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Top 100 2025 vs 2026

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Ghandi said:
Can you define bust?

I saw a guy like Horton, who will be an NFL receiver, marked as a bust.
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The Horton you’re referring to is the 2022 Horton who he listed as a “Hit, transferred out”.

The Horton he listed as a “bust” is the bum who transferred to UGA to also “bust” out there. Although he did get a sweet selfie with an SEC trophy
 
Rellyrell said:
The reason y HS guys r getting passed up is b/c most staffs in America rather the microwave results vs. developing their own.
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This is a bit of simplification. The game has changed with the portal and money involved, so staffs are under pressure to win immediately. The money involved here really doesn’t have time for the slow builds either. Belichick just took like 40 HS kids at UNC this year. Zero chance he’s there or all of those kids are there for the duration of their careers.
 
No_Fly_Zone said:
Lol. I stopped reading right here, lol. Either: (1) you actually don't understand the difference between calling a player a "Zero" and "Depth" (in which case, lol); or (2) you are being disingenuous (in which case, LOL).
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Its always funny when people say they stopped reading somewhere on a pretty small response and use that as the reason to justify not answering valid points made later lmao.
 
Rellyrell said:
Not to be a ****, especially after the season we’ve had, but have they, though, on the HS recruiting side? (List based upon highest to lowest rankings)

2022:
1. Moss - Bust
2. Kelly - Bust
3. Skinner - Bust
4. Citizen - Bust
5. Rogers - Bust
6. Graves - Bust
7. Bisainthe - ✅
8. J. Brown - Bust
9. Williams - Bust
10. Horton - Hit, transferred
11. Harris - Bust
12. Moten Sr - ✅
13. McCoy - Bust
14. Cooper - ✅
15. Young - Hit, transferred

2023:e
1. Mauigoa - ✅
2. Samson - TBD
3. Bain - ✅
4. Wayne - Bust
5. R. Williams - Bust
6. Joseph - Bust
7. Stafford - Bust
8. Fletcher - ✅
9. Acheampong - Bust
10. Bryant - Bust
11. D. Brown - Inconsistent/TBD
12. Aguirre Jr. - Bust
13. R. Washington - Bust
14. C. Johnson Jr. - Bust
15. B. Washington- Bust
16. Horton - Bust
17. Kinsler IV - Bust
18. Kirk - Bust
19. E. Williams - Bust
20. Carver - Bust
21. Spencer - Bust
22. Tripp Jr - Bust
23. Pulliam - Bust
24. Tinilau - Bust
25. Joyce - Inconsistent
26. Freeney - Bust
27. Ruskavich - Bust

2024:
1. Scott - ✅
2. Blount - ✅
3. Lightfoot - ✅
4. Trader - Bust
5. Carr - Bust
6. Pickett Jr - Bust
7. Patterson - Bust
8. Hayes - Bust
9. Lyle - Bust
10. Robinson - Bust
11. A. Jones - Bust
12. Lofton - Inconsistent
13. Mack - Bust
14. Rudolph - Bust
15. Pruitt - TBD
16. Bell - Inconsistent but more hit than anything
17. Thomas - Bust
18. Anderson (everyone’s fave QB) - Bust
19. Day - Bust
20. Plazz - Bust
21. McConathy II - Bust
22. Frédérique Jr. - ✅
23. Wheatley-Humphrey - Bust
24. Minaya - TBD
25. Russell - Bust
26. Francavilla - Bust
27. Murray - Bust
28. Daragjati - Bust

I won’t consider the 2025/2026 classes just yet, b/c both are either true freshmen, RS-freshmen, or true sophomores.

I think u’re conflating what we’ve been able to do in the portal w/ HS evaluations. There’s a reason we’re diving into the portal every off season & it’s due to the quality of our HS recruiting has been something left to be desired. On3 had a podcast a couple of days ago praising our relentless attitude towards the portal, while also cautioning this dangerous game we’ve played 3 yrs in a row by getting top portal QBs to commit at the very last minute, & this yr it literally almost bit us in the ***.

The 2025-26 team featured the following portal players, either starting or playing heavy snaps:
•Carson Beck
•Charmar Brown
•Alex Bauman
•Keelan Marion
•CJ Daniels
•Carter Davis
•Mohamed Toure
•Keionte Scott
•Jakobe Thomas
•Zachariah Poyser
•Akheem Messidor
•Xavier Lucas
•Ethan O’Connor
•David Blay Jr
•James Brockermeyer

68% of our starters/heavy rotation were transfers, & this off season, what did the fans beg for? More transfers, which indicates our HS evaluations are still a tad off. Yes we can praise Toney (as we should), or Fletcher, Moten Sr, Lightfoot, Scott, even Blount…but u’re talking about a small % of hits based upon 100+ HS recruits that are making a difference on the field or have the potential to.

