On the Road (Again)

It's going to be a slow morning on the blog. I'm about to head to Macon for the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame's annual Pigskin Preview Day, where Mark Richt and other coaches and players from around the state will be meeting with media.

UGA's player reps will be Kris Durham and Akeem Dent, so if you have any questions for them, let me know.

I'll hopefully have some updates from Macon this afternoon.

In the meantime, two stories came out in the past 24 hours that don't exactly show Georgia's coaches in the best of light:

-- Nash Nance said former Georgia recruit Da'Rick Rogers had "bad dealings" with Georgia's coaches in the days before he committed to Tennessee.

-- Makiri Pugh's position coach says Georgia offered him little support after he decided to transfer, failing to even return calls from schools interested in bringing Pugh in.

Now, neither story comes directly from the source, but does this dose of negative publicity worry you at all? Or is it a whole bunch of nothing?

Coaches on Recruiting Trail

From UGA release...

Spring practice might be over, but Georgia’s football coaches are still hard at work.

The Georgia coaches are on the road recruiting prospects during the NCAA’s designated evaluation period. The coaches began their work earlier this week and will continue recruiting throughout the month of May.

“By the end of next week, our assistant coaches will have been to more than 350 schools in the state of Georgia,” Bulldogs head coach Mark Richt said. “Our coaches are really pounding the state of Georgia. The focus of our staff is to make sure we recruit the state of Georgia first.”

Coaches may use one evaluation session to assess a prospective student-athlete’s athletics ability and another evaluation session to assess his academic qualifications.

“As we all know, recruiting is the lifeblood of any program and our state is a hotbed for talent,” Richt said. “It’s our job to do everything we can to show these young men the academic and athletic merits of the University of Georgia. I know if we get the best players in our state to come to the University of Georgia, we will win championships. When we do go out of state, it's always been our philosophy to only sign great players who are great people.”

The eventual signees among the prospective student-athletes being evaluated by Georgia’s coaches now will be the first freshman class to benefit from the ongoing $40 million expansion of the Butts-Mehre Heritage Hall. The expansion, targeted for completion in January 2011, will include a 12,000-square-feet strength and conditioning area, an 8,500-square-feet training room, new coaches offices and a multipurpose room with a turf field that can be used for drills, walkthroughs and receptions.

“We are committed to providing the academic and athletic resources necessary for our football program to be among the very best in the country,” Richt said. “Our coaches are equally committed to winning championships on the field and to helping our players become the leaders of tomorrow. That is our message as we are on the road recruiting.”

Fun With Numbers: From Promise to Production

I'll admit, even after a week away, I'm still pretty burned out on recruiting coverage after signing day, so I don't want to belabor the point. However... I had a few final thoughts I wanted to share.

I wrote pretty extensively in my last mailbag about the notion that seems to be floated among the more "glass-half-full" contingent that it's better to have 3-star guys with heart than 5-star guys who don't really want to be Dawgs. This seems to be the common wisdom among fans who don't want to be bummed about losing a few commitments near signing day.

If you're still in that camp, go ahead and stop reading now. I won't be mad, I promise. There's a real upside to not wanting to know too much about how the sausage is made, so to speak.

For the rest of you, I decided to dig a bit deeper.

My primary argument about this whole "3-star with heart" idea was two-fold:

1.) It's not a player's job to want to come to UGA. The coaches have to convince them that's what they want. So the idea of, "We don't want a guy who doesn't really want to be here," is really simply saying, "We don't want a guy that our coaches haven't convinced to come here." I have no problem with this philosophy, other than to say that eventually your coaches either need to do a better job of convincing or you need to hold those coaches accountable when too few top players are sold on the program.

(*And it's worth noting that I'm not trying to make a case against Mark Richt and Co. here. In looking over the past few signing classes, they've had a few years where they've done a really nice sales job and a few where it wasn't as hot.)

2.) Recruiting is an inexact science, but it's not completely worthless. People seem to put recruiting rankings into one of two categories: a.) They're super important, or b.) they're all guesses.

Well, it is true that it's a guess... but it's an educated guess. There is rationale and reasoning behind the "stars."

So when we're dealing with educated guesses, the best thing we can do is talk in probabilities, and my point was that a 5-star guy has a much higher probability of success than a 3-star guys does, no matter how much "heart" they have.

Of course, in my previous post, I wrote mostly in general terms. My theory, so it went, was that even for the best coaching staff, it would take about 5-10 3-star recruits to find one that was capable of playing at a 5-star level by the end of his career.

That was my theory. But what about reality?

