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Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Fun With Numbers: How Bad Was It Really?

Georgia's overall class didn't provide enough "points" to rate up there with the biggest of the big boys, but let's take a closer look. This is all based off of Scout's rankings:

Of the top 25 classes, Georgia signed the third fewest number of players at just 19. If you take away Lonnie Outlaw, who will go to GMC, then Georgia is tied for the fewest with Ohio State and USC. Penn State (20 signees) was the only other team in the top 25 with fewer than 22.

Of the 11 other SEC schools, none had fewer than 24 commitments.

If you go simply by the average number of stars for a class, Georgia scored a 3.47 -- the second-highest total in the SEC and the ninth-best mark overall.

Figure that the odds of a highly regarded recruit panning out in college are better than a lower-tier guy, and it's certainly quite possible that, despite a lower ranking overall, the impact of this class will be as good as any in the SEC (with the possible exception of the ridiculous haul Florida came up with).

And, as we discussed at length last week, much of this stuff doesn't turn out to mean a whole lot in four years anyway. Go back and look at the top-100 guys UGA has gotten over the years. It's at best a 50-50 shot of whether they make a real impact.

Anyway, here's a run down of the rest of the SEC (minus Vandy, who was the only team not ranked in the national top 50), plus Georgia Tech.

School Scout
Rank
Total
Commits
5-stars
4-starsCombined
Avg.
Florida 1 28 516
21 3.89
Alabama 4 29 2 14 16 3.38
Auburn 5 32 3 10 13 3.34
LSU 6 29 0 12 12 3.34
Ole Miss
14 25 1 6 6 3.24
Tennessee 15 25 1 7 8 3.24
Georgia 21 19 1 9 10 3.47
S. Carolina
34 24 1 1 2 2.88
Arkansas 36 26 0 1 1 2.65
Miss. State
38 26 0 3 3 2.58
Georgia Tech
40 18 0 3 3 3.00
Kentucky 46 25 0 1 1 2.68

(*Note, Rodney Garner discussed the SEC's new rule that a team cannot sign more than 28 players without a penalty. There are caveats though when you consider junior college guys and counting some signees toward the previous year. But yes, Auburn, LSU and Alabama could potentially have to take a hit next year due to oversigning this year.)

2 comments:

BenG said...

We missed out on a few big ones, but I think we still hauled in a solid, if small, class. People are just freaking out because of the last-minute attrition, the loss of a potentially great receiver, and the fact that the hated Gators cleaned up like they did. It stings, but it isn't the end of the world. Now let's see what our newly revamped coaching staff can mold from this clay.

Left to Right said...

Thanks for the info, but using the Rivals "average star" rankings we finished 6th in the SEC and 13th overall.

I am beginning to despair of ever being able to win more than 20% of the time against Florida. The Gators have become a hard cap on the level of success for this program. Even beating them this year won't change that.