Do stars matter? A look at the top teams & what it means for UM

It’s not that stars define players. It’s that recruiting services and other programs are good enough to pile onto the best kids, because the information superhighway makes it easier, and changes the game.

Say what you want about stars in the ‘80s and ‘90s, but the point is, we got the RIGHT GUYS. Hall of famers. Ballers. Ed Reed wasnt just a 3* from LA. He was ED REED. Folks here get excited by 3*s because ... Ed Reed. That’s insane. There have been thousands of 3*S since he came out of HS, and only one Ed Reed.

We must get the best kids. If they’re highly rated, because that’s the era, well, tough. Get them. Or stfu. We do not with in the ‘80s without Irvin, Jerome, Kelly, Kosar, Eddie brown, Maryland, Kennedy, Vinny, et al. Nor the ‘90s without another host of stars. You camn imagine those guys would be ‘under the radar’ today. Maybe. But then ... go find them. If our staff cant find them amongst 3*s, then aim higher.

Once again, when you using the term "aim higher" that places your whole argument and non-credibilty on these nerd recruiting sites trying to tell others what players are better than others prior to anyone of them ever even having played a down of college football. Coach richt, coach banda and now coach diaz has consistently said "they dont go by star rankings, they recruit based on their own evals" like real coaches do. When you naming players from the 80's, that further proves the point because none of these nerd recruiting sites were even out yet, jimmy johnson knew talent tho, proved that at all his stops, butch davis knows talent, its the coaches that know how to evaluate players the best for the system that they're going to run who consistently have a high level of success, see frank beamers record, he admittedly used the Miami blue print to build that program up, and he was successful. So do yourself a favor, stop trying to make those recruiting sites and their flawed system relevant, its asanine, imagine nfl gm's using the mel kiper blueprint, if you listen to mel kiper long enuff, he acts as if he's put together more superbowl teams than anyone in nfl history, but now the nfl draft is only his part time job now or something!
 
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Once again, when you using the term "aim higher" that places your whole argument and non-credibilty on these nerd recruiting sites trying to tell others what players are better than others prior to anyone of them ever even having played a down of college football. Coach richt, coach banda and now coach diaz has consistently said "they dont go by star rankings, they recruit based on their own evals" like real coaches do. When you naming players from the 80's, that further proves the point because none of these nerd recruiting sites were even out yet, jimmy johnson knew talent tho, proved that at all his stops, butch davis knows talent, its the coaches that know how to evaluate players the best for the system that they're going to run who consistently have a high level of success, see frank beamers record, he admittedly used the Miami blue print to build that program up, and he was successful. So do yourself a favor, stop trying to make those recruiting sites and their flawed system relevant, its asanine, imagine nfl gm's using the mel kiper blueprint, if you listen to mel kiper long enuff, he acts as if he's put together more superbowl teams than anyone in nfl history, but now the nfl draft is only his part time job now or something!
You sure don’t seem to understand what I have written.

I have been really clear. I don’t care about stars. Get the kids we need and quit failing and quit with excuses. If the kids we need are 4-5 star kids ... get them. If you can fill our roster with 3* kids who turn out to be studs who turn into future all pros, good, do it. But do it. Because the kids we historically got, stars aside, they were the best guys. That’s the standard. Guys who can dominate, not just hang on. Doesn’t matter what their stars are. What matters is that they are that good. You seem fixated more on stars than I am. I want results.
 
Yes stars matter, but coaching, and talent evaluation/development matter more. Much more. Who tf cares if MIA signs the 27th ranked class or the 8th ranked class, if it lacks the ability to properly coach & develop the talent? No matter the ranking every single class that MIA signs will ultimately be overrated. The last 15+ yrs prove that. Which is why as fans it's pointless to focus on recruiting rankings & blue chip ratios. Theres a self-regulating/correcting mechanism that exists in recruiting that needs to be accounted for

I agree with you that coaching & development matters; but to dismiss the importance of blue chips in a program’s stability and ability to compete for titles is not going to change.

The Wisc’s, TCU’s, WASU’s, & Stanford’s of the world r just dangerous enough to win their conference and play in a NY6 bowl every 3 or 4 yrs due to their system & development....but they are never going to beat the upper echelon of the CFB world.

We can agree/argue that Saban & Urb r two of the modern day best coaches, but go look at Saban’s record at MSU (winning pct & players drafted) & compare it when he was afforded resources at LSU, then Bama. Go look at Urb’s record at BG & Utah (winning pct & players drafted) & compare it when he was afforded resources at UF and OSU.

Let’s look at the polar end, coaches who absolutely sucked ***; go look at Coker’s record at UTSA w/o those same resources & compare it to when he was here at Miami (winning pct & players drafted). Go look at Golden’s record at Temple w/o those same resources & compare it to when he was here at Miami (winning pct & players drafted).

