[Cracked Sidewalks] Top 20 Recruiting Classes - Ranked

[CrackedSidewalksSays]

Top 20 Recruiting Classes - Ranked

Written by: noreply@blogger.com (mu_hilltopper)


http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/2008/07/top-20-recruiting-classes-ranked.html

[bilsu]

Delsman and Neary were both walkons. I not sure  they should be considered part of the recruiting class. Lloyd Walton was a junior college transfer Like Butler and Fulce. He did not sit out a year like statement that he was activiated seems to indicate.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Great stuff by Pudner and Hilltopper

[ATWizJr]

Kojis?

[mu_hilltopper]

The only credit I can take is not wanting to do it myself, and finding someone else to do it: Pudner.  With his book coming out, he is an attention whore. 

As for Kojis .. great players might not show up at all, if their recruiting classmates weren't any good. 

[Tugg Speedman]

The recruiting class Buzz Williams has produced in his first couple of months looks like it could be one of the greatest recruiting classes in MU history. We won't know until their careers have all concluded, but the signees have spurred some posts on the greatest recruiting classes so far.


Question about this methodology.  This is a ranking of RECRUITING classes.  Shouldn't the criteria for judging RECRUITING classes be what we know about them BEFORE they start their career?

Instead what was done here was rank CLASSES only.  The difference is players outperfrom and underperform.  Coaches do a good and bad job.  Players get injured and others don't.  A lot goes into the sucess/failure of a class other than recruiting.

Given this distinction, could not a ranking of recruting class be done based on the incoming reputation of the signees?  And if so, where would the 2008 class rank using this criteria?

[ATWizJr]

cany you tell me where Kojis was ranked among all players, or can I only get that by buying the book?

[NYWarrior]

cany you tell me where Kojis was ranked among all players, or can I only get that by buying the book?

here is the link to Pudner's top 100 players of all-time

http://www.crackedsidewalks.com/search/label/Top%20100

[1990Warrior]

An alternative would be to use averages than sums.  This would penalize for recruiting stiffs which waste schollies.
Here is what happens (to the top 10) if you use averages instead of sums:

1951 1960 1978 2005 1932 1972 1990 1975 2001 1970

21.18 24.52 24.58 26.35 27.86666667 27.9 30.975 35.06666667 35.36666667 36.475

[mu_hilltopper]

Instead what was done here was rank CLASSES only.  The difference is players outperfrom and underperform.  Coaches do a good and bad job.  Players get injured and others don't.  A lot goes into the sucess/failure of a class other than recruiting.

Given this distinction, could not a ranking of recruting class be done based on the incoming reputation of the signees?  And if so, where would the 2008 class rank using this criteria?

Perhaps Pudner could chime in about that one .. but I'd guess that access to those records would be very difficult to uncover beyond the past ~10 years.

(Anyone know how many stars Jim Chones had from Rivals.com?  Ohhhh, right, Rivals wasn't around back then.) 

[MR.HAYWARD]

WOW!!

What an absolute waste of time and energy, additionally as was discussed last week recruitng classes are rated before they ever step foot on campus.  Now I realize the RSCI has probably not been around for 60+ years but to rate a recruitng class based on waht they did in college is simply wrong  it is not how it is done.

Secondly, I am only speaking my mind and I am sure the indivdual spent some time and made some difficult decisions but asfter the Top 100 list which i could barely read it was so inaccurate and poorly done it gives 0 credibility to this list, which I will not even read.   Anyone can make a list .

[ChicosBailBonds]

WOW!!

What an absolute waste of time and energy, additionally as was discussed last week recruitng classes are rated before they ever step foot on campus.  Now I realize the RSCI has probably not been around for 60+ years but to rate a recruitng class based on waht they did in college is simply wrong  it is not how it is done.

Secondly, I am only speaking my mind and I am sure the indivdual spent some time and made some difficult decisions but asfter the Top 100 list which i could barely read it was so inaccurate and poorly done it gives 0 credibility to this list, which I will not even read.   Anyone can make a list .

When does your book come out Hayward? 

[MR.HAYWARD]

so are you saying you become an authority by writing a book?

[ChicosBailBonds]

Nope, but I will give credit to the man for at least putting in the effort, creating a system of evaluation and then publishing it.  He could be totally off, he will certainly incur some disagreements, but to suggest it's a total waste of time and effort is really for him to decide don't you think?

