I made this a new topic to hopefully stop the official verbal thread from become yet another ranking service thread.

OK, I don't get it. What do these rating services do? I know they give out stars, etc., but what type of analysis do they do? How big of a staff do they have? Who (Football coaches, fans, other) subscribes to these services?

I looked at U.S. News academic rankings of Illinois high schools and found out that there are 667 high schools in Illinois. OK, I concede that not every high school has football such as an all girls school, etc. So let's say there are 500 schools. Are there approximately 25 analysts assigned just to Illinois to cover every school at least once during the season? During the week do they take visits to schools and have the run and lift?

Here are some additional stats:
California has about 2,200 high schools
Texas has about 1,800 high schools

High School Football

Quote:In the 2012-2013 school year, 14,048 U.S. high schools fielded teams to play 11-man per side American tackle football.

The 1,088,158 athletes who played on these teams in the 2012-2013 school year made football the No. 1 participation sport in the nation's high schools

So with over one million players and 14,048 teams, please explain how these services go about picking and rating the players they cover? What makes these services worth anything more than this boards opinion?

I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

if a player has a ton of offers, why would he pick NIU over a warmer climate or a bigger fan base? Your idea that a player is only good if they have a ton of offers is so far off base. Just let the professionals do their jobs, and you just keep watching the games. Unless you think you can go around and show all these recruits our orange bowl flag and highlights of Wolfe, Turner, Ward, and English and sway them, then you should apply to do so. You act like these coaches don't know how to do the very job they are paid to do. They know what NIU provides, and they also have a system on both offense and defense that they recruit for. NIU doesn't throw offers at every kid, they pick the ones they want and the work to get them signed. If they don't work out they go to the next guy.

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

I agree finding those players can be tough, but when a school does it with some consistency maybe it has more to do with coach/ program's ability to develop players.

(02-01-2016 06:49 PM)DogPoundNorth Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

if a player has a ton of offers, why would he pick NIU over a warmer climate or a bigger fan base? Your idea that a player is only good if they have a ton of offers is so far off base. Just let the professionals do their jobs, and you just keep watching the games. Unless you think you can go around and show all these recruits our orange bowl flag and highlights of Wolfe, Turner, Ward, and English and sway them, then you should apply to do so. You act like these coaches don't know how to do the very job they are paid to do. They know what NIU provides, and they also have a system on both offense and defense that they recruit for. NIU doesn't throw offers at every kid, they pick the ones they want and the work to get them signed. If they don't work out they go to the next guy.

WMU has way less success than us and they ARE getting those players with good offers. How could that be?

I never said that a player is only good if he has a ton of offers. You're putting words in my mouth. I said a kid with offers is likely to pan out better than a kid with no offers. I doubt a bunch of teams offering a kid are doing so because he won't be any good. They evaluated him and found him to be someone they wanted and felt he could contribute. Sure the kids with many offers don't always pan out. Maybe legal issues, immaturity, can't hack it academically, or whatever else.

(02-01-2016 06:56 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 06:49 PM)DogPoundNorth Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

if a player has a ton of offers, why would he pick NIU over a warmer climate or a bigger fan base? Your idea that a player is only good if they have a ton of offers is so far off base. Just let the professionals do their jobs, and you just keep watching the games. Unless you think you can go around and show all these recruits our orange bowl flag and highlights of Wolfe, Turner, Ward, and English and sway them, then you should apply to do so. You act like these coaches don't know how to do the very job they are paid to do. They know what NIU provides, and they also have a system on both offense and defense that they recruit for. NIU doesn't throw offers at every kid, they pick the ones they want and the work to get them signed. If they don't work out they go to the next guy.

WMU has way less success than us and they ARE getting those players with good offers. How could that be?

I never said that a player is only good if he has a ton of offers. You're putting words in my mouth. I said a kid with offers is likely to pan out better than a kid with no offers. I doubt a bunch of teams offering a kid are doing so because he won't be any good. They evaluated him and found him to be someone they wanted and felt he could contribute. Sure the kids with many offers don't always pan out. Maybe legal issues, immaturity, can't hack it academically, or whatever else.

With every "sure thing" that pans out there is a "sure thing" that ends up being awful. This multiple offers thing is meaningless. It's system based recruiting, and stars don't matter. Welcome to NIU.

