4 and 5 Star Players On This Team

[Youngsta71701]

The worst thing that's gone on is the misuse of Agim. He should be a dominant force but he's hamstrung by game plan.

Exactly, Agim is a penetrator yet they wanted him to hold the point. SMH...

[Youngsta71701]

A lot of freshmen, redshirt freshmen, and sophomores on this list.

That's true, but it's funny how those same type of players seem to perform well on other teams but not Arkansas.

[Youngsta71701]

TJ is not the best RB. Fastest, sure. But not best

The best all around back has proven to be Williams. Who would've thunk it.

[Youngsta71701]

No there isn't.  Take Hjalte Froholdt, for instance.  He was 4*, but he plays like a low 2*.  He is representative of the entire roster.

Uh, maybe because he's playing out of position. Have you thought about that any? He's a Defensive Tackle not and Offensive Guard.

[Youngsta71701]

Agim needs to be playing at around 270lbs.

Yep, between 270-275

[Youngsta71701]

There is no way in hell Austin Allen was a 4 Star QB.  The spotlight should now be moving from the coaches and players to the people who decide how many stars are "awarded' to each prospect's ranking

Yep, he was a 4 star on ESPN. Don't forget how good he was coming out of Fayetteville. He was just as good if not better than his brother in high school.

[Cinco de Hogo]

Man why can't some of you at least give a little creedance to the ideal that this coaching staff didn't exactly do a good job developing players?  Let wait til next year and see what happens before throwing player under the bus just because you got a "thing" for BB.

You guys sound like Hogsanity after Petrino was fired, he didn't stop harping on The players Petrino left until every last one of them was gone.

[hogsanity]

When looking at player ratings you have to take some things into consideration. Who did they play against in HS/ Ty played in 3a, not the greatest high school football for sure. Dude always looked like a 22 yr old man playing against 14 yr olds. But did his overwhelming physical talent ( compared to those he was on the field with ) give a false sense of his abilities? Another things is, rating services can just flat out be wrong. And, also, what did the staff do to try to develop the players.

All of these things go into whether a player lives up to the hype of not.

[31to6]

Yep, he was a 4 star on ESPN. Don't forget how good he was coming out of Fayetteville. He was just as good if not better than his brother in high school.

Brandon had everything that Austin does not: a decent OL, a dominant running game, experienced NFL tight-ends, and a solid cadre of WRs.

We will never know if AA would have been better or not.

[cjack]

When looking at player ratings you have to take some things into consideration. Who did they play against in HS/ Ty played in 3a, not the greatest high school football for sure. Dude always looked like a 22 yr old man playing against 14 yr olds. But did his overwhelming physical talent ( compared to those he was on the field with ) give a false sense of his abilities? Another things is, rating services can just flat out be wrong. And, also, what did the staff do to try to develop the players.

All of these things go into whether a player lives up to the hype of not.

Come on Hogsanity.  This is your bread and butter.  Tell them why and how we don't have talent and never will at Arkansas.  Are the recruiting rankings just wrong on the 4 and 5 star guys we get or are they wrong on the teams you use in your arguments against Arkansas?

[hogsanity]

Come on Hogsanity.  This is your bread and butter.  Tell them why and how we don't have talent and never will at Arkansas.  Are the recruiting rankings just wrong on the 4 and 5 star guys we get or are they wrong on the teams you use in your arguments against Arkansas?

I have never said the Hogs do not get 4 and occasionally 5 star players. What I have said is they do not get nearly enough of them, especially on defense.

On the list of 22 4 & 5 star players that was posted of these players on this Hog team, there were no lb's or db's. Also, I believe 2 of them were qbs, so only 1 is going to be on the field. Not sure what the breakdown was by position otherwise.

At a real contender, if the LG goes down, and he was a 4 star, they likely have another 4 star to put in his place. If the mlb goes down, they likely have another 4 star to put in his place. At AR if a LB goes down, we have a walkon to put in.

I have always said it is a question of lack of talent on the back 8 of the d, and lack of quality depth all over the field.

[hogginbama]

Come on Hogsanity.  This is your bread and butter.  Tell them why and how we don't have talent and never will at Arkansas.  Are the recruiting rankings just wrong on the 4 and 5 star guys we get or are they wrong on the teams you use in your arguments against Arkansas?

