After grazing over this, this and this – all involving Georgia prospects – in just the last fifteen minutes, I continue to be amazed by the capacity of my fellow man to get caught up in the uncertainty of the teenage mind.
And to think some of you spend good money to follow this stuff.
Get The Picture 
These recruits have learned to play up their recruitment on social media to get attention, followers, etc.
No matter how “crucial” a certain recruit is, it’s is absolutely no guarantee of any future success.
If any of you guys are paying for this, please send all future payments to me and I’ll personally forward all of my teenage daughter’s texts to you so you can have all the teenage angst / drama / suspense you can handle.
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These are the self-same experts who brought us Willie Williams. If you don’t remember Willie, Google is your friend.
I would be less than candid if I did not admit there were Februaries past when I looked at “recruiting” as the beginning of the football season.
If you can stand to wait till they play in an actual game you will have a happier life.
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There are misses every year, but by and large the recruiting services get it right. Not that hard to do, though, as you can see if the top-10 schools are offering, you’re probably a good player.
While there are aspects to recruiting that are nauseating and unseemly, the fact of the matter is recruiting is vital to the success of your program. Coaching still matters more, but it narrows the margins when you don’t recruit at an elite level. But the biggest recruit UGA signed this year is Pruitt. Make no mistake about it. What UGA has needed for the past 6ish years was a group of teachers on defense the same caliber they have on offense. My hope is Pruitt can do just that: teach.
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Parrish, calling Willie Williams a miss is like calling the Titanic disaster a small problem with icing.
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In that same class Adrian Peterson, Ted Ginn, Early Doucet, Keith Rivers and Chad Henne will all in the top 13. And the recruiting sites have gotten so much better from 2004 to now. So while I agree there are misses, the misses are becoming the exception to the rule.
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Senator, at this time of the year, I suggest time spent at Audio Asylum, Lenco Heaven or the Art of Sound message boards is significantly more productive than time spent with Rivals.
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What is this “Rivals” you speak of? 😉
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I don’t get too worked up over recruiting and agree with the good Senator that people following a high schooler’s twitter feed passionately are, well, not wired the same as me.
However, something I’ve noticed that is equally as annoying is the “recruiting ranking mean nothing” mantra you sometimes see. It’s far from an exact science, and this blog showed us just the other day that school’s signing a lot of 4 and 5 stars can still struggle, but there is a pretty good correlation between highly ranked classes and success on the field.
Thankfully this site avoids both of the flavors of absurdity I was just bitching about.
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just because you recruit a bunch of 4 and 5 stars doesn’t mean you’ll win a bunch of games but if you can’t sign a bunch of 4 and 5 stars you’ll most likely not win many games. Especially true in the SEC where it seems like everyone signs a top 10 class.
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So….you basically called every Georgia Tech fan annoying. I knew I liked the cut of your jib.
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I subscribe to Bear Bryant’s philosophy on recruiting – “You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken …” Raw talent evaluation matters but not as much as player development and coaching once the kid is on campus. Coaches have to identify the right players, sell them and the entourage on the benefits of their school, and close the deal. The recruiting services can tell you what they think a player can become based on the tape measure and a highlight reel (what HS player doesn’t have a fabulous highlight reel), but the recruiting services can’t evaluate whether a player wants to work to improve.
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“Well you’ve got to have chicken to make chicken salad.” Bear Bryant
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“The funny thing about that little white speck on the top of chicken shit. That little white speck is chicken shit too.” Ernest
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Not so fast my fine Dog friend in Florida. Birds do not secrete nitrogenous wastes in the form of urea CH4ON2, like mammals do. (Urea is what is in human urine.) Instead, birds secrete uric acid C5H4O3N4, which in insoluble in water and looks like a white paste.
Birds have a single exit opening, the cloaca, again unlike us. This opening is used for both for excretion and reproduction. When they excrete waste, they combine the uric acid crystal-paste (the white stuff) with the dark fecal waste from their intestine. So in summary that little white speck in not chicken shit at all. It is none other than chicken piss Ernest was a cattleman… never impressed me with his knowledge of poultry. He certainly wasn’t from the country.
😉
I was there at the park that day. Saw the Allman Brothers there too.
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Sorry about starting that … 🙂
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Discussing the chemistry of chicken excrement is just about as useful as discussing recruiting.
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Ha! Well played, man.
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Just so you know …Poultry production in the United States is a multi-billion dollar enterprise. Soviets buy a lot of Georgia poultry. Not my thing but I did take a class in Poultry Science towards working towards by BS. I bought a John Deere hat just for that class. lol.
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It’s information like this that keeps me coming back to GTP. You can learn a lot on this site.
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Thanks loads AHD. I always wondered why the skink droppings in my Florida Room were white-tipped. Now I know it’s because of acid
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I just wonder how many college coaches buy into this hype like a fan does and allows the hype to become the measuring stick of a recruit.