(02-01-2016 06:50 PM)Cowboy95 Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

I agree finding those players can be tough, but when a school does it with some consistency maybe it has more to do with coach/ program's ability to develop players.

Coaching has a ton to do with it I'm sure. I thought Doeren, Novak, and Kill were good coaches. I wish I had more faith in our current head coach but I don't.

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

I appreciate that it is nice to see that a player with offers from name schools ends up going to NIU, but you do understand that the listing of offers is an inexact science. The schools do not put out lists of the players that they have offered, the only way these services can find out is from the players themselves and these services do not have the time or resources to find out all of this information.

(02-01-2016 06:26 PM)HUSKIEFOOTBALLFAN Wrote:  So with over one million players and 14,048 teams, please explain how these services go about picking and rating the players they cover? What makes these services worth anything more than this boards opinion?

In an attempt to provide somewhat of an answer to your question. The best of these services were established by long-time high school writers or former coaches who have built up a network of connections. The connections run the gamut from people who actually work as scouts (Tom Lemming, Edgy Tim / same as in baseball), to college assistant coaches, to media people covering tons of games (Mike Helfgot or Bobby Narang at the Tribune, John Leusch, Dave Oberhelman, Marty Miaciaszek at the Daily Herald down to sports editors from Joliet to DeKalb; media people ala Dave Kaplan or Jim Blaney), and high school coaches themselves. They'll ask one prep coach to evaluate a player from a team in their league or from their non-conference schedule, and sometimes about their own kids. Theoretically they develop a consensus based on feedback from one season to the next, from college summer camps, etc. Word of warning, it's a business, so there is the inevitable you scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. Assistant coach from SEC school Y or B1G Q asks the guy if he knows who is looking at Tom Jones from Chicago Suburb HS because we're interested, or we heard he's a monster in the weight room, or he doesn't have the grades. They trade info, sometimes one or the other is bluffing. There is definite prejudice involved at times. Gerald O'Dell has a buddy with let's say the Parker Executive Search Firm, Parker (blindly) recommends O'Dell to Cincinnati (which foolishly hires him), so someone figures if Parker can get O'Dell hired, he'll get to know the folks at Parker which helps him land a job, so when he / she goes looking for a new football coach, suddenly Parker is hired again, and the back scratching continues until NIU uses Parker to hire Phillips, who uses Parker to hire Doreen from Wisconsin, which uses Parker for some other search and the people at Wisconsin tell the people at Northwestern, who then hire Phillips, and of course Parker recommends a women's coach for NU, and on and on ... naturally, a George O'Leary (ND) or Julie Hermann (Rutgers) slips through the cracks.
So the recruiting services are definitely not fool proof. At some point, someone with the service adds or deducts a star based on the schools in the hunt (SEC, B1G, BXII or C-USA, AAC, MAC), plus some schools can be deceptive because they've found a diamond in the rough and want to keep that person under wraps.
However, despite all the potential negatives, since the number of stars are not an exact science, DogPoundNorth is too quick to dismiss the idea of multiple offers. In theory, assistant coaches add to their reputations by helping identify talent and potential, plus coaching that player up. That's how they can get to be a coordinator or someday a head coach. If a bunch of coaches, coordinators or assistants are all convinced a kid can help, the multiple offers are an indication that several people are seeing the same skills, instincts or abilities in some kid. Once again, is that a guarantee? Hell no, but it's like the very first time four out of five doctors agreed on something. It was significant, now it's an over-used catchphrase. So three stars and seven FBS offers is more likely still a better gamble than one star with one FBS and four FCS offers.

(02-01-2016 08:38 PM)StevenNIU Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 06:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I care less about stars and more about who is offering them. If other schools want a player then that is more of a sign that a player is valuable and can be an asset. There are only so many Jordan Lynch, Chandler Harnish, and Michael Turner types that pan out with no or few offers.

I appreciate that it is nice to see that a player with offers from name schools ends up going to NIU, but you do understand that the listing of offers is an inexact science. The schools do not put out lists of the players that they have offered, the only way these services can find out is from the players themselves and these services do not have the time or resources to find out all of this information.

Most of these kids have twitter and tweet every offer they get. Some of them lie about the offers but most of them don't. Pretty much how we find out about most of our verbal commits on here.