I applaud Mr. Pudner for writing a book and having it published.  Should be an interesting read.

[bamamarquettefan]

Hey - couple of notes. No, writing a book does not make one an expert, but to some degree going through every source I could get my hands on from 1917 on and compiling info on every player does.  I certainly agree there were some whiffs on the original Top 100, but I was amazed when I went out to Anaheim how many people had read the list.  It was good criticism from many MU fans that got me researching the holes I had.  And by researching, I mean finishing my typical 13 hour work day, THEN going through info from 10 p.m. to 3 a.m.  So the best criticism would be making fun of me for getting obsessed with this.  Once I had compiled the stats and notes for all 669 players, there were times I cringed and said to myself, "ouch, that guy really didn't belong anywhere near the Top 100," but in most cases I believe the stats confirmed the player was about as good as I thought.

I wrote the book for myself.  I simply accumulated so much info after going through everyone's criticism and praise of the original Top 100 that I had to organize it into a ordered story of MU basketball from Al Delmore and the 1917 team to watching MU lose on my birthday to Stanford last year.  Now when I hear any MU player mentioned I will just open my book to the index in the back and see the years the player played, and what he did during those years.  Hey, other people can ignore it, they can come trash me in person next Saturday morning at the Ambassador, or they can take a look at the book themselves (www.collegeprowler.com/basketball) but regardless it was fun as heck putting it together and getting rid of all the "holes" in my knowledge of MU hoops.

Anytime anyone ranks players on any basis - which I've done for major newspapers in the past - it generates a lot of criticism, but they used to make fun of baseball statician Bill James for simplifying player's values by crunching the numbers - until the Red Sox hired him and finally won the World Series.

As for rating the classes based on how good they were supposed to be coming out of high school, versus how good they turned out to be, I just disagree on that count.  But regardless, I certainly am NOT an expert when it comes to evaluated talent, only crunching the numbers after the fact.

[ChicosBailBonds]

Thanks again for your efforts Bama.  I'm in total agreement on when to judge a recruiting class as well.  Some would like to judge it before they've done anything but that seems silly as hell to me.

When I hire someone I may think it was a good hire, but I don't truly know until years down the road.  That's when I can truly say it was a good hire.  No different with recruiting classes, elected politicians, a brand new car or anything else.  Judging them at the outset doesn't truly give you the complete picture.  How many vehicles have people purchased that sure seemed great for 10,000 miles until....  How many politicians were going to save the world until....  How many recruiting classes on paper would take someone to the promised land until....


Keep up the good work.  Congratulations on the book.

[bamamarquettefan]

Kojis was a one-man class, so even though he was one of the Top 10 of all time, there was noone else recruited that year so he can't be a Top 10 class by himself.  MU got Moran and McCoy two years before him, then Mangham and Kollar the year before, so that was the great 1959 team that went Sweet 16.

Then when those four were done, MU brought in Erickson, Glaser, Hornak and Nixon - a very solid class that played one year with Kojis.

[77ncaachamps]

What a book...

Geez...it would be great to assimilate the info with MUWiki to make a SUPER MUWiki!

[augoman]

Delsman and Neary were both walkons. I not sure  they should be considered part of the recruiting class. Lloyd Walton was a junior college transfer Like Butler and Fulce. He did not sit out a year like statement that he was activiated seems to indicate.

actually both were hotly recruited, and lack of schollys aat the time resulted in the 'walk-on'.  according to coach Raymonds, Neary had his heart set on going to Valpo, and initially, he was not particularly happy that his parents and Coach Al won out.

[MR.HAYWARD]

HEy Bama,  please do not take offense to my post, in fact I noted that you probably spent a ot of time and effort on it and as a n Mu fan myself I congratulate you on that, love the dedication of an Mu fan. 
My post though clearly stated nothing against the man, moreso against the basis upon the decison making...My big gripe with the top 100 list was too much empahisis on certain things I would have diminished etc.  But again kudos on the effort I simply strongly disagreed with the basis and therfore many of the rankings.
Lastly, Agin since recruitng classes are ranked before they step foot on campus always have always will be...the very fact that it is based on success on the collge level deems it null and void.