We have to raid the portal b/c the Sr leadership that was supposed to come via the classes of 2022-2023 was an unmitigated disaster, & the class of 2024 provided little to no upperclassmen leadership to bridge the youngins of 2025 & 2026. That’s not being a mope vs. providing a clear, detail picture as to the state of HS recruiting from 2022-2024. Hopefully 2025 eradicates its predecessors & become what the others couldn’t.
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all of this may be true, but one very important thing is missing from this analysis: two of the players with the green check marks next to their names -- Bain and Maugioa -- were two of the most valuable players in the entire sport across the span of their careers. the value provided by those two alone is equal to that of many average "hit" recruits combined. for instance, Bain played so many snaps at such a high level this season that the development of other DEs from the 2023 class -- Malik Bryant, Collins Acheampong, Jayden Wayne -- literally did not matter. whether they were good or bad, on the team or not, they were never getting on the field anyway in large part because we had one guy from that class who was the best player at the position in the country and never came off the field. we basically only needed one back up DE during our best season in 20 years and that was in large part because of Bain.

if you were going to put a WAR-like number on all of these guys, Bain and Mauigoa would have such high numbers that the 2023 class would still rate as one of our best, if not the best, in the last two decades. when people do exercises like this, it flattens every player into being equal with one another. but that's not how value in sports works. yes, our portal evaluations really helped shore up depth, but players who are as good as Bain and Mauigoa -- if we were talking about pro sports they would essentially be considered Hall of Fame players (Bain will definitely be in the Ring of Honor one day, Mauigoa may as well) -- make up for missing on dozens of players. I am not even exaggerating: we only needed one RT for three whole seasons because of Maugioa, so what happened w/ like 5+ other OL recruits just did not matter.

one other thing that I would say is that, even if we take your hit/bust evaluations, these recruiting classes hit on players at premium positions:

Moten - DL
Cooper - OL
Mauigoa - OL
Bain - DL
Scott - DL
Blount - DL
Lightfoot - DL
Bell - OL
Fredrique - CB

these are all positions that are highly valued by NFL teams, correlate with winning at the highest level, etc. Fletcher at RB and Bissainthe at OLB are the only two "hits" who are at non-premium positions. consider that you're basically looking at nearly the entire OL/DL rotation (8 of like 12-13 players who made up our OL/DL rotation) for a team that almost won the national title, just from these recruiting classes alone. that is massively valuable and ultimately made up for many of the mistakes you see listed here when you go down the lists one by one.
 
rayray said:
all of this may be true, but one very important thing is missing from this analysis: two of the players with the green check marks next to their names -- Bain and Maugioa -- were two of the most valuable players in the entire sport across the span of their careers. the value provided by those two alone is equal to that many average "hit" recruits combined. for instance, Bain played so many snaps at such a high level this season that the development of other DEs from the 2023 class -- Malik Bryant, Collins Acheampong, Jayden Wayne -- literally did not matter. whether they were good or bad, on the team or not, they were never getting on the field anyway in large part because we had one guy from that class who was the best player at the position in the country and never came off the field. we basically only needed one back up DE during our best season in 20 years and that was in large part because of Bain.

if you were going to put a WAR-like number on all of these guys, Bain and Mauigoa would have such high numbers that the 2023 class would still rate as one of our best, if not the best, in the last two decades. when people do exercises like this, it flattens every player into being equal with one another. but that's not how value in sports works. yes, our portal evaluations really helped shore up depth, but players who are as good as Bain and Mauigoa -- if we were talking about pro sports they would essentially be considered Hall of Fame players (Bain will definitely be in the Ring of Honor one day, Mauigoa may as well) -- make up for missing on dozens of players. I am not even exaggerating: we only needed one RT for three whole seasons because of Maugioa, so what happened w/ like 5+ other OL recruits just did not matter.

one other thing that I would say is that, even if we take your hit/bust evaluations, these recruiting classes hit on players at premium positions:

Moten - DL
Cooper - OL
Mauigoa - OL
Bain - DL
Scott - DL
Blount - DL
Lightfoot - DL
Bell - OL
Fredrique - CB

these are all positions that are highly valued by NFL teams, correlate with winning at the highest level, etc. Fletcher at RB and Bissainthe at OLB are the only two "hits" who are at non-premium positions. consider that you're basically looking at nearly the entire OL/DL rotation (8 of like 12-13 players who made up our OL/DL rotation) for a team that almost won the national title, just from these recruiting classes alone. that is massively valuable and ultimately made up for many of the mistakes you see listed here when you go down the lists one by one.
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OK, we’re talking about two different things.

So let me spell it out:
1. When listed the players from 1 - whatever number, I wasn’t ranking them 1 - w/e # based upon their impact or value. I was ranking them literally by their composite star ratings from the recruiting service 247 & simply listing who was ranked the highest to the lowest.

