Recruiting Site Accuracy

Recruiting
1

As most everyone knows, I gravitate toward ESPN for basketball recruiting accuracy. Thought it would it be fun to examine our past 5 recruiting classes and the various ranking assessed to each player in an effort to bring some clarity.

My subjective findings pretty much support what I initially thought - ESPN is the most accurate

2010 (didn’t count Christian because he was post-grad): ESPN was obviously the most accurate with regard to THJ and Horford. ESPN and Scout were pretty much a wash on Smot, with Rivals being far too high. Overall, I think ESPN was the most accurate for this class, Scout second, and Rivals third.

ESPN:
THJ - 4 star/#93 overall
Smotrycz - 4 star/#84 Overall
Horford - 2 star/#76 PF

Scout:
THJ - 3 star/#36 SG
Smotrycz - 4 star/#98 overall
Horford - 3 star/#42 PF

Rivals:
THJ - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)
Smotrycz - 4 star/#59 overall
Horford - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)

2011: ESPN & Scout were the most accurate on Trey, with Rivals having him way too low. ESPN was the most accurate with Beilfeldt. Rivals was the most accurate with Brundidge, and ESPN had him too high. I think ESPN was the most accurate (were better than the other 2 services for 2 players), with Scout and Rivals pretty much even, but Rivals was horrible in their take on Trey.

ESPN:
Burke - 4 star/#84 overall
Brundidge - 4 star/#75 overall
Bielfeldt - 2 star/#72 PF

Scout:
Burke - 4 star/#94 overall
Brundidge - 4 star/#98 overall
Bielfeldt - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)

Rivals:
Burke - 3 star/#142 overall
Brundidge - 4 star/#106 overall
Bielfeldt - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)

2012: Mitch was a wash by all sites. ESPN & Rivals clearly more accurate for Nik. Rivals was a bit too high on GR3, while Scout was the most accurate. ESPN was the worst for Caris, while Rivals & Scout were the most accurate. ESPN was the worst for Spike, with Scout and Rivals pretty much nailing it. I think Scout & Rivals did an equally accurate job, while ESPN was the worst based on their Caris & Spike underranking.

ESPN:
GR3 - 5 star/#18 overall
McGary - 4 star/#27 overall
Stauskas - 4 star/#76 overall
Levert - 2 star/#69 SG
Spike - 1 star/#112 PG

Scout:
GR3 - 4 star/#29 overall
McGary - 4 star/#26 overall
Stauskas - 3 star/no position rank (Generic 3 star)
Levert - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)
Spike - not ranked at all

Rivals:
GR3 - 5 star/#11 overall
McGary - 4 star/#30 overall
Stauskas - 4 star/#71 overall
Levert - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)
Spike - 3 star/no position rank (generic 3 star)

2013: Walton was a wash by all site. Scout clearly the most accurate on Irvin, with ESPN & Rivals basically the same. Rivals the most accurate on Donnal, with Scout and ESPN behind. I think Scout was the most accurate this year, with ESPN & Rivals being a wash (their numbers on Donnal & Irvin are almost identical).

ESPN:
Irvin - 5 star/#22 overall
Walton - 4 star/#30 overall
Donnal - 4 star/#89 overall

Scout:
Irvin -4 star/#51 overall
Walton -4 star/#43 overall
Donnal - 4 star/#93 overall

Rivals:
Irvin - 4 star/#24 overall
Walton - 4 star/#37 overall
Donnal - 4 star/#111 overall

2014: Pretty obvious all the site had Kam way overranked, but ESPN was the most accurate. ESPN was also the most accurate with Doyle, ranking him just outside the top 100 rather than the generic 3 star status. ESPN was certainly the most accurate for Wilson, with Scout being way off. Really can’t tell with Dawkins or MAAR yet. Overall, I think ESPN was by far the most accurate, with Scout being the worst.