I think a lot of it has to do with overall development. Take Alabama for example, since they are the measuring stick of all things related to college football. Their 4-5 star players practice each and every day against other 4-5 star players, similar to Kentucky in basketball. If I hone my skills each and every day against someone that is just as good physically and mentally as myself, I will get better through the daily competition. Put me against someone who is 1-2 stars lower than me, then I only have to give half effort to beat them and look good. This is where internal and external motivation comes into play. As we get more highly rated players, the competition in practice will inherently make all the players better. Without a boatload of 4-5 stars across the board, the coaching staff must push the players harder to improve. They must hold them to a higher level of excellence across the board when on the practice and game field.

[Cementhog]

So just a question but who's fault is this? Enos or BB? Has BB made the call with these guys or is it Enos calling the shots. Not that it matters at this point. The scheme for the hogs has been all over the place this year. If you could even call what we did a scheme. Looks like they will both be gone so it doesn't really matter. I would just like to hear what Enos has to say after it is all said and done.

[HogFanOSU]

I think a lot of it has to do with overall development. Take Alabama for example, since they are the measuring stick of all things related to college football. Their 4-5 star players practice each and every day against other 4-5 star players, similar to Kentucky in basketball. If I hone my skills each and every day against someone that is just as good physically and mentally as myself, I will get better through the daily competition. Put me against someone who is 1-2 stars lower than me, then I only have to give half effort to beat them and look good. This is where internal and external motivation comes into play. As we get more highly rated players, the competition in practice will inherently make all the players better. Without a boatload of 4-5 stars across the board, the coaching staff must push the players harder to improve. They must hold them to a higher level of excellence across the board when on the practice and game field.

Exactly! The #2 team in the country right now may be Alabama's 2nd string.

[IronHog]

I think a lot of it has to do with overall development. Take Alabama for example, since they are the measuring stick of all things related to college football. Their 4-5 star players practice each and every day against other 4-5 star players, similar to Kentucky in basketball. If I hone my skills each and every day against someone that is just as good physically and mentally as myself, I will get better through the daily competition. Put me against someone who is 1-2 stars lower than me, then I only have to give half effort to beat them and look good. This is where internal and external motivation comes into play. As we get more highly rated players, the competition in practice will inherently make all the players better. Without a boatload of 4-5 stars across the board, the coaching staff must push the players harder to improve. They must hold them to a higher level of excellence across the board when on the practice and game field.

Great roids too

[IronHog]

I have never said the Hogs do not get 4 and occasionally 5 star players. What I have said is they do not get nearly enough of them, especially on defense.

On the list of 22 4 & 5 star players that was posted of these players on this Hog team, there were no lb's or db's. Also, I believe 2 of them were qbs, so only 1 is going to be on the field. Not sure what the breakdown was by position otherwise.

At a real contender, if the LG goes down, and he was a 4 star, they likely have another 4 star to put in his place. If the mlb goes down, they likely have another 4 star to put in his place. At AR if a LB goes down, we have a walkon to put in.

I have always said it is a question of lack of talent on the back 8 of the d, and lack of quality depth all over the field.

BP had the #1 dB class one year


So it can be done.....with Jucos

[colbs]

Thank you for pointing this out; excellent post and point. Wish I could find the link , but a month or so ago someone on tigerdroppings had a comparison of talent for all 14 teams in SEC .  There were two teams that separated themselves from the "log jam" and they were Alabama and UGA. 3-9 literally had a spread of maybe 6 or 7 in total number of 4stars per roster . Put it this way; we only had two less four stars than Florida. A&M maybe had 4-5 more than us on roster, it was a very telling roster comparison. My first impression was,  how in the hell are we performing like this?

This can't be right.  Auburn has over 40 so almost twice as many as Arkansas.  LSU, Tennessee, A&M, and Florida all recruit in the same range. I will guess they all have upper 30's to 40's. 

[greenie]

Thank you for pointing this out; excellent post and point. Wish I could find the link , but a month or so ago someone on tigerdroppings had a comparison of talent for all 14 teams in SEC .  There were two teams that separated themselves from the "log jam" and they were Alabama and UGA. 3-9 literally had a spread of maybe 6 or 7 in total number of 4stars per roster . Put it this way; we only had two less four stars than Florida. A&M maybe had 4-5 more than us on roster, it was a very telling roster comparison. My first impression was,  how in the hell are we performing like this?