Part of the reason I beleive "experts" and others including myself look at rsci's and other recruiting rankings is becuse it measure s the strenght, breadth, and perception and ability of a school to go and get thoise kids that everyone wants.  Now I will be the first to say that they are not scientific and upside and potential, and attitude and commitment etcetc are all huge factors in a players performance come junior or senior year and there are players like a abraham, or mccaskill, or tony miller etc  that will never be rated at the top of a espn 100 but ended up as solid players.  note they were all oneil kids, the true master of the diamond in the rough at MU. 
Nevertheless, a recruiting ranking assesses the perception of a school and a coaches ability to seal the deal ...now these guys might be absolute busts, but for the most part they end up as solid contributors...show me the last top 100 Mu recruit that was a bust.  When a coach can go in and sign enought top 100 kids to end up with a top 10 type class it says a whole lot about the current status of the program and the recruiting and that is all that should measure.  now if you want to come up with some other measure that focuses on development of players, retention of players, ability to stay eleigible how well they performed during their tenure that may well better measure the actual hands on ability of a program to produce players.  I think your list confuses the two.   

[RawdogDX]

Thanks again for your efforts Bama.  I'm in total agreement on when to judge a recruiting class as well.  Some would like to judge it before they've done anything but that seems silly as hell to me.

As someone who loves semantical arguments I would say that Best should be judged later on.  What I think most people who say to do it before game one are thinking of is Highest Rated.   
Highest rated - class with the best national rankings among it's recruits
Best - class that does the most to carry the team and succeed on the court.

This seems like a pretty simple way to break the argument into two distinct parts.
Obviously 'Best' is more important, 'highest rated' is like preseason rankings.  You can get excited about them if you want but it really won't matter till the games start.

[NYWarrior]

since recruitng classes are ranked before they step foot on campus always have always will be...

That's half true.......'ranking' recruiting classes is a relatively new metric that began somewhere in the middle of Pudner's era of evaluation.  It is difficult to assess where recruiting classes stack up nationally going back decades; classes just weren't tracked as feverishly as they are now.  With that in mind, analyzing a larger pool of recruiting classes (ie, back to the McGuire days) required a different approach based on the dearth of data.

Pooled RSCI rankings did not begin until 1998 -- and just look at the names RSCI aggregates from, few did this for a living 15-20 yrs ago.  In general, rankings of individual players in classes didn't begin in earnest until the early-to-mid 1980's though some, like Parade of all places, have published high school all-america teams for quite a while.  Following recruiting was just not sophisticated -- now it's mainstream.  Heck, as late as 1987 HoopScoop didn't rank any program's haul so much as list out the top 100 players- - - and HoopScoop didn't even do that until 1983.  Blue Ribbon Basketball Yearbook ranked players too (as groups of starting five which is what HoopScoop and others did, btw), but not in their first year (81-82 season) and the analysis after that was was based on a very limited pool of evaluators (one really, Chris Wallace based on feedback from Garf, Van and McDonald from BT), whereas now there are more folks tracking more kids for longer periods or time (and of course, much more scrutiny and analysis).

[THEGYMBAR]

Hard to argue with #1. Probably made up greatest team in MU history.

[bamamarquettefan]

Sorry, been on business travel since my last reply, but if you are still reading, no offense was taken at all.  Two separate items:

1. There's no right or wrong on rating recruiting class before or after - I like after because if you steal a Dwyane Wade that noone else wanted I think that should be viewed as a huge coup.  But I completely understand the other approach, which is that Buzz should be rewarded more for being good enough to get people to choose Marquette when everyone else wanted them.  I chose the former for my top 20 because I have no expertise in evaluating potential talent, but if I do have an expertise it is in crunching the numbers after the fact.  Also, you can only go back a few decades if ou go by rankings coming in, and I like to get through that there was MU basketball before the greatest basketball icon of all time, Al McGuire.

2. On the Top 100, I'm glad I put one out when I did, but I freely admit there were a handful of TERRIBLE picks.  It got me on the path to looking up every stat, and there were a few people I listed who didn't end up in the Top 250 in the book.  I just hadn't accumulated enough info to put the emphasis on the actual individual performances - but 750 hours of research later, I think I've closed almost all the holes.

Really, thank you for the feedback - I learned so much in the comments that came back on the Top 100.  You don't know how deprived I am for interaction on MU stuff living down here in Alabama, where most people really don't know how to pronounce Marquette!

2.

[mu_hilltopper]

You don't know how deprived I am for interaction on MU stuff living down here in Alabama, where most people really don't know how to pronounce Marquette!

.. But I thought MUScoop was in ALL 50 states?  Ohhh, no internet in Alabama.  Right, right.  Good thing you keep going on business trips.