"I said a kid with offers is likely to pan out better than a kid with no offers. I doubt a bunch of teams offering a kid are doing so because he won't be any good"

A lot of subjectivity in your statement and no coach offers a player he thinks isn't going to be good. But they also understand that not every kid is a star and that only a certain percentage are contributors. I think Coach Joe was famous for saying only about a third of your class contributes on the field and for many reasons. Last year we took a bunch of walk-on Olinemen, probably knowing that maybe one will contribute but that we also needed bodies on the practice field.

As to the number of offers, edgytim, rivals main state of Illinois analyst wrote in the fall that coaches were indicating to him that more kids were reporting nonexistent offers, so number of offers is not necessarily accurate. Also many if not all schools may give an athlete an offer but they won't take his commitment until they hear from their top choices

It's simple guys. We offer guys we think will do well and help us on the field. That's it. Sorry if they don't have enough stars or offers for you. If only there was a way to play a game with the players you recruit and then the final score of that game will decide which team was better.

(02-01-2016 09:01 PM)NIUSAE Wrote:  "I said a kid with offers is likely to pan out better than a kid with no offers. I doubt a bunch of teams offering a kid are doing so because he won't be any good"

A lot of subjectivity in your statement and no coach offers a player he thinks isn't going to be good. But they also understand that not every kid is a star and that only a certain percentage are contributors. I think Coach Joe was famous for saying only about a third of your class contributes on the field and for many reasons. Last year we took a bunch of walk-on Olinemen, probably knowing that maybe one will contribute but that we also needed bodies on the practice field.

As to the number of offers, edgytim, rivals main state of Illinois analyst wrote in the fall that coaches were indicating to him that more kids were reporting nonexistent offers, so number of offers is not necessarily accurate. Also many if not all schools may give an athlete an offer but they won't take his commitment until they hear from their top choices

There's subjectivity in recruiting. Nothing is a sure bet.

If 10 coaches evaluate player 1 and five of them offer him and 10 coaches evaluate player 2 and only one coach offers him, who would you rather have? Who has a better chance of being successful? The chances that the player with one offer being the next Jordan Lynch are slim.

The schools that are consistently good aren't winning with a bunch of kids with little to no offers. NIU has been one of the few to do it but our program is also on the decline now.

Lynch
Harnish
Turner
English
Coffman
Ward
Melvin
Lurry
Boomer
All those O-line
etc
etc

We keep saying "there are only so many of them", but we've been doing it for 10+ years with them. THIS is the NIU, THIS is the way we do it. That's the culture, it's not some fluke, it's made us one of the most successful teams (in wins). It's not just the type of recruiting, it's not just coaching, it's the process and the player leadership. And to continue that, it means getting the right make-up of player.

It's not going to change until it really stops working and we get a complete change in coaching/direction. 3 sucky losses doesn't mean it's completely stopped working. It probably will eventually change, but it hasn't yet, so enjoy the ride.

(02-01-2016 09:23 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  It's not going to change until it really stops working and we get a complete change in coaching/direction. 3 sucky losses doesn't mean it's completely stopped working. It probably will eventually change, but it hasn't yet, so enjoy the ride.

I wish it was only three sucky losses. But it's more. We had no business losing to Boston College...a two-win (or is it three-win?) team. We played awful. We had Drew Hare for that game. So i guess we can't use the injury excuse for that one. We got destroyed last year by Marshall, another game we had Drew Hare. We got destroyed in the 2013 MAC Championship with the great Jordan Lynch, then proceeded to play awful against Utah State in our bowl game. This has been developing over the last three years now. The injuries have become a crutch and excuse. Everyone has injuries. NIU is not and will never be impervious to them.

(02-01-2016 09:37 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:23 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  It's not going to change until it really stops working and we get a complete change in coaching/direction. 3 sucky losses doesn't mean it's completely stopped working. It probably will eventually change, but it hasn't yet, so enjoy the ride.

I wish it was only three sucky losses. But it's more. We had no business losing to Boston College...a two-win (or is it three-win?) team. We played awful. We had Drew Hare for that game. So i guess we can't use the injury excuse for that one. We got destroyed last year by Marshall, another game we had Drew Hare. We got destroyed in the 2013 MAC Championship with the great Jordan Lynch, then proceeded to play awful against Utah State in our bowl game. This has been developing over the last three years now. The injuries have become a crutch and excuse. Everyone has injuries. NIU is not and will never be impervious to them.