Even when our coaches sucked, they had a measure of success when they had star players. Star players can cover over a lot of coaching deficiencies, but to ONLY to a certain point. Never have I EVER dismissed the importance of player development; ****, I’m a huge advocate of player development & coaching & have complained about our lack of it for 15 yrs, but player development can only go so far.

So the ? is if Manny is supposed to be the man, what’s our end game? Do we want to win 10-11 games once every 3-4 yrs and be satisfied w the Coastal and a NY6 victory? Or do we want to be revered again? If it’s the latter, then we need a combo of coaching & blue chips. If it’s the former, then we can continue to be satisfied w a couple of blue chips and a boat load of high potential 3 stars.
 
You sure don’t seem to understand what I have written.

I have been really clear. I don’t care about stars. Get the kids we need and quit failing and quit with excuses. If the kids we need are 4-5 star kids ... get them. If you can fill our roster with 3* kids who turn out to be studs who turn into future all pros, good, do it. But do it. Because the kids we historically got, stars aside, they were the best guys. That’s the standard. Guys who can dominate, not just hang on. Doesn’t matter what their stars are. What matters is that they are that good. You seem fixated more on stars than I am. I want results.

That's the main point. Many seem to think it's binary, either/or decision. Either they're 5* or just a Jag. There a lot of gray area in between. They just have to get the best guys available for what we're trying to do.
 
Who TF cares about stars??? Knute Rockne never had a 5 star recruit in his life and he won 3 nattys.

Honestly, and I’m being so real...the only reason why that argument is being had & given credence to is b/c of our current state of recruiting. If we were landing stars & landing in the top 15 consistently, competing for titles, no body would say that chit.

We’ve had a lack of star power here & lack of coaching & development. And let’s stop acting like Schnelly, JJ, and Butch didn’t have stars here. Schnelly even said his toughest job was convincing top players in the back yard to stay home b/c they were going elsewhere. Are we really going to act like Schnelly wasn’t one of the best recruiters in the game? Lol.

Man, I just laugh at this asinine argument; no one is arguing coaching don’t matter....but for these guys that keep saying stars don’t matter, it’s b/c of them being conditioned to what we’ve been fed by bum coaches who can’t recruit or sustain recruiting since 07.
 
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That's the main point. Many seem to think it's binary, either/or decision. Either they're 5* or just a Jag. There a lot of gray area in between. They just have to get the best guys available for what we're trying to do.
As I have been yelling from the mountaintop since the Coker era: “It’s about the evaluations!”
 
Dumb! Look at what you've just said. Who the **** do you think you are ordering me or anyone else for that matter what to say or do after glossing over crux of the post and this thread. And acting like you haven't done or said anything impulsively while going full ******.

At least I had the balls to admit I made a mistake. It a shame you took offense that I didn't think it was worth the time to put in a Lance Roffers type analysis which wouldn't have convinced morons like yourself anyways.
Thanks for the analysis, looking forward to the entertainment of your completely unsupported points using invalid examples in your drivel moving forward.
 
I agree with you that coaching & development matters; but to dismiss the importance of blue chips in a program’s stability and ability to compete for titles is not going to change.

The Wisc’s, TCU’s, WASU’s, & Stanford’s of the world r just dangerous enough to win their conference and play in a NY6 bowl every 3 or 4 yrs due to their system & development....but they are never going to beat the upper echelon of the CFB world.

We can agree/argue that Saban & Urb r two of the modern day best coaches, but go look at Saban’s record at MSU (winning pct & players drafted) & compare it when he was afforded resources at LSU, then Bama. Go look at Urb’s record at BG & Utah (winning pct & players drafted) & compare it when he was afforded resources at UF and OSU.

Let’s look at the polar end, coaches who absolutely sucked ***; go look at Coker’s record at UTSA w/o those same resources & compare it to when he was here at Miami (winning pct & players drafted). Go look at Golden’s record at Temple w/o those same resources & compare it to when he was here at Miami (winning pct & players drafted).

Even when our coaches sucked, they had a measure of success when they had star players. Star players can cover over a lot of coaching deficiencies, but to ONLY to a certain point. Never have I EVER dismissed the importance of player development; ****, I’m a huge advocate of player development & coaching & have complained about our lack of it for 15 yrs, but player development can only go so far.

So the ? is if Manny is supposed to be the man, what’s our end game? Do we want to win 10-11 games once every 3-4 yrs and be satisfied w the Coastal and a NY6 victory? Or do we want to be revered again? If it’s the latter, then we need a combo of coaching & blue chips. If it’s the former, then we can continue to be satisfied w a couple of blue chips and a boat load of high potential 3 stars.

Anyone who's been through the 70's is not anxious for their return even though lately we seem to be reliving it. The end game is most certainly the latter. I just don't think we can win an arms race going directly against Bama, OSU and GA with what they're going to throw at it (💰💰💰). We need to approach this differently and be smarter. And it's not going to be easy.

