Just how talented is the 2017 Vols roster?

[Dobbs 4 Heisman]

So rather than waiting for 247 to put out their rankings of talent level in college football, I decided to do my own research and see if I could put together a list that is more accurate. It always confused my why people weigh recruiting classes equally. Just think about this logically. Why should the freshmen class be treated the same as the junior class? If you had only one top 5 class on campus, wouldn't you rather it be your junior class that is loaded rather than your freshmen class since the juniors have more experience and more likely to make a huge impact? For most of the elite teams like Alabama, Ohio State, and Florida State, this distinction doesn't matter cause they recruit top 5 classes every year. However, this distinction will prove significant for a team like Michigan vs a team like Tennessee. How come? Because Tennessee's talent is concentrated in their senior and junior class while Michigan's talent is concentrated in their freshmen and sophomore classes. If you just averaged their last 4 classes, they would be ranked similarly, however, which situation would you rather be in? Would you want your loaded classes be experienced seniors and juniors or inexperienced freshmen and sophomores? It should stand to reason that Tennessee should be ranked higher since the senior and junior class ranking should get more weight.

So here is my methodology: I counted the number of 4-star and 5-star recruits signed over the last 4 years. Then I weighted each of those classes based on the percentage of seniors, juniors, sophomores, and freshmen teams typically have in their 2-deep. For example, Tennessee's projected 2-deep will have 11 seniors, 17 juniors, 11 sophomores, and 6 freshmen. So my formula came out to this: [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2014 x (1)] + [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2015 x (1.75)] + [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2016 x (1)] + [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2017 x (0.25)] = total talent score.

And without further ado here is how the rankings came out:

***NOTE*** The number you see next to the team name is the total score I got based on my formula above and the numbers in the parenthesis are the number of 4-star and 5-star recruits according to the 247composite rankings that the school signed in the past 4 years. The order goes (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017).

TIER ONE (70+ points)
1. Alabama - 80.00 (22, 20, 17, 24)

TIER TWO (60-70 points)
2. Ohio State - 65.00 (16, 15, 18, 19)
3. Auburn - 63.75 (13, 20, 13, 11)
4. Florida State - 62.00 (16, 14, 18, 14)
5. LSU - 61.50 (17, 13, 18, 15)

TIER THREE (50-60 points)
6. USC - 59.00 (10, 18, 14, 14)
7. Georgia - 56.75 (13, 14, 14, 21)
8. Tennessee - 55.25 (16, 16, 10, 5)
9. Notre Dame - 53.00 (16, 14, 10, 10)
10. Texas - 50.25 (8, 14, 16, 7)

TIER FOUR (35-50 points)
11. Texas A&M - 47.00 (14, 13, 8, 9)
12. Clemson - 45.50 (10, 12, 12, 10)
13. UCLA - 43.50 (9, 13, 10, 7)
14. Oklahoma - 41.00 (9, 10, 10, 18)
15. Michigan - 38.75 (9, 6, 14, 21)
16. Penn State - 38.50 (5, 13, 8, 11)

TIER FIVE (25-35 points)
17. Ole Miss - 34.00 (6, 7, 15, 3)
18. Miami - 28.25 (8, 5, 9, 10)
19. Stanford - 28.25 (8, 5, 9, 10)
20. Florida - 27.75 (9, 4, 9, 11)


Interesting Results:

• ITS ALABAMA AND THEN EVERYONE ELSE. Honestly, I was shocked by how much more talented Alabama's roster is than everybody else. As you can see, nobody else even breaks into the 70s in terms of their final score. But there is Alabama by themselves in the 80s over 15 points clear of everyone else. To put it in perspective, at least according to my rankings, there is a bigger gap in talent between Alabama and Ohio State who rank #1 and #2 than there is between #2 Ohio State and #10 Texas. THAT'S CRAZY. No wonder Nick Saban and Alabama are always in the national title game.

• Auburn and Notre Dame ended up a little higher on this list than I would have expected. Auburn was helped mainly by the fact that they signed 20 4 and 5-star recruits in 2015. While Notre Dame has just signed solid classes each and every year the last 4 years. I wouldn't be surprised if Notre Dame has a huge bounce back year this season. They have too much talent not to be very good.

• Tennessee plays 3 teams that according to these rankings are more talented. However, the talent level between Tennessee and Georgia is nearly identical. Given that Tennessee will have home-field advantage, I think we can say that we should be the favorite in that match-up. LSU is also a little bit more talented than Tennessee but that game is also at home. Tennessee should have every chance in the world to win that game because the gap in talent between LSU and Tennessee isn't wide enough to overcome home field advantage. The only game on Tennessee's 2017 schedule that looks unwinnable is the road game against Alabama in Tuscaloosa. Other than for that game, Tennessee should have a good chance to win every other game. 10-2 should be the expectation with 11-1 being a distinct possibility.