2. This exercise was simply to verify if having Top 100 players are a requirement or not & can we “really” trust the staff’s acumen on HS recruiting evals. That’s it. I think it’s safe to say that when it comes to the trenches, yes. When it comes to the portal, yes. When it comes to the RB room, maybe…sorta kinda, but all the other positions r up for debate.

WR is another position I feel we can give leeway of trust; but to arbitrarily say no need to stack our classes w as many Top 100 players b/c the staff’s evals r on point regardless of ratings, ehhh, the data shows otherwise at many positions. Hence, once again, we’re adamant about portal shopping b/c we’re not secure w guys who’s been here 3+ yrs as being “them” to lead us.

Which is y I said hopefully the classes of 2025-2026 bucks this trend. That’s it…all the other stuff is, not u, being defensive. And again, all I’ve done is harshly, & bluntly regurgitated what’s already been posted on the main board &/or transfer portals about players.
 
gogeta4 said:
I dont think driving record is part of the charater eval..this is stupid..he was a starter rotational player fromt he day he step foot on campus went to ucf n did the same.
Im not even in the Mario camp but this is weird coming off a championship game appearance 40 yards away from a chip.

They could miss on 100 of their hs classes n we make it to the chip again i wouldnt give a flyin ****
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Driving and culture get mocked on this board from Athens to Baton Rogue and if it wasn't an issue, he would still be here. So we evaluated a player and he is not here producing for Miami = Miss.

40 yards don't mean ****. A loss is a loss. And we lost. That has nothing to do with discussing the individual contributions of the players discussed in this thread and/or the concerns around high school recruiting. I don't care where the roster is built from -- all the way back to when we did not recruit the portal well and the excuse caboose rolled in to say the portal wasn't a sustainable thing and THE ONLY way to recruit was through high school (something something Butch Da Gawd) -- which is why many mock the **** out of it and also mock the moving of the goalposts.
 
rayray said:
all of this may be true, but one very important thing is missing from this analysis: two of the players with the green check marks next to their names -- Bain and Maugioa -- were two of the most valuable players in the entire sport across the span of their careers. the value provided by those two alone is equal to that of many average "hit" recruits combined. for instance, Bain played so many snaps at such a high level this season that the development of other DEs from the 2023 class -- Malik Bryant, Collins Acheampong, Jayden Wayne -- literally did not matter. whether they were good or bad, on the team or not, they were never getting on the field anyway in large part because we had one guy from that class who was the best player at the position in the country and never came off the field. we basically only needed one back up DE during our best season in 20 years and that was in large part because of Bain.

if you were going to put a WAR-like number on all of these guys, Bain and Mauigoa would have such high numbers that the 2023 class would still rate as one of our best, if not the best, in the last two decades. when people do exercises like this, it flattens every player into being equal with one another. but that's not how value in sports works. yes, our portal evaluations really helped shore up depth, but players who are as good as Bain and Mauigoa -- if we were talking about pro sports they would essentially be considered Hall of Fame players (Bain will definitely be in the Ring of Honor one day, Mauigoa may as well) -- make up for missing on dozens of players. I am not even exaggerating: we only needed one RT for three whole seasons because of Maugioa, so what happened w/ like 5+ other OL recruits just did not matter.

one other thing that I would say is that, even if we take your hit/bust evaluations, these recruiting classes hit on players at premium positions:

Moten - DL
Cooper - OL
Mauigoa - OL
Bain - DL
Scott - DL
Blount - DL
Lightfoot - DL
Bell - OL
Fredrique - CB

these are all positions that are highly valued by NFL teams, correlate with winning at the highest level, etc. Fletcher at RB and Bissainthe at OLB are the only two "hits" who are at non-premium positions. consider that you're basically looking at nearly the entire OL/DL rotation (8 of like 12-13 players who made up our OL/DL rotation) for a team that almost won the national title, just from these recruiting classes alone. that is massively valuable and ultimately made up for many of the mistakes you see listed here when you go down the lists one by one.
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Well said. You have about 45ish players that really are playing the vast majority of snaps yearly. You have 22 starting jobs where you're filling about 900 snaps in the regular season or thereabouts. Whether you get high level output from a 15 person HS class and 10 person transfer class all with an incredibly high hit rate, or a 30 person HS class and 5 person transfer class with a lower hit rate out of HS... Doesn't actually matter that much if that is your team building strategy... And ultimately it should be looked at in terms of NIL spend. In fact each additional developmental 3star or low 4star (or definite outside top 100/200 type) player you add is a very marginal cost NIL wise. Yet the returns on Depth, development long-term and them growing into starts is well worth a low "hit" rate within 3 years....

Wonder if @No_Fly_Zone will respond to this one. I said the same in like 2 sentences but was too much for him to read Iol.
Why not weight grades towards high value positions or superstars? They have a far larger impact on winning. Getting 1 superstar brings more value than what at least 5-7 misses leaves?
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