Is a top-10 recruiting class good enough for Florida in 2019?

Bill Sikes did a great job the past two weeks outlining the chances of Florida’s Big 3 (Miami, Florida State and Florida) landing top-10 classes in the 2019 recruiting cycle.

First, he looked at what has historically been needed to achieve a top-10 class and applied that to Miami and Florida State. Then, he used the same analysis to go even further in-depth on Florida’s prospects

But the one question I saw asked a lot was why top-10? That’s a pretty arbitrary cut-off, isn’t it? And are you honestly telling me that a class ranked 11th is a calamity while one ranked 10th is acceptable?

Well, those are the kinds of questions I like to try and answer here at Read and Reaction and luckily, 247Sports has data we can use to test how important it is.

Team Talent Composite

I typically use 247Sports composite rankings because they are a combination of the three major recruiting services (Rivals, 247 and ESPN) and that hopefully eliminates bias from the ratings.

Since 2015, 247 has put together a team talent composite for each roster, which looks at the talent actually on a team’s roster and not just its recruiting rankings. This keeps us from counting a 5-star recruit who left for the NFL early or a 3-star who got injured and never saw the field if he’s not actually on this year’s roster.

What this means is we can rank teams by the talent on their current roster – as rated when the players were recruited – to see if those rankings actually translate into wins.

Moving forward, when I refer to a top-10 team in this article, I’m referring to a team ranked in the top-10 of the team talent composite rankings, not the AP or any other poll. For the purposes of this article, what I’m trying to measure is whether teams that rank highly in the team talent composite win more than those that are rated slightly below.

A few of disclaimers here are important:

First, because the team talent composite rankings only go back to 2015, there is noise in the data. For example, Mississippi was ranked 19th in 2015 but went 4-0 against teams ranked in the top-10. That will skew a chart slightly (but not change the overall trend) when looking at the SEC specifically. This doesn’t change the broader point, but there’s no doubt that as more of this data becomes available in subsequent years, stronger conclusions can be drawn.

Second, these rankings are the talent on the roster for that specific year and not the actual recruiting ranking averages over a 4 or 5-year period. This was because those time periods don’t take into account the attrition that occurs for programs that recruit at high levels. For instance, Calvin Ridley (Falcons), Deron Payne (Redskins) and Minkah Fitzpatrick (Dolphins) would be counted in a 4-year average from 2015-2018. But none of them are on Alabama’s 2018 roster and so I didn’t think they should be factored in when considering the Tide’s record in 2018.

Third, I want to emphasize that I don’t think that coaching is unimportant. It is critically important. But so is recruiting. Both things can be true. An argument for recruiting is not an argument against coaching and development. Instead it is an argument that recruiting is a huge part of coaching in the college game and has an impact on winning.

NCAA Overall

If you’ve read my site for any length of time, the answer of whether recruiting matters should be obvious. But I was actually surprised how much it mattered at a granular level.

Top-10 teams win 76 percent of the time compared to 64 percent for teams ranked 11-20. This split occurs whether you look at records against top-10 teams (50% vs. 34.9%) or all others (81.6% vs. 70.2%). So not only do teams ranked 11-20 win less against more talented teams, they win less often against less talented teams as well.

What does this mean for Florida? Well, the Gators have averaged a ranking of 15th over the past four seasons. If we assume an average winning percentage of 64 percent (since they are right in the middle of the 11-20 rated teams), that would have predicted 30.7 wins from 2015-present. Florida’s record over that time period is currently……30-18.

The QB Effect

But this can be offset by QB play, correct?

Certainly Oklahoma has been buoyed by excellent QB play in recent years. The Sooners ranked 16th in 2015 and 2017 yet were still able to make the playoff. This was in large part due to Baker Mayfield’s otherworldly play measured by yards above replacement (YAR = 1.39 in 2015 and 3.29 in 2017).

When teams ranked 11-20 sport YARs over 1.0, their combined record was 105-26 (80.2%). That’s a pretty significant bump from the overall winning percentage of 64. There’s also a bump for teams ranked in the top-10 with elite QB play (86.9%), but it’s not quite as large.

What this means is that when the QB doesn’t play really well, teams ranked 11-20 struggle while teams ranked 1-10 still win almost three quarters of the time. That’s why Clemson was able to thrive in 2015 (ranked 13^th but Deshawn Watson’s YAR was 1.35) or why Penn State won the Big 10 in 2016 (ranked 20^th but Trace McSorley’s YAR was 1.24).

But it also explains why teams struggle when they get poor play like Florida (ranked 17th with a -1.45 YAR for Franks in 2017) or UCLA in 2016 (ranked 12th with a -0.63 YAR for Rosen and Fafaul). There just isn’t enough talent to overcome terrible QB play.

But that applies to average QB play as well, as the gap between 1-10 and 11-20 gets even wider if we set the YAR threshold to zero (average QB play).

What this says is that if top-10 teams get even average QB play, they win over 80 percent of the time. That drops to below 70 percent for teams ranked 11-20. Additionally, top-10 teams win more often (65.4%) as teams ranked 11-20 overall (64.0%) even if their QB play is below average.