• And finally, my goodness is Florida in trouble. They are less talented than 6 of the teams they play this year (Florida State, LSU, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas A&M, and Michigan). I don't think home-field will be enough to close the gap against Florida State, LSU, and Tennessee because the gap in talent between those teams and Florida is just huge according to my rankings. The games against Georgia and Michigan also look unwinnable because they are at neutral sites rather than being home games that Florida could benefit from. The only game where Florida is less talented than their opponent that they have a decent chance of winning is against Texas A&M. The gap in talent in that game could be close enough that home-field becomes an advantage. All in all, the recruiting rankings say Florida could be in for a very rough year. And its the fact they only signed 4 recruits in the 2015 class that were either 4-stars or 5-stars that will hurt them this year.

 

[IndianaVolunteer]

I agree about Florida. I don't get all the hype with the talent drop off especially on defense.

 

[5FingerVolPunch]

I agree about Florida. I don't get all the hype with the talent drop off especially on defense.

The media is hyping them because they've picked Vols and UGA the last 2 years to win the East and both years UF got it done. But I totally agree that UF takes a huge drop this year. That defense will not be as good this year and I won't believe the offense will be good until I see it happen.

 

[JettVol]

been saying this for a while, UF isn't gonna be that good this year, they lost a ton to the draft and have already been hampered by injuries this offseason. I hope we can start our owe streak against them. GBO!

 

[zeppelin128]

Few things are better than watching Florida trend down. All hype this year: 7-5.

 

[Booker512]

Yep. I have noticed Florida being....at the edge of a hole, since early July when I started looking at their rosters and stuff.

Gonna be a toughe crowd down in Gainesville this season.

 

[SpringBokVol]

Pretty interesting breakdown. I enjoyed the read.

 

[ArmyVol697]

Great work, OP! I would be very curious to know how attrition (transfers and such) and season ending injuries play in. My guess is that hurts Florida even more than the rest.

 

[TUSKtimes]

Interesting Results:

• ITS ALABAMA AND THEN EVERYONE ELSE. Honestly, I was shocked by how much more talented Alabama's roster is than everybody else. As you can see, nobody else even breaks into the 70s in terms of their final score. But there is Alabama by themselves in the 80s over 15 points clear of everyone else. To put it in perspective, at least according to my rankings, there is a bigger gap in talent between Alabama and Ohio State who rank #1 and #2 than there is between #2 Ohio State and #10 Texas. THAT'S CRAZY. No wonder Nick Saban and Alabama are always in the national title game.
  
  The only game on Tennessee's 2017 schedule that looks unwinnable is the road game against Alabama in Tuscaloosa.

• 
  
  
  You need to read my post more. And this year's freshmen class will outdistance them all.

 

[EweTVol]

That looks like a lot of work

 

[OH-Vol]

Nearly the entire 2014 Recruiting class is gone via attrition. How is this factored in?

 

[Boca Vol]

Great work, OP! I would be very curious to know how attrition (transfers and such) and season ending injuries play in. My guess is that hurts Florida even more than the rest.

You must not lurk around here much. Otherwise you would know....

 

[orangemadam]

Good work and very interesting. Also a factor to take into consideration is possibly weighting a few of the positions, i.e. adding a factor for OL and DL and possibly skill positions, etc. Just a suggestion.:hi::hi::hi:

 

[jlawso21]

So rather than waiting for 247 to put out their rankings of talent level in college football, I decided to do my own research and see if I could put together a list that is more accurate. It always confused my why people weigh recruiting classes equally. Just think about this logically. Why should the freshmen class be treated the same as the junior class? If you had only one top 5 class on campus, wouldn't you rather it be your junior class that is loaded rather than your freshmen class since the juniors have more experience and more likely to make a huge impact? For most of the elite teams like Alabama, Ohio State, and Florida State, this distinction doesn't matter cause they recruit top 5 classes every year. However, this distinction will prove significant for a team like Michigan vs a team like Tennessee. How come? Because Tennessee's talent is concentrated in their senior and junior class while Michigan's talent is concentrated in their freshmen and sophomore classes. If you just averaged their last 4 classes, they would be ranked similarly, however, which situation would you rather be in? Would you want your loaded classes be experienced seniors and juniors or inexperienced freshmen and sophomores? It should stand to reason that Tennessee should be ranked higher since the senior and junior class ranking should get more weight.

So here is my methodology: I counted the number of 4-star and 5-star recruits signed over the last 4 years. Then I weighted each of those classes based on the percentage of seniors, juniors, sophomores, and freshmen teams typically have in their 2-deep. For example, Tennessee's projected 2-deep will have 11 seniors, 17 juniors, 11 sophomores, and 6 freshmen. So my formula came out to this: [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2014 x (1)] + [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2015 x (1.75)] + [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2016 x (1)] + [# of 4 and 5-star players from 2017 x (0.25)] = total talent score.