ESPN:
Chatman -4 star/#38 overall
Doyle - 3 star/#22 Center
Wilson - 3 star/#41 PF
Dawkins - 3 star/no position rank
MAAR - 2 star/#102 SG

Scout:
Chatman -4 star/#23 overall
Doyle - 3 star/no position rank
Wilson - 4 star/#68 overall
Dawkins - Not Ranked at all
MAAR - 3 star/no position rank

Rivals:
Chatman - 4 star/#25 overall
Doyle - 3 star/no position rank
Wilson - 4 star/#86 overall
Dawkins - 3 star/no position rank
MAAR - 3 star/no position rank

2

This is solid work. But I wonder how you could dig deeper, to investigate who is performing the rankings/evaluations? You hear people say Nike is better than Adidas, then you read that Nike is suing Adidas because it stole two designers away and they may have trade secrets. My uncle, a car designer, was hired away from Chrysler by Ford. It’s not really “ESPN,” per se, that is doing the rankings, it’s human beings at ESPN. Who are they? If ESPN is more accurate over a long period, one’s hat is especially off–they are making great hires. Otherwise, bowing to one corporate entity over another could be a mistake. What kind of resources and criteria do they bring to the work? Do they value some useful young player traits over others? If we figure that out we can improve our own evaluative skills.

3
This is solid work. But I wonder how you could dig deeper, to investigate who is performing the rankings/evaluations? You hear people say Nike is better than Adidas, then you read that Nike is suing Adidas because it stole two designers away and they may have trade secrets. My uncle, a car designer, was hired away from Chrysler by Ford. It's not really "ESPN," per se, that is doing the rankings, it's human beings at ESPN. Who are they? If ESPN is more accurate over a long period, one's hat is especially off--they are making great hires. Otherwise, bowing to one corporate entity over another could be a mistake. What kind of resources and criteria do they bring to the work? Do they value some useful young player traits over others? If we figure that out we can improve our own evaluative skills.

I think the ranking criteria quetion is a really good one…wish I had the answer. Is NBA potential involved, or strictly college production projection, athelticism weight vs skill weight, age…it could go on forever.

ESPN is under the guide of Paul Biancardi to the best of my knowledge, I think Eric Bossi runs Rivals, while Evan Daniels runs Scout.

4

This is why I tend to rely most on the composite rankings.

5
This is why I tend to rely most on the composite rankings.

I don’t like relying on 247 Composite rankings, because they factor in outliers such as Burke being #142 on Rivals, or Wilson being #68 by Scout. Those type of rankings are so far away from reality that it just totally skews the mean number to something that isn’t a true reflection.

6

Thanks for compiling that list, Mattd. My take is all 3 are not very reliably accurate. They all more or less missed on Burke, Brundidge, Stauskas, Levert, Spike, Chatman, Doyle, THJ. They are all accurate enough on GR3, Mcgary, Walton, Horford, Smotrycz, and Biefeldt. I think time will show that they missed on MAAR and Dawkins and I really hope Chatman puts his talents together so he does not prove to be overrated. Oh, and I think Wilson will prove to be a player that is more appropriately placed as a 4 star not a 3 star.

7
Thanks for compiling that list, Mattd. My take is all 3 are not very reliably accurate. They all more or less missed on Burke, Brundidge, Stauskas, Levert, Spike, Chatman, Doyle, THJ. They are all accurate enough on GR3, Mcgary, Walton, Horford, Smotrycz, and Biefeldt. I think time will show that they missed on MAAR and Dawkins and I really hope Chatman puts his talents together so he does not prove to be overrated. Oh, and I think Wilson will prove to be a player that is more appropriately placed as a 4 star not a 3 star.

I think the proper question is not whether any given site missed, but how badly did they miss?

For example, Burke (Rivals), Smot (Rivals), Stauskas (Scout), Wilson (Scout), Brundidge (ESPN)…are pretty extreme misses. They all miss, but in my opinion, Rivals missed big more than the other sites, whereas ESPN is the most accurate.

8

I agree. Based on this list of players, ESPN has a slight edge in accuracy, Scout is the next most accurate, Rivals is the least accurate. I do find it interesting that if you look at the wildly misranked players: THJ, Burke, Brundidge, Stauskas, Levert, And Spike. They are all uniformly over ranked or under ranked…Suggesting there is not a lot of analysis independent of each other.

9
I agree. Based on this list of players, ESPN has a slight edge in accuracy, Scout is the next most accurate, Rivals is the least accurate. I do find it interesting that if you look at the wildly misranked players: THJ, Burke, Brundidge, Stauskas, Levert, And Spike. They are all uniformly over ranked or under ranked....Suggesting there is not a lot of analysis independent of each other.

