always causes much consternation among fans, who see a player committed to their school dropped in the rankings or a player committed to a rival shoot up.
But they really shouldn't get mad about that.
The most important thing is to get the rankings as accurate as possible. I've explained how unreliable early recruiting rankings are. They exist to placate the readers who don't want to wait eight months to get told how good their commitments and targets are. The final rankings are by far the best because they are based on the biggest sample set of evaluations -- an extra season of football, All-Star Games, camps, combines, seven-on-seven tournaments, feedback from college coaches, etc.
Instead of getting angry, readers should celebrate recruiting services correcting their rankings. When a linebacker like Clemson commit Tre Lamar shows he can change direction against elite competition during All-Star practice at 6'4, 240, let's be happy that the rating services are willing to say, "Hey, this is new," and move him up 200 spots.
Kids' bodies develop at different rates. Some are maxed out as sophomores. Some grow three inches between junior and senior year. They get hurt and bounce back from injury (or not). Valuing every opportunity for evaluation is important.
Quickly
- I enjoyed reading Dan Steinberg's take on verbal commitments in the Washington post.
- Two major Southeastern defenders confirmed their expected official visits this weekend. Alabama five-star linebacker Lyndell "Mack" Wilson will be visiting Alabama, while Georgia five-star defensive tackle Derrick Brown will be visiting Georgia. I have the pair picking those schools, so work will need to be done this weekend.
- Michigan dropped a recruit sometime in the last few weeks, and he took to Twitter Wednesday to express his frustration. Michigan coaches cannot announce why they dropped the kid, but I believe it is because they do not think he is good enough. I am fine with kids decommitting from verbal commitments, and if the school gives a kid enough notice to find another school and take his full allotment of official visits (let's say before Christmas), fine with them dropping players. What I'd like to know is when Michigan started telling Erik Swenson that he wasn't going to have a spot. We know he went public on Wednesday, but do not know when Michigan started dropping those hints or told him outright. From my experience, schools do not just do this out of the blue. They stop calling and visiting, drop hints, or suggest a player might want to keep his options open and look around.
- There may be more variance in recruiting rankings at the lower levels, but they are still fairly predictive in the Group of 5 leagues, Underdog Dynasty found.
- Would an All-Star team of SEC recruits beat an All-Star team of recruits from the rest of college football's conferences? We take a look.