Potential recruiting ability of Pruitt's staff

#1
Shades

Shades

30 minutes of ball and we are smokin at the end
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#1
For the tl;dr folks: Scroll down to the final section with conclusions.


Over the past three recruiting cycles 2015-2017, the top five recruiting teams over that three year period have been, according to 247:
Alabama
Ohio State
Florida State
Georgia
LSU

In order to gauge the potential recruiting ability of Coach Pruitt's new Tennessee staff, let's first look at the recruiting ability of the staffs of above five teams over the past three years.

For example, the top six recruiting coaches on Alabama's #1 ranked recruiting class of 2017 consisted of coaches with the following individual rankings on 247.com:
# 7th ranked recruiter
# 15th ranked recruiter
# 24th ranked recruiter
# 27th ranked recruiter
# 33th ranked recruiter
# 149th ranked recruiter
----------------------------
43 = average of above six coaches' recruiting rankings


If we take the average of these six coaches' individual recruiting rankings, we get a score of 43 for the coaching team. Or for the top five coaches, the average score is 21, which biased to a better score because we are dropping the #149th ranked coach.

We can repeat this process for each of the five teams above over the years 2015-2017, for either the top five or the top six recruiting coaches on each team.

What we find in general is that the average recruiting ranking score for a team of coaches that produces a top five recruiting class is normally in the 20's-50's range (for the top 5 coaches on the team) and in the 30's-70's range (for the top 6 coaches on the team). The lowest score does not always result in the highest ranked class, but low scores do generally result in top 5 classes.

For example, Tennesse's 4th ranked class in 2015 had a coaches' average recruiting ranking of 32 for the top 5 coaches and 38 for the top 6 coaches on the 2015 team.

By contrast, Tennessee's 14th ranked class in 2016 had a coaches' average recruiting ranking of 79 for the top 5 coaches and 91 for the top six coaches on the 2016 team.

So how might CJP's new staff perform if they continue their recruiting performances of the past three years? While we know who some of the staff will be, this will involve some assumptions on the remainder of the staff.

Reportedly will be on CJP's staff:
HC: Jeremy Pruitt
OC: Tyson Helton
DC: Kevin Sherrer
RB: Robert Gillespie
OL: Will Friend
DL: Chris Rumph
DL: Tracy Rocker
DB: Terry Fair

Unknown, but possibly on CJP's staff, who have known recruiting rankings over the past 3 years:
Lance Thompson
Bryan McClendon
Tosh Lupoi

The biggest wildcard here is Tosh Lupoi, currently at Alabama, who has been a top ten recruiter in the past two years. Probably less than a 50% chance of landing him, but at this point I don't put anything past CJP.


So to get to the conclusion, here is the average recruiting ranking for CJP's potential staff for the over the past three years:


For the top 5 coaches on CJP's potential staff (includes Tosh Lupoi):
2015 = 41
2016 = 41
2017 = 33
Conclusion: This score is typical of a coaching staff that pulls in a top 5 class.

For the top 5 coaches on CJP's potential staff (does NOT include Tosh Lupoi):
2015 = 39
2016 = 49
2017 = 41
Conclusion: This score is still typical of a coaching staff that pulls in a top 5 class.



For the top 6 coaches on CJP's potential staff (includes Tosh Lupoi):
2015 = 54
2016 = 59
2017 = 39
Conclusion: This score is typical of a coaching staff that pulls in a top 5 class.

For the top 6 coaches on CJP's potential staff (does NOT include Tosh Lupoi):
2015 = 45
2016 = 69
2017 = 64
Conclusion: This score is still typical of a coaching staff that pulls in a top 5 class.


WGWTFA
 
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#4
#4
Absolutely fantastic work here; one quick question for ya.

I assume these rankings aren’t adjusted by school? For instance, all of these staff members are from schools that tradionally recruit lights out with or without them being there, so their rankings are going to be improved simply by being at schools that attract top talent.

