Think it might be against some rule to post on topic but I like your moxie. IF Brandon Martin makes it academically, he is the easy pick for me. The guy is supposedly a 3* and looked like a 5* WRer in the Army AA game. Also, at the practices before the game, he dominated in those. Apparently, they really "graded" him down due to attending Prime Prep (now defunct), playing literally against JV teams since Texas UIL wouldn't allow them to play in the state of Texas, and also his questionable academic status. If Martin doesn't make it to LSU due to some academic issue, I will go with George Brown, Jr a medium 3*. How in the world can a guy with his offers be less than a medium 4* at least?
Ok, the Pope called and wanted me to de-ignore you. He said you were a good, knowledgeable person but admitted that you can be "preachy". Actually, the main reason is I checked my "Likes" and you are flooding me with them on my posts even though I put you on ignore (yes, likes are still visible even with someone on ignore). See, I CAN be bought very cheap! To answer your post, I think stars in general are reasonably fair with 3 exceptions: 1) PK, P, and SN are pretty much the scum of the earth for some bizarre reason by the services. Yet, they are the absolute easiest in the world to project if the would get off their asses and cover them 2) ESPN is a joke and the ultimate proof of that is if you accept an invitation to their Under Armour game, guess what...you get an automatic bump in your rating 3) people they don't cover even at positions other than PK, P, and SN, they just throw into a high 2*/low 3* basket like a dead letter file or something. Frank Wilson said it right when asked why so many of LSU signees were rated low a few years ago. He said "I don't know how they can rate a guy they have never seen play in a game or on video or talked to his coach. I know for a fact that several players we signed, they have 0 idea what talent the guy has because they never even tried to find out."
I "like" posts without generally looking at who posted them until afterwards. If someone posts good stuff, then it takes little time and effort to give them a kudos. I definitely like the "like" feature this forum offers. As I said, when you're on topic I thought you were often insightful. 1. I agree that special teams guys are wrongfully valued as a flat 2 star max player, but I think that's the best way to do it right now. Why? Most recruiting services do not employ guys who will accurately be able to assess and assign star ratings to specialists. It's so subjective it could REALLY skew the system. Especially in areas where the services rely heavily on under-reported/scouted high schools. Imagine if Alabama as an example "won" the top recruiting title based on a 5 star kicker (imaginary since Nick usually never has a good kicker, heh) when the second team only had a 4 star kicker or a 2 star deep snapper. It's just a mess. 2. ESPN may be a joke, but I've heard massive criticisms of the other services. Isn't the story on Rivals that it was started and run by an Alabama grad? All of these services rely on subscriptions so is it any surprise that the fanbases with the most subscriptions sold will also get a little favoritism thrown their way? Alabama has no major league pro sports teams. So Rivals if they were to sell a commodity it would be "hope" which is what the star ratings really are they are best to sell that hope to the fans to excite them and thus get more of them to pay/subscribe.. I'm sure every service has its perceived and its factual biases? 3. Agreed. I think it'd be nice to give them a 2 star NE or UE rating meaning Not Evaluated or Under Evaluated where you give them credit for having a pulse but you admit hey we just don't have much coverage of this kid other than word of mouth or a few clips, etc.. I just see you reference heavily the star ratings, but ultimately it's inexact. The thing I heard years ago that best sums it up is a top 5 to top 10 class is what matters. That's a good representation of how quality the kids in that class overall are and that being regarded as "#1" is a source of pride and something to sell to kids and fans that it really often is very little difference between that #1 class and the #5 class. I think the uneven numbers also skews things. So average star rating is also intriguing and often overlooked.