This might be true if all 4*'s were created equal. Our 4* players are all in the lower half of the range, and most are the lower quarter.  In 2017, the average 247 recruit rating was Arkansas = 86.02, Florida = 89.11, aTm = 87.93, Alabama = 93.76, Auburn = 89.34, LSU = 91.05, MSU = 86.11, OM = 86.06, Ken = 86.04, MU = 84.59, Vandy = 83.40, Georgia = 92.27, USC = 87.14, Tenn = 87.24.

If you look at a population distribution of the 3*, 4*, and 5* players. It looks like the graph below.  There is approximately 2250 players making up 3*-5* (from 2017 data).  You can see that as you get into 3*, you really are getting into the "general" population of athletes considered to be D1, and many of these will not even make to an FBS team.  I also marked on the graph where each SEC team's 2017 class average would be against the distribution.  It may not look like aTm and Florida are that much better, but that is deceiving. Both of their averages fall much closer to the "elite" area...that area where there are far fewer players (the graph gets close to the bottom). 

My point is that just looking at the number of 4* is not a good indicator of the available talent pool on your team.  Even this analysis is somewhat subjective, but I believe it gives a better indicator of the talent distribution across the SEC.

[31to6]

This might be true if all 4*'s were created equal. Our 4* players are all in the lower half of the range, and most are the lower quarter.  In 2017, the average 247 recruit rating was Arkansas = 86.02, Florida = 89.11, aTm = 87.93, Alabama = 93.76, Auburn = 89.34, LSU = 91.05, MSU = 86.11, OM = 86.06, Ken = 86.04, MU = 84.59, Vandy = 83.40, Georgia = 92.27, USC = 87.14, Tenn = 87.24.

To put this into perspective, CBB has only recruited 6 players in 5 years that are higher rated than Alabama's *average* (Alex Collins, Hunter Henry, Bijhon Jackson, Brian Wallace, Devwah Whaley and McTelvin Agim).

[Piggfoot]

So basically the graph posted by greenie points out our relative standing in the SEC. If we want to be better we have to recruit better regardless of the coach.
Of course this is only for 2017.
We're not going to be in the top half of the SEC we recruit better and that is on the coaches. People rant that we have the talent but we simply do not. Our fans had rather point at the coaches for not coaching our players up. Certainly there is enough fault to blame the coaches but it is their inability to bring better players to Arkansas.

[31to6]

So basically the graph posted by greenie points out our relative standing in the SEC. If we want to be better we have to recruit better regardless of the coach.
Of course this is only for 2017.
We're not going to be in the top half of the SEC we recruit better and that is on the coaches. People rant that we have the talent but we simply do not. Our fans had rather point at the coaches for not coaching our players up. Certainly there is enough fault to blame the coaches but it is their inability to bring better players to Arkansas.

So I am wiling to accept that there are probably players in Arkansas who are under-rated. For example, most recruiting scouts will not rate a player in a low classification as high as they would someone who has faced better competition. Also, a lot of our in-state players don't get to make it to a lot of camps to be evaluated (and scouted by recruiting services). But what if that 3-A player actually is as good as they seem? What if they are even better once they get the benefits of an SEC training staff and position coaching? Riskier than just piling up highly-rated guys that *also* evaluate well when the coaches see them in person, but viable for sure.

So I don't think it is hopeless. We've beaten "more talented" teams in the past and we will continue to do so given quality coaching and developing underrated players.

But yes, there just aren't enough diamonds in the rough to expect to beat the top 5-6 programs regularly. We either need a couple Ace recruiters to drag our classes up into the top-15, or we need to cheat like hell, or we need a +wins coach. (As in, a coach who regularly wins 1-2 more games per season than their recruiting rankings would suggest.)

CBP was a +wins coach. Other good examples are Dabo, Gundy, Bob Stoops, Fuente, Petersen, Leach, Snyder, etc... Ironically, Wisconsin routinely outperforms their recruiting, which is why CBB was a "good hire" on paper.

Good link using FPI for comparison: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/which-college-football-teams-do-the-most-with-the-least-talent-and-vice-versa/

[greenie]

Good link using FPI for comparison: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/which-college-football-teams-do-the-most-with-the-least-talent-and-vice-versa/

Very interesting link.  Thanks.