Is there a way to subjectively look at these coaches recruiting ability? Maybe by comparing their performance to that of previous coaches at their respective positions/schools?

Like I said though, fantastic work!
 
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#6
#6
Vols410 said:
Absolutely fantastic work here; one quick question for ya.

I assume these rankings aren’t adjusted by school? For instance, all of these staff members are from schools that tradionally recruit lights out with or without them being there, so their rankings are going to be improved simply by being at schools that attract top talent.

Is there a way to subjectively look at these coaches recruiting ability? Maybe by comparing their performance to that of previous coaches at their respective positions/schools?

Like I said though, fantastic work!
Click to expand...

You are correct, they are not adjusted in any way based on their former school.

It would be an interesting study to go back and look at each coach's full recruiting history. I would bet that good recruiters have always been good recruiters within the pool of candidates that they have to work with. It is sort of a chicken and egg dilemma, but I think for the most part recruiters have good individual rankings mostly because they are good recruiters and put in the hard work, and then a smaller part is due to the institution they work for.

Tennessee was a hotbed of recruiting on the 90s and early 2000s then fell off for 10 years and then began to pick back up recently, and are likely about to go on another hot streak.

UT is still the same great institution regardless of decade. Why was recruiting great in the 90s and sucked from mid-2000 to mid 2010's? And why did it pick back up again recently? I would have to say because of a good recruiting staff, which of course tends to build momentum that feeds on itself. But if the recruiting falls off (latter Fulmer years), it can't be sustained on the past reputation of the coaches and the institution alone. Work still has to go into recruiting and that has to be done by good recruiters.

Same with Alabama. In the late 90s and early 2000's their recruiting classes were ranked down in the 40s. But along came some good recruiters with Saban and team, and they have built up good momentum that tends to help keep it going. But if the recruiting slacks off even in the midst of their success right now, it will eventually catch up just like it did with UT in the mid 2000s.

If it were due to institution alone, then Tennessee, Alabama, Michigan, Notre Dame, Nebraska, Oklahoma, etc would never have a down year or down era in recruiting, and would always be in the top 10. These schools have always had the name brand to bring in 5 star talent at any time, but some flounder for years with sub-par recruiting.
 
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#7
#7
Great lay out and easy to understand ...Nice job.Nice to be able to read sumthing and not feel like I'm trying to crack the Zodiak.
 
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#8
#8
He’ll be a great recruiter.

Least of my worries right now.

I’m just ready to see that translate into wins.
 
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#10
#10
At this point, my only concern is not having an experienced full time offensive play caller on the staff. That's a pretty big concern, but everything else is looking and sounding great so far.
 
#15
#15
14VolFan88 said:
Top 5 class next year would say a lot.
Click to expand...

Not really. Butch Jones did that his 2nd year as well. And that was with much less in the way of instate talent and way less name recognition with recruits and coaches in the South. Jeremy Pruitt has way more name recognition and the talent instate is WAY BETTER in 2019 than it was in 2014.

We should be fighting Georgia, Alabama, and Ohio State for the #1 recruiting class in 2019 with THIS STAFF and the talent we have instate.
 
#18
#18
Honestly, the 247 rankings for individual assistants are pretty useless. The rankings seem to fluctuate extremely wildly from year to year (Greg Schiano, for example, went from 225th to 2nd in a single year) and the way they appear to be measuring it (attaching specific recruits to specific assistants) seems way too simplistic.
 
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#21
#21
UTRavens said:
Honestly, the 247 rankings for individual assistants are pretty useless. The rankings seem to fluctuate extremely wildly from year to year (Greg Schiano, for example, went from 225th to 2nd in a single year) and the way they appear to be measuring it (attaching specific recruits to specific assistants) seems way too simplistic.
Click to expand...

Yes, so are recruit rankings.

Josh Dobbs was a 3 star. Played like a 5 star.
Crompton was the NO. 2 QB in his class behind Mark Sanchez. Sanchez played his career in the NFL, Crompton played in the CFL.

Colt McCoy was #15 in that class
 
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