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Miami did a few short years ago. Didn’t seem to turn out so well.
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Senator, isn’t there some Zappa you could refer us to for this post?
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“No wonder these albums didn’t sell well” (h/t FetaCheese222)
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Yeah!
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Very interesting article on SB Nation reviewing the Super Bowl starters on Denver’s offense and Seattle’s defense as high school recruits.
Denver: 5 offensive starters who were not ranked by recruiting services. I do not include Manning in this group, since he would have been a 4 or 5 star by today’s standards. Still, the Denver offense features a total of 22 stars if you count Manning as a 5.
Seattle: 34 stars if you count Clemons as a 3-star. Only 1 guy who wasn’t ranked coming out of high school.
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For someone who professes to have no use for recruiting talk, you certainly post about it a lot.
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I talk about trends and schools. I don’t spend any time talking about a pending class or where a particular prospect might go.
You really can’t tell the difference?
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I subscribe to a both/and philosophy when it comes to recruiting. Nearly every pretty good school signs a few good DL and OL. Almost everybody signs a couple good LBs. Nearly all the decent schools sign some competent WRs and DBs, and serviceable RBs and QBs.
The question is difference makers. It’s hard to determine WHAT will make a difference maker (or, more precisely, what won’t). But, we knew we missed on Derek Henry last year. And we hit big with Marshall and Gurley the year before. AJ Green and Stafford were going to be good out of the gate. The other key is what position they play. I still believe that an elite RB is the most important position in our league, we we’ve signed 2 of them. We missed on 2 great RBs last year, and it bit us this year.
We’re always going to get good players. Every player we’ve got committed is a good player and better than nearly every player someone like Tech or Duke has committed. And they look just like every other player that a team like South Carolina, Auburn or Bama has committed. The question is those big time “almost” can’t miss guys. Lorenzo Carter is one of those. Does it always pan out? No, but you’d rather have them than not have them.
I’m excited to see what Pruitt does down the road in recruiting, because I think we can do a better job or luring those elite-type defensive players.
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Feb. 2, 2011: ” The Georgia Bulldogs have completed a legendary recruiting class by landing the top prize on National Signing Day.
Running back Isaiah Crowell (Columbus, Ga/Carver) announced Wednesday that he will join the 2011 Bulldogs. Crowell becomes the final cog in head coach Mark Richt’s “Dream Team” recruiting class.”
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Well, you can poo-pool IC all you want, but he was an NFL talent with a high school head. We’d have been pretty sorry in 2011 had we not gotten him. He was the SEC freshman of the year and led the team in rushing. His performance against Florida that year (and Auburn) are often forgotten. He also nearly single-handedly won the Tennessee game. He had a bonehead, which cost him some games that year and his career.
I contest IC is the recruit Richt couldn’t afford to lose and the player he couldn’t afford to keep.
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agreed.
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Well stated and the puppy stunt made Kirk Herbstreit lose his mind which is always fun to watch.
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Herbie will never forgive us for not batting the ball around on his Hail Mary against us in Orlando
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I can’t believe those DBs didn’t bat the ball down. They actually intercepted it when everyone knows you bat it down! Unbelievable!
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Shaq Jones just announced a flip from Louisville to UGA…
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247 has him listed as a 2 star?
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Yeah. His attention is coming late. He was pursued by Pruitt more than anybody as some feel he saw something. Maybe it was the 4 kick returns for TD’s this past year. I’m just glad we have somebody digging who seems to look past stars here in the last week or so. I trust CJP’s gut..
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Recruiting services are just like stock brokers, they both sale a product that they don’t have any control over and they make money whether they are right or wrong. I can only afford to support my broker so I don’t pay for something that doesn’t have a chance of making me any money.
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Recruit in and around the top 15 and you have the talent to get the job done. I remain steadfast in my opinion that someone cannot tell the difference in the top 50 guys at any given position on the field from schools all over this Country.
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I agree completely. As long as you have a top 15ish class, then you are getting enough talent. It then becomes about whether you are adequately addressing needs.
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And coaching up the ones you get.
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Senator, As one who is more recruiting-curious than the average blogger, I appreciate any info you give us or allow to be posted. Maybe you could have a “post it” catagory that people could post rumors and thoughts of recruiting on….maybe just a couple of times until the hay is in the barn.
I appreciate that, while you don’t follow this stuff too much, you realize there are many of us that do and at least somewhat accommadate us.
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“accommodate”. Been spending some time over around Clemson..you know…phonics and all that.
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I’ve enjoyed watching the recruiting the last coupla weeks… The difference between this NSD and the past two or three is that we have a DC/Recruiter who is out busting his ass on the recruiting trail instead of spending the final two weeks choking down buffalo wings and cheesecake while asking if any NFL teams will give him a job.
Last year we had ZERO recruits on campus over the last weekend before NSD. Even if we strike out trying to snag a coupla high profile last minute commits, at least we’re fonking trying to this go ’round.
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