And without further ado here is how the rankings came out:

***NOTE*** The number you see next to the team name is the total score I got based on my formula above and the numbers in the parenthesis are the number of 4-star and 5-star recruits according to the 247composite rankings that the school signed in the past 4 years. The order goes (2014, 2015, 2016, 2017).

TIER ONE (70+ points)
1. Alabama - 80.00 (22, 20, 17, 24)

TIER TWO (60-70 points)
2. Ohio State - 65.00 (16, 15, 18, 19)
3. Auburn - 63.75 (13, 20, 13, 11)
4. Florida State - 62.00 (16, 14, 18, 14)
5. LSU - 61.50 (17, 13, 18, 15)

TIER THREE (50-60 points)
6. USC - 59.00 (10, 18, 14, 14)
7. Georgia - 56.75 (13, 14, 14, 21)
8. Tennessee - 55.25 (16, 16, 10, 5)
9. Notre Dame - 53.00 (16, 14, 10, 10)
10. Texas - 50.25 (8, 14, 16, 7)

TIER FOUR (35-50 points)
11. Texas A&M - 47.00 (14, 13, 8, 9)
12. Clemson - 45.50 (10, 12, 12, 10)
13. UCLA - 43.50 (9, 13, 10, 7)
14. Oklahoma - 41.00 (9, 10, 10, 18)
15. Michigan - 38.75 (9, 6, 14, 21)
16. Penn State - 38.50 (5, 13, 8, 11)

TIER FIVE (25-35 points)
17. Ole Miss - 34.00 (6, 7, 15, 3)
18. Miami - 28.25 (8, 5, 9, 10)
19. Stanford - 28.25 (8, 5, 9, 10)
20. Florida - 27.75 (9, 4, 9, 11)


Interesting Results:

• ITS ALABAMA AND THEN EVERYONE ELSE. Honestly, I was shocked by how much more talented Alabama's roster is than everybody else. As you can see, nobody else even breaks into the 70s in terms of their final score. But there is Alabama by themselves in the 80s over 15 points clear of everyone else. To put it in perspective, at least according to my rankings, there is a bigger gap in talent between Alabama and Ohio State who rank #1 and #2 than there is between #2 Ohio State and #10 Texas. THAT'S CRAZY. No wonder Nick Saban and Alabama are always in the national title game.

• Auburn and Notre Dame ended up a little higher on this list than I would have expected. Auburn was helped mainly by the fact that they signed 20 4 and 5-star recruits in 2015. While Notre Dame has just signed solid classes each and every year the last 4 years. I wouldn't be surprised if Notre Dame has a huge bounce back year this season. They have too much talent not to be very good.

• Tennessee plays 3 teams that according to these rankings are more talented. However, the talent level between Tennessee and Georgia is nearly identical. Given that Tennessee will have home-field advantage, I think we can say that we should be the favorite in that match-up. LSU is also a little bit more talented than Tennessee but that game is also at home. Tennessee should have every chance in the world to win that game because the gap in talent between LSU and Tennessee isn't wide enough to overcome home field advantage. The only game on Tennessee's 2017 schedule that looks unwinnable is the road game against Alabama in Tuscaloosa. Other than for that game, Tennessee should have a good chance to win every other game. 10-2 should be the expectation with 11-1 being a distinct possibility.

• And finally, my goodness is Florida in trouble. They are less talented than 6 of the teams they play this year (Florida State, LSU, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas A&M, and Michigan). I don't think home-field will be enough to close the gap against Florida State, LSU, and Tennessee because the gap in talent between those teams and Florida is just huge according to my rankings. The games against Georgia and Michigan also look unwinnable because they are at neutral sites rather than being home games that Florida could benefit from. The only game where Florida is less talented than their opponent that they have a decent chance of winning is against Texas A&M. The gap in talent in that game could be close enough that home-field becomes an advantage. All in all, the recruiting rankings say Florida could be in for a very rough year. And its the fact they only signed 4 recruits in the 2015 class that were either 4-stars or 5-stars that will hurt them this year.

I gave you a like for creativity, persistence and initiative. We'll see how this plays out.

 

[volfannbama]

Didnt you make a thread last week claiming we have 4 layers of top talent? Didnt you tell me that CBJ has been bringing in players so fast it would make my head spin?

 

[Johnnyreb#VFL]

The media is hyping them because they've picked Vols and UGA the last 2 years to win the East and both years UF got it done. But I totally agree that UF takes a huge drop this year. That defense will not be as good this year and I won't believe the offense will be good until I see it happen.