This is not clinging to the past as some may think because the land scape has clearly changed and anyone claiming otherwise is in denial. The Stanford's and Wisc's may get good enough for their conference but that's their ceiling. I think the only ones that are capable of competing against the upper echelon in this arms race is us, USC west and obviously Clemson. And that's what makes Clemson interesting because when Dabo started, they didn't have a recruiting advantage.

As far as is Manny the man? I'm encouraged about this recruiting class because we've seemed to have locked in a core of 4*s and hopefully "high potential" 3*s. My sense is the 3*s we've got are ones we've specifically targeted and not ones we've settled for when we ran out of options (as has happened too often in the recent past). But as they say you can't judge a class properly until 2-3 years down the road. So we shall see how his evaluations turn out.

Now, Manny has plug in the leaks in the **** against UFag because the rest of the schedule is not difficult. Win and the class will hold together and we may pluck off a few of the 5*s that he's still chasing.
 
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Anyone who's been through the 70's is not anxious for their return even though lately we seem to be reliving it. The end game is most certainly the latter. I just don't think we can't win an arms race going directly against Bama, OSU and GA with what they're going to throw at it (💰💰💰). We need to approach this differently and be smarter. And it's not going to be easy.

This is not clinging to the past as some may think because the land scape has clearly changed and anyone claiming otherwise is in denial. The Stamford and Wisc's may get good enough for their conference but that's their ceiling. I think the only ones that are capable of competing against the upper echelon in this arms race is us, USC west and obviously Clemson. And that's what makes Clemson interesting because when Dabo started they didn't have a recruiting advantage.

As far as is Manny the man? I'm encouraged about this recruiting class because we've seemed to have locked in a core of 4*s and hopefully "high potential" 3*s. My sense is the 3*s we've got are ones we've specifically targeted and not ones we've settled for when we ran out of options (as has happened too often in the recent past). But as they say you can't judge a class properly until 2-3 years down the road. So we shall see how his evaluations turn out.

Now, Manny has plug in the leaks in the ****s against UFag because the rest of the schedule is not difficult. Win and the class will hold together and we may pluck off a few of the 5*s that he's still chasing.

Agreed.
 
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The problem is, too many fans fall into one of two categories regarding recruiting rankings.

There's the "Stars don't matter" guys who point to outliers like Ed Reed and say "See! Reed was a two star!!!!" when it's mathematically proven that the higher a player is rated, the better his odds are that he will succeed. The championship contenders tend to have rosters composed of at least half 4 and 5 star players. Even the most well coached team of 3 star players will have a ceiling. You can build a **** of a program without majority blue chip players but you'll never reach the apex of college football without them.

Then there's the "star whores" who believe that signing as many blue chip players as possible guarantees success. They point to Alabama and say "Saban always has the best recruiting class, that's why they're always good". While simultaneously ignoring the fact that there are more than a few teams that have recruited at a top 10-15 level that are pretty much garbage in terms of on field product. Teams like USC, Texas, Florida, Tennessee, UCLA, and Florida State have rosters full of 4 and 5 star players but are nowhere near contending for championships. Even Clemson, who has won two of the last three titles has done it with classes in the 10-15 range. Until this year, they've recruited well but not great. Especially when compared to Alabama.

Also, only a tiny percentage of FBS scholarship players are 4 and 5 stars. A majority are 3 star rated and the spectrum of 3 star players is incredibly vast. Both Alabama and FIU have 3 star rated players on their roster. Does that mean those players are equally as talented? Of course not. Most teams can't just pick and chose which ever players they want and chase the highest rated players at every position. Most teams have to do their own evaluation work because just because a recruiting site says a guy is good, it doesn't mean he'll fit your system or even be a good player at all.

Ideally, you'd like to have as many blue chip guys as possible as long as those guys fit your system. If you're in the vast majority of teams that can't jsut pick and choose every player they want, you have to trust your evaluations and try to turn as many 3 star prospects into 5 star players. Success on the field breeds success on the recruiting trail. You develop a reputation as a winning program who develops kids and gets players drafted, you'll have a much easier time signing the blue chip kids on signing day. You have to be realistic. I don't care how good of a recruiter you have on your staff, if your program isn't successful, you're not going to be able to get the pick of the litter kids.
 
The question is not the number of stars, but what do you do with the players, after recruiting them?.
How are they Coached?., Do they make the 3 star, work cohesively with the 4 and 5 stars ?.

This is where the Coaches earn the payoff, but it HAS to be consistent in order to be successful.
FSU has always had talent, top classes, and pub,.................and so does the Tide, but look who has the provenance to be top 3 every year.

Evaluations can be potluck, but the Coaches make the gel, to make the team take on their character, of what they want produced on the field.
 