I think the common thread with all of those players is this…it is extremely difficult to predict whether a “just skills” type player (meaning they aren’t really athletic) can translate to the college game, especially in the case of a guard/wing. THJ is the outlier here, as he was an above average athlete in HS.

10

For practical purpose recruits ranked 1-10 are safe bets. If you have a player ranked 11-200 then it is wise to evaluate players independent of what the ranking services say. Luckily for Michigan, Beilein and staff appear to be good at evaluating talent and potential.

11
For practical purpose recruits ranked 1-10 are safe bets. If you have a player ranked 11-200 then it is wise to evaluate players independent of what the ranking services say. Luckily for Michigan, Beilein and staff appear to be good at evaluating talent and potential.

Always best to evaluate the film (and in person if possible) independent of recruiting sites. Big reason why I’m high on Levi Cook regardless of his 3 star ranking to Rivals and Scout

12

Corrections: Chatman was a 5 star on scout, Irvin a 5 star on rivals. Those are the two that stuck out to me. Not that it changes anything.

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Corrections: Chatman was a 5 star on scout, Irvin a 5 star on rivals. Those are the two that stuck out to me. Not that it changes anything.

Thanks for corrections. Number of stars doesn’t do anything for me either, overall ranking takes priority. Some sites are just more greedy, or giving, with stars.

For me Burke, Irvin, and Chatman were the most obvious candidates for extremely poor evaluation…interesting that Rivals was involved with all 3.

14
This is why I tend to rely most on the composite rankings.

I don’t like relying on 247 Composite rankings, because they factor in outliers such as Burke being #142 on Rivals, or Wilson being #68 by Scout. Those type of rankings are so far away from reality that it just totally skews the mean number to something that isn’t a true reflection.

But that is the point. The outliers get diluted but can still be relevant. Since we can’t know until the player gets to college which rankings were correct how do you know if the outlier is wrong or not?

15
This is why I tend to rely most on the composite rankings.

I don’t like relying on 247 Composite rankings, because they factor in outliers such as Burke being #142 on Rivals, or Wilson being #68 by Scout. Those type of rankings are so far away from reality that it just totally skews the mean number to something that isn’t a true reflection.

But that is the point. The outliers get diluted but can still be relevant. Since we can’t know until the player gets to college which rankings were correct how do you know if the outlier is wrong or not?

You certainly raise a valid point…but for me, it was fairly obvious that a guy like Irvin was EXTREMELY overrated as a 5 star, much the same it was fairlly obvious that a guy like Trey was EXTREMELY underrated at #142. Wilson was really overrated by Scout to the point where #68 was very questionable as well.

16

Way too early to critique the rankings of the 2014 class, especially as it pertains to Wilson.

17
Way too early to critique the rankings of the 2014 class, especially as it pertains to Wilson.

Not in my opinion, as a top 100 player (Rivals/Scout), you should at least look competent on the court. There have been times where Chatman and Wilson don’t even look worthy of D1 scholarships…I fully expect them to improve, but I don’t think there is any doubt that Kam was extremely overrated, and I think the “2 and done” projections on Wilson were extremely far fetched as well.

18

DJ Wilson played 24 minutes total. It’s ridiculous to make any sort of judgment on his game right now.

19
DJ Wilson played 24 minutes total. It's ridiculous to make any sort of judgment on his game right now.

In your opinion it may be, but in my opinion, the fact that he’s only played 24 minutes is all the reason why he should be judged. Granted, nearly all of that is due to injury (although he could play at this point, and has been healthy enough to play for at least a week), he didn’t look good when he was on the court, and that’s being generous.

No way in hell was that kid the #68 player in the country in my opinion. Damn sure not a 2 and done

20

No. 68 players are supposed to be 2 and done? Wilson was hurt all summer and then got hurt two weeks into the season. He’s taking a redshirt as almost everyone said he would, probably including Scout.

Did he look like he had no idea what was going on? Probably for 18 of those 24 minutes, yes. But that’s to be expected at that point when you have barely had a chance to practice.