And yet they continue to win the East. It seems like we've said that They aren't going to be that good the past few years and they end up proving everyone wrong..again.

So I'm taking a different approach. I say Florida are kings of the East until proven otherwise, forget the talent differential.

 

[temptn]

Just think about this logically. Why should the freshmen class be treated the same as the junior class? If you had only one top 5 class on campus, wouldn't you rather it be your junior class that is loaded rather than your freshmen class since the juniors have more experience and more likely to make a huge impact?
[/LIST]

I think there is a problem with this logic in today's football. There are few good seniors that play. If they are really good they leave early and don't even play their last year. And many times they coast their last year to keep from getting hurt. Look at the good players that did not want to play in their bowl game.

 

[81Orange]

Thanks for the hard work. I tried a very similar ranking but couldn't decide on the weighting factor for very issue you raised about freshmen sophomore etc.
Also I think you'll have to include 3 stars to get a better comparison. Many three stars will be in starting positions as juniors and seniors.

 

[Jaws]

I agree about Florida. I don't get all the hype with the talent drop off especially on defense.

Maybe I can explain it. Florida returns everyone on offense, playmakers and experience at every position and finally some options and promise at QB. They return the best punter/kicker duo in America.

On defense, which seems to be what all the skeptics point to, they return way more talent and experience than people realize; 10 players who started at least 3 games in 2016, 3 players with more than 10 career starts, 6 players with significant action but less than 3 starts. Ridiculous depth at DT/DE (8-deep), solid experienced starters at LB (will admit here that beyond the first four, others will need to emerge) and three secondary players who have played a ton of football (Dawson, Washington, Gardner). So I guess some can question the Secondary, but I'm telling you this, Florida's DB haul in the last recruiting class was ridiculous. 6 guys, with 4 or 5 of them who will not only play, but will be studs this year. Most of them are south Florida guys, tall and rangy ballhawks, freak athletes who can fly. If you are holding your own in practice against Callaway, Cleveland and Powell, you're going to be fine.

Florida's defense will be fine. Florida's season hinges on a QB. If they get the QB, it will be back to Atlanta and for more than an appearance this year, to actually compete with Alabama (or whomever).

 

[AM64]

And yet they continue to win the East. It seems like we've said that They aren't going to be that good the past few years and they end up proving everyone wrong..again.

So I'm taking a different approach. I say Florida are kings of the East until proven otherwise, forget the talent differential.

Sometimes it take a while for the losing to catch up with a new coach. Bill Battle is a good example.

 

[volfan102455]

Alabama is beatable. Clemson, who you have in tier 4, showcased that. Ole Miss showcased that twice.

What the numbers can't measure is -

- How well will the players perform as a team?
- Will they pan out with the projection out of high school = to what happens on the field?
- Will they sustain an injury and only see partial playing time?
- Will they stay and wait their turn when they are beat out by someone else?

 

[barrylee]

Maybe I can explain it. Florida returns everyone on offense, playmakers and experience at every position and finally some options and promise at QB. They return the best punter/kicker duo in America.

On defense, which seems to be what all the skeptics point to, they return way more talent and experience than people realize; 10 players who started at least 3 games in 2016, 3 players with more than 10 career starts, 6 players with significant action but less than 3 starts. Ridiculous depth at DT/DE (8-deep), solid experienced starters at LB (will admit here that beyond the first four, others will need to emerge) and three secondary players who have played a ton of football (Dawson, Washington, Gardner). So I guess some can question the Secondary, but I'm telling you this, Florida's DB haul in the last recruiting class was ridiculous. 6 guys, with 4 or 5 of them who will not only play, but will be studs this year. Most of them are south Florida guys, tall and rangy ballhawks, freak athletes who can fly. If you are holding your own in practice against Callaway, Cleveland and Powell, you're going to be fine.

Florida's defense will be fine. Florida's season hinges on a QB. If they get the QB, it will be back to Atlanta and for more than an appearance this year, to actually compete with Alabama (or whomever).

Bye!

 

[VOLywood]

D4H why would you give seniors a 1 multiplier, juniors a 1.75, and sophomores a 1? Shouldn't seniors get a bigger multiplier than juniors by your logic? And what about redshirts that have had an extra year in the system?

 

[volfannbama]

D4H why would you give seniors a 1 multiplier, juniors a 1.75, and sophomores a 1? Shouldn't seniors get a bigger multiplier than juniors by your logic? And what about redshirts that have had an extra year in the system?

Because it makes Tennessee appear better.

I wonder if it accounted for attrition as many of the 4 star players recruited are not here.

 

[TennesseeZep]

been saying this for a while, UF isn't gonna be that good this year, they lost a ton to the draft and have already been hampered by injuries this offseason. I hope we can start our owe streak against them. GBO!

We do owe them a streak of our own I'd say!