The Most Underachieving College Football Teams Since 2005

Third worst? Who was worser? Who worsest?

Does Ketch bump up shit? “Fozzy Whitaker is Barry Sanders with more juice.”

This is definitely a harsh metric. I think you can definitely attribute some ranking inflation based on school reputation to some of these and you can also see who has access to the big recruiting areas – Miami, Texas, OU, USC, Michigan, Ohio State, and the top half of the SEC.

I’m a bit surprised UCLA and TAMU would have broken through at some point – tells you how bad their recruting has been for the better part of the last decade.

I’d like to see the inverse – most overachieving teams based on recruiting and resultant rank. I’m sure it would be dominated by Boise St., Utah, and TCU.

This is a harsh metric. I think you can definitely attribute some ranking inflation based on school reputation to some of these and you can also see who has access to the big recruiting areas – Miami, Texas, OU, USC, Michigan, Ohio State, and the top half of the SEC.

I’m a bit surprised UCLA and TAMU would have broken through at some point – tells you how bad their recruting has been for the better part of the last decade.

I’d like to see the inverse – most overachieving teams based on recruiting and resultant rank. I’m sure it would be dominated by Boise St., Utah, and TCU.

The chart seems to be on target if we accept the premise that the ‘05 team is the least underachieving & the ’10 team as the 3rd-most underachieving (makes sense to me), although I don’t see how the ‘08 team was better than the ’09 team if he’s just relying on final rankings.

Obvious point is obvious. Though only to people with some critical thinking skills.

Another (hopefully) obvious point: The best recruiting teams only have downside, really, under that metric.

Recruiting rankings tend to be statistically right, over a large enough sample size and enough time. But a look at some of the classes the Horns signed between 2005 and 2009 would be a great education in the impact of outliers.

Coaching (in the Xs and Os sense) also matters a lot. But I’d say just as important, if not moreso, is evaluation. Which 3 stars can play like 5 stars? Which 5 stars will only end up being average? Which 4 stars will be more interested in bitch kicking than becoming better football players? Those are evaluation questions. More specifically, they tend to be work ethic and character evaluation questions, rather than ones of pure talent.

I would think we (A&M) would have to achieve first before we could under achieve.

Interesting, but I don’t believe Football Study Hall’s adjusted recruiting rankings account for academic casualties. You won’t get much contribution from a four-star player who flunked out after their freshman year.

Some universities (here I use the term loosely) don’t have academic casualties. Texas and Michigan do, which may explain at least some of the frequency with which they show up on the list. Now, as far as the multiple appearances by Florida State, Florida, and Georgia are concerned – well, there are obviously additional factors at work.

Dmitri -
 
Wrong direction, actually.
 
Texas comparatively loses very few players and sees almost all of our signees because we take kids who are qualifiers. Teams in the SEC and Miami/Fla St experience much higher frequency of roster turnover and frequently don’t get all of their signees. Which penalizes them in the rankings.
 
And Michigan has a retard studies program that would make FSU proud.

Yeah, FSU in particular would take a fuckload of borderline recruits. Meyer came in and destroyed Bowden in recruiting, leaving FSU to take a lot of grade and character risks. Which is part of the reason they underachieved so badly relative to their recruiting rankings: their classes were always something of a mirage, with higher flameout rates than the rest of the country.

Interesting that the 05 team had an adjusted recruiting ranking of only 9, even after giving extra weight to the seniors that year that came from the #1 rated VY class.

I don’t remember recruiting rankings dropping off that badly from 03-05. I know the Colt/Charles class of 05 was ranked lower but as freshman that class would have the least effect on the team recruiting ranking of 05.

Scipio—

I pointed out earlier this week that Florida had roughly the same 2010 that Texas did, they just hid it better. UT’10 is 3rd on this list, but Florida is 9th.

If you are going to implode, you might as well implode all the way. This portends bad things for Florida this year. I think Texas managed this transition off-season far better. Ironically, partially with Florida’s unwanted help.

Keith Jackson would have put all this information together in a one-liner containing the words “bell cows,” “plow,” “pasture,” and “nap.”

Part of the issue with the recruiting is that " all recruiting stars" are not created equal. Where you have the stars is very critical. For example, when Mack had like 10 TEs, none of whom could both catch and block on the roster, it left depth issues at other positions. The recruiting star status of TEs 3 thru 10 are a non factor. Getting top star recruits that cannot excell in your system (or lack thereof) is also a critical factor. So we may have grabbed Hales, DJ Monroe, Chris Jones, John Chiles – all highly decorated recruits – but GD the last scatback/WR hybrid kind of guy to have success was Ramonce Taylor. Ditto when your only RB recruit in a class has more positions in his first 2 seasons than carries.

Chemistry and leadership is the X factor. If these studs all show up and don’t really like each other or the Alpha dogs aren’t good leaders, then a super-talented team will get beat by a semi-talented team with good chemistry and leadership just about every time. Shit, it happens every year at the micro-level in the Texas high school playoffs. And once a team with bad chemistry and leadership starts losing, things snowball quickly. This applies not just to the players, but the coaches as well.

I savour, lead to I discovered exactly what I was having a look for. You’ve ended my four day lengthy hunt! God Bless you man. Have a nice day. Bye