Exactly where did I mention injuries? Maybe try reading it again.

(02-01-2016 09:41 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:37 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:23 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  It's not going to change until it really stops working and we get a complete change in coaching/direction. 3 sucky losses doesn't mean it's completely stopped working. It probably will eventually change, but it hasn't yet, so enjoy the ride.

I wish it was only three sucky losses. But it's more. We had no business losing to Boston College...a two-win (or is it three-win?) team. We played awful. We had Drew Hare for that game. So i guess we can't use the injury excuse for that one. We got destroyed last year by Marshall, another game we had Drew Hare. We got destroyed in the 2013 MAC Championship with the great Jordan Lynch, then proceeded to play awful against Utah State in our bowl game. This has been developing over the last three years now. The injuries have become a crutch and excuse. Everyone has injuries. NIU is not and will never be impervious to them.

Exactly where did I mention injuries? Maybe try reading it again.

Where did I say you did? You should try reading. The excuse has been made by many others on this board.

(02-01-2016 09:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:41 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:37 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:23 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  It's not going to change until it really stops working and we get a complete change in coaching/direction. 3 sucky losses doesn't mean it's completely stopped working. It probably will eventually change, but it hasn't yet, so enjoy the ride.

I wish it was only three sucky losses. But it's more. We had no business losing to Boston College...a two-win (or is it three-win?) team. We played awful. We had Drew Hare for that game. So i guess we can't use the injury excuse for that one. We got destroyed last year by Marshall, another game we had Drew Hare. We got destroyed in the 2013 MAC Championship with the great Jordan Lynch, then proceeded to play awful against Utah State in our bowl game. This has been developing over the last three years now. The injuries have become a crutch and excuse. Everyone has injuries. NIU is not and will never be impervious to them.

Exactly where did I mention injuries? Maybe try reading it again.

Where did I say you did? You should try reading. The excuse has been made by many others on this board.

You replied directly to me. Give it up. It's old, it's stale. You're unhappy, go be unhappy.

(02-01-2016 09:49 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:41 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:37 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:23 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  It's not going to change until it really stops working and we get a complete change in coaching/direction. 3 sucky losses doesn't mean it's completely stopped working. It probably will eventually change, but it hasn't yet, so enjoy the ride.

I wish it was only three sucky losses. But it's more. We had no business losing to Boston College...a two-win (or is it three-win?) team. We played awful. We had Drew Hare for that game. So i guess we can't use the injury excuse for that one. We got destroyed last year by Marshall, another game we had Drew Hare. We got destroyed in the 2013 MAC Championship with the great Jordan Lynch, then proceeded to play awful against Utah State in our bowl game. This has been developing over the last three years now. The injuries have become a crutch and excuse. Everyone has injuries. NIU is not and will never be impervious to them.

Exactly where did I mention injuries? Maybe try reading it again.

Where did I say you did? You should try reading. The excuse has been made by many others on this board.

You replied directly to me. Give it up. It's old, it's stale. You're unhappy, go be unhappy.

I agree, the injury excuse by many on here is old and stale.

Yes, I am unhappy about the direction our program has been going the last three years.

(02-01-2016 09:52 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:49 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:46 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:41 PM)17Huskies Wrote:  

(02-01-2016 09:37 PM)epasnoopy Wrote:  I wish it was only three sucky losses. But it's more. We had no business losing to Boston College...a two-win (or is it three-win?) team. We played awful. We had Drew Hare for that game. So i guess we can't use the injury excuse for that one. We got destroyed last year by Marshall, another game we had Drew Hare. We got destroyed in the 2013 MAC Championship with the great Jordan Lynch, then proceeded to play awful against Utah State in our bowl game. This has been developing over the last three years now. The injuries have become a crutch and excuse. Everyone has injuries. NIU is not and will never be impervious to them.

Exactly where did I mention injuries? Maybe try reading it again.

Where did I say you did? You should try reading. The excuse has been made by many others on this board.

You replied directly to me. Give it up. It's old, it's stale. You're unhappy, go be unhappy.

I agree, the injury excuse by many on here is old and stale.

Yes, I am unhappy about the direction our program has been going the last three years.

Ha, you're the only one that brought up injuries in this thread, bud.

You're the new MD. Congrats.