Remember when people on this board were saying Jarren Williams was better than Trevor Lawrence, because of some All America game?

Or, here's an idea. Let's compare a list of our 4 star players vs our 3 star players currently on the roster.

Actually, let's not. No need to embarrass anyone.

Of course stars matter.

247, for example, has 50 full time employees who do nothing but evaluate recruits all day, every day. These people are ex coaches and so forth.

That makes 247's recruiting staff bigger than the University of Miami's, and a **** of a lot better than the fan evaluations we get around here.

I'm a star *****. Straight up. This is 2019, not 1984. Study after study have shown that teams with the most blue chip players are FAR more likely to win championships.

That's not an opinion, it's a FACT.
 
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Ed Reed was a 3 star. I get sick of seeing that. That was the infancy of recruiting rankings. To be honest, I don't even remember them.

He was an all-state selection in a very good football state. He also had a very successful track and field career.

Camps weren't even much of a thing back then. We're Sparq around, he would've tested too 10 or even 5 percent. He Would be been much more well known and a 4 star to whatever degree.

Let's not get it twisted.
 
Honestly, and I’m being so real...the only reason why that argument is being had & given credence to is b/c of our current state of recruiting. If we were landing stars & landing in the top 15 consistently, competing for titles, no body would say that chit.

We’ve had a lack of star power here & lack of coaching & development. And let’s stop acting like Schnelly, JJ, and Butch didn’t have stars here. Schnelly even said his toughest job was convincing top players in the back yard to stay home b/c they were going elsewhere. Are we really going to act like Schnelly wasn’t one of the best recruiters in the game? Lol.

Man, I just laugh at this asinine argument; no one is arguing coaching don’t matter....but for these guys that keep saying stars don’t matter, it’s b/c of them being conditioned to what we’ve been fed by bum coaches who can’t recruit or sustain recruiting since 07.

Exactly. People just like to slurp the HC. If we had a class like Bama our fans would be making fun of other schools for landing 3 stars.
 
Remember when people on this board were saying Jarren Williams was better than Trevor Lawrence, because of some All America game?

Or, here's an idea. Let's compare a list of our 4 star players vs our 3 star players currently on the roster.

Actually, let's not. No need to embarrass anyone.

Of course stars matter.

247, for example, has 50 full time employees who do nothing but evaluate recruits all day, every day. These people are ex coaches and so forth.

That makes 247's recruiting staff bigger than the University of Miami's, and a **** of a lot better than the fan evaluations we get around here.

I'm a star *****. Straight up. This is 2019, not 1984. Study after study have shown that teams with the most blue chip players are FAR more likely to win championships.

That's not an opinion, it's a FACT.
247's number one priority isn't to give accurate evaluations. It's to sell subscriptions. Guys get arbitrarily bumped up and down to generate clicks. There are far and away more college scouts than there are members of the 247 staff. If any of those guys were offered a position at a university, they'd jump on it immediately. The football staffs evaluate players themselves. The website stuff is literally just for fans to argue over.
 
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247's number one priority isn't to give accurate evaluations. It's to sell subscriptions. Guys get arbitrarily bumped up and down to generate clicks. There are far and away more college scouts than there are members of the 247 staff. If any of those guys were offered a position at a university, they'd jump on it immediately. The football staffs evaluate players themselves. The website stuff is literally just for fans to argue over.

You’re basing that off one article that came out about Rivals almost 10 years ago.

There is no anti-canes bias, and players don’t get bumps because they commit to schools with big fan bases.

Anybody who is reasonably smart and who has taken one semester of statistics can easily verify for themselves that star rankings do correlate with success.

Stars absolutely matter. Your feelings don’t.
 
In the last 4 NFL drafts an avg of 80 players were drafted in the top 4 rounds that were 3 stars or less. Give me 20 of those players every year and im happy.
 
You’re basing that off one article that came out about Rivals almost 10 years ago.

There is no anti-canes bias, and players don’t get bumps because they commit to schools with big fan bases.

Anybody who is reasonably smart and who has taken one semester of statistics can easily verify for themselves that star rankings do correlate with success.

Stars absolutely matter. Your feelings don’t.
If you are a Cane fan then anti-canes bias is a given..................and you **** well know that...On the field, off, in the media, at games......it is in your face.
Statistics and stars do not equate when dealing with teenagers who will change their minds frequently, and the bag factor is a force to be reckoned with, every day with recruiting .
If you state that an Alabama interest, does not bump a player because of the THE school, and the fan base in the 100,000's.........afraid that does not correlate........... then go watch baseball............it does.
What you think is fine to post, but reality, and what College football is doing, is a **** of a lot different, in front of your face..
 
Get me 82-85 kids with a mix bag of 3-5 stars, coach the **** out of them, win more games, and watch how you land more kids with talent along with getting kids at 3* to bump to 4* because they pick Miami.
 
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