This is where recruiting makes the biggest difference. If you get an elite QB, he might be able to get you past teams with more talent. But if your QB is not really good, you’d better have top-10 classes surrounding him because otherwise, you’re looking at winning just more than half your games.

Conference Breakdown

But QB play actually pales in comparison to the effect of which conference your favorite team happens to reside.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Michigan State (ranked 23rd in 2015) or Washington (ranked 24th in 2016) are in the Big-10 and Pac-12, respectively. But contrary to what some may argue, this isn’t proof that coaching can overcome sub-par recruiting.

Instead, it appears to be an argument that taking conferences into account is incredibly important. Bill likes to emphasize top-3 conference recruiting rankings, and after looking at the data I think he has a really good point.

This chart shows the winning percent as a function of the conference roster talent ranking for the Power-5 conferences. This makes it really clear that being in the top-3 in the conference makes a huge difference in winning.

Again, I’ll emphasize that where you rank does not guarantee winning any single game. But this chart represents over 1,900 games and so suggests that once your team ranks below third, it faces an uphill battle to win a conference or get to the playoff.

Michigan State ranked 4th in the Big-10 (23rd nationally) in 2015 and Washington ranked 5th in the Pac-12 (24th nationally) in 2016. Other than those two teams, every other playoff team has ranked either first or second in its conference.

If we conclude that a top-3 talent level is necessary for consistent winning, then the problem for Florida – or any other SEC team – becomes apparent pretty quickly.

That’s because the average rank of the 3rd team in the SEC is 6.3 nationally, compared to 17.0 for the second best conference (Pac-12). If you stretch and include Notre Dame in the ACC, they then come in at 10th but that’s not really a fair comparison. That’s because if Notre Dame were in the ACC, then they would have to play Clemson to make it to a playoff.

But the other thing to note is that the SEC has way more teams in the top-20 (7.8 per year) and top-10 (4.0 per year) than any of the other conferences as well. So it’s not just that the top-3 teams are ranked higher. It’s that the entire conference has elite recruiting.

This chart shows SEC roster talent ranking versus win percentage both overall and against top-10 opponents. Just as with conferences in general, there is a clear benefit to being in the top-3 of the conference from a recruiting perspective as the winning percentage against the top-10 falls off significantly (note: the percentage rises for the 8th place team due to Ole Miss going 4-0 in 2015 vs. top-10 teams).

I don’t want to gloss over the significance of this. In a year with an “easy” schedule (like Florida had in 2018), the Gators faced two top-10 teams (LSU and Georgia) and went 1-1 while ranking 4th in overall SEC talent. The chart above says they should have won 6.4 out of 10 games and they now currently sit at 7-3.

But in 2017, the Gators ranked 17th in overall talent and 7th in the SEC thanks to Jim McElwain’s recruiting issues – particularly in 2015 – and faced Georgia (4th), Florida State (5th), LSU (6th) and Michigan (7th). The wheels certainly fell off last season, but the profile for issues before the season was there, particularly considering they also needed to take on Tennessee (12th) and Texas A&M (15th).

This is why we have harped so strongly on Dan Mullen’s bump class. If the rankings don’t change (i.e. if Florida ends up ranked 5-7 in SEC recruiting ranking again in 2019), next year’s schedule will include Miami (17), Tennessee (15), Auburn (14), LSU (7), Georgia (3) and Florida State (5). Plus, Alabama (2) is waiting in Atlanta.

Takeaway

As it stands currently, Florida is ranked 24th nationally for the 2019 class. That isn’t concerning on its face as the Gators only have 15 signees and so will rapidly rise past many of the teams in front of them.

But Florida also ranks 10th in the SEC currently, and not just because of the number of recruits. By average recruit ranking (measuring quality rather than quantity of recruit) Florida ranks 7th, just barely behind Tennessee and just barely in front of South Carolina.

Other SEC teams are currently ranked 1st (Alabama), 2nd (Texas A&M), 3rd (Georgia) and 5th (LSU). That means that to get to top-3 in the conference, multiple top-10 classes aren’t going to be good enough.

Bill’s research shows this clearly. Earlier this year he found that the six future SEC Championship coaches hired since 2005 had a bump-year class with an average national ranking of 4.7 and conference ranking of 2.3.

That’s because the conference is just tougher.

Oklahoma has been a very good team for the past 5 years. But it’s not a coincidence that they have won the Big-12 while Texas has been struggling. The Longhorns are really their only competition on the recruiting trail in the conference. The same can be said for Clemson, who has risen to power as Florida State has faded in the ACC.

Florida doesn’t have that luxury. Alabama, LSU and Georgia have been the three most talented teams in the SEC over the past four seasons. That means to win the SEC will require that Florida goes through the top-3 teams in the conference almost every year.

Certainly, Florida could outcoach those teams and come out on top. But we already showed that teams with their profile only win those games 35 percent of the time.

So while I think Bill’s path to a top-10 class is encouraging for Florida fans (he puts their chances at 49 percent), I think it’s incumbent upon those of us who look at the numbers to state the truth.

The real way to regularly compete with the big boys in the conference is to become one of them. And that requires top-5 classes, not top-10.