Don't understand the point that you and Red? in the past are making. PK, P, and SN are the easiest of all the positions to evaluate. They have centralized camps so the recruiting services need to get off their butts and go to the Sailor? camp. You measure PK by accuracy and distance. You measure punters by time from catching ball to kick, distance, and accuracy. You measure snappers by accuracy and the time it takes from his hands to the kicker/holder's hands. Not rocket science...just science. Bottom line...I assume the services don't think most readers care about kickers so they ignore them. How stupid is that! Brad Wing saved multiple games for LSU one season....so uh yeah, punters are irrelevant. I do agree that obviously all the services are subjective for the most part and that I definitely think they check their subscription list by area to perhaps "influence" their decisions a bit. That is one explanation for the infamous Alabama bump. A kid is a 3*, Alabama offers, magically he becomes a 4* without attending one more camp or playing in one more game. If Alabama was God in evaluating players, they would be winning the NC every year...lately they can't even win a bowl game. What pisses me off about ESPN is they are obvious about it. Once the player accepts to play in their Under Armour game, he soon gets an upgrade so obviously they can rant and rave about how many highly rated players they have. That is nothing less than sleazy because someone is getting dropped in rankings when those kids are promoted in them. As far as overall rankings (ESPN fortunately smoothed out by the 24/7 composite one where ESPN is only 1/4 of that rating), they have been pretty accurate on predicting who is great in the rankings. Out of the top 15 say, the only 3 exceptions I can really think of are TCU, Baylor, and Oregon as far as on the field performance vs great recruiting. Those 3 schools are never ranked in the top 10 recruiting wise but seem to be finishing well on the football field. But when you consider every other team is pretty predictable, that is pretty good IMO. Of course LSU should have finished higher last season based upon recruiting but then again, when you have a bad passing game, that trumps a lot.
Here's the thing.. special teams aren't just how far you can kick and what your hang time is.. special teams are as much mental as it is physical. Technique is one thing. You can gauge the measurables as you said, but why do kickers miss field goals especially in crucial moments? Why does a punter shank the ball on a typical punt with no pressure and a perfect snap? If it was all a science and easy as you said the top teams would have the best special teams players every year. All the best kickers would be at tOSU, LSU, USC, Texas, FSU, Alabama, etc.. That's not the case though because it isn't that simple, imo.
If they gave stars for excellence at their position, then there would be five-star kickers and five-star deep snappers every year and your assessment would be correct. But it is clear that they give star ranking for a player's value to a team. Players that get on the field 5 or 6 times a game will never have the kind of impact that a stud back or lineman will have playing every single down. That is not saying that special teams virtuosos are not valuable to a team, it is saying that they are not considered as valuable as offensive or defensive starters, especially in the 85 scholarship limit era. It is a fact that most schools get by pretty well with walk-on kickers who must perform on the field to earn that scholarship. It's not the rating services that choose kickers this way, it is the coaching staffs.
First, I will admit that kickers are not that big of a deal in HS. However, in college in my experience of watching dozens of games every season, other than the QB position, the PK wins/loses more games than any other position on the team. Ask ND last season...losing multiple games because their PK kept choking kick after kick. They put points on the board or take points off with a miss. A DE making a sack is a play of note but rarely does that. And of course the infamous LSU vs Alabama 2011 regular season game where Alabama outplayed LSU all over the field, missed 5 FGs, and lost the game in OT 9-6. And once again, I will mention Lou Holtz who was skewered by South Carolina fans an entire season because their punting and FG kicking sucked and lost them multiple games that season. Holtz refused to give scholarships to them. Bottom line: The services not rating kickers/punters/snappers is a huge hole in their system. Those players win and lose games week after week. A great example last year of a play that destroyed LSU in the Arkansas game...not by a snapper per say but Porter the center snapping the ball on a LOS play. He snapped the ball literally 25 yards over Jennings head in the 1st quarter. LSU had rotten field position the entire 1st quarter because Porter apparently was trying to make 3 points by snapping the ball between the uprights.
A lot of the positions are mental so to just act like kickers and punters are the only ones subject to that ignores the poise issue with QBs.....the ooopppssssiiieeessss that WRers get many times...the fumblistis that RBs get who don't fumble in practice. You mentioned kickers missing FGs at crucial moments. So what? I have seen QBs miss wide open WRers for no reason. I have seen WRers wide open who take their eyes off the ball. 0 difference between what you are claiming for PKs as QBs, WRers, RBs, etc. 0 difference...no one can replicate college realtime game conditions when rating HS seniors. It doesn't stop them from giving a wide range of ratings for every other position other than specialists.
I say just take the specialist out of the equation when ranking a team's class, that would be very easy to do and wouldn't penalize a program. However it doesn't really matter much unless you are real concerned about your team dropping or moving up a position or two which doesn't really concern me.