Well, combing through thousands of commitment lists and stats isn't something I have the time nor inclination to do, but I was interested in looking at a more micro version of these results. So, I went back through each of Georgia's recruiting classes from 2004-2008 (five seasons) and compared the "star" rating of players when they signed with Georgia (courtesy of Rivals.com) with an arbitrary "star" rating I provided to gauge the success of their careers thus far.

Here's how I broke it down:

1-star: A guy who came and went without any significant production of any kind. A career bench guy, career-ending injury case or someone booted from the team.

2-star: A player who was serviceable at times but whose primary contributions came in reserve or special teams duty.

3-star: A regular starter for at least a year or two, but never someone who routinely affected the outcome of the game.

4-star: A regular starter for at least two seasons who was among the better players in the conference at his position. A difference-maker, but not a superstar.

5-star: Game-changers who had significant impacts for at least two seasons and, in general, went on to be legitimate NFL prospects.

Now, a few caveats here:

-- For some of the players we're talking about (particularly those from the 2008 class), there is much left to learn about how their careers will pan out. My star rating was based about 50 percent on what they've done so far and about 50 percent on my educated guess as to the roles they'll fill going forward. Still, I'd expect a few to outperform my star ranking.

-- A few guys were a bit tough to categorize, with their overall production hovering right in between two categories. In those cases, I generally tried to give them the benefit of the doubt and bump them up to the higher category. (Truth be told though, the star system is probably a bit too generic. A grade of 1 through 10 might be more satisfying in terms of differentiating players.)

-- A number of Georgia's commitments never made it onto campus. In those cases, I did not include them at all. I did, however, include any player who was officially on a Georgia roster at some point -- even if they never actually played a game.

So, with all of that in mind, here's what we found...

Recruiting Stars	Total Number of Players	Production Star Avg	Difference
2 or 3	42	1.98	1.02
4	52	2.81	1.19
5	5	3.80	1.20

So what have we learned?

First off, recruiting "stars" are always going to overvalue the overall impact those players will have, because the handful that exceed expectations are never going to be enough to counterbalance all those who fall short due to injuries or discipline or simply a lack of ability.

But... The drop off from recruiting star rating to production star rating really isn't much different for any of the groups -- at least in the case of Georgia's recent recruiting classes. So the fact still remains... the recruiting rankings are a pretty good indicator of production, even if that production is less than promised. It might be fair to say that we can essentially expect a group of players to perform almost exactly one star level below what they were rated coming out of high school.

What else?

Well, for one, all those "3-star guys with heart" are nice, but there are very, very few who actually see that heart translate into production.

Of the 42 2- and 3-star players who enrolled at Georgia since 2004 (and note, there were only 2 2-star guys, Bryce Ros and Kelin Johnson), the only ones who turned out to be better than average starters were Clint Boling and Ben Jones. Only 12 others turned out to be starters at all. The rest are guys who were used intermittently or completely flamed out.

In fact, for all the talk about how risky recruiting is, and how we don't really know a whole lot about who will turn out to be good and who will fall off the map, the numbers simply don't support the argument.

Yes, there is an inherent unknown quantity in any recruit, but that level of unknown greatly increases as a player's star ranking decreases...

Recruiting Stars	Number of Players	Flamed Out	Percent
3	42	18	43%
4	52	8	15%
5	5	0	0%

(NOTE: By "flamed out" I mean guys who earned a 1-star valuation for their career performance.)

Of the five 5-star guys Georgia has landed, only Richard Samuel has turned out to be below average, and he obviously has some time to turn that around still, and he probably isn't to blame for being misused in the first place.

On the other hand, those 3-star guys are essentially a coin flip as to whether or not they'll ever even see the field. And of those eight 4-star busts, four transferred and one had his career cut short by an injury.

Of the three groups we're talking about, 80 percent of the 5-star guys turned into productive starters (and Samuel still has time), 60 percent of the 4-star guys went on to be productive starters, and only about 30 percent of the 3-star guys did.

So the point is this: If you sign a 5-star guy, you are virtually guaranteed to at least get a player who is productive at some point in his career. If you sign a 3-star guy, there is almost a 50-50 chance that he'll never even make a mark on special teams.

Do recruiting ranks mean everything? Absolutely not. But there is value in what they tell us, and the odds aren't in the favor of all those 3-star guys who "just want it more."

Notes: Position Changes Could Come Soon

Several of Georgia's top commitments on the defensive side of the ball made it official that they were coming to Athens on Wednesday, but just where they might line up once they arrive remains a bit of a mystery.

Star defensive back Alec Ogletree will begin camp at safety, head coach Mark Richt said, but there's a chance he could end up at linebacker at some point. At 6-foot-6, 215 pounds, defensive end T.J. Stripling has the prototypical frame for an outside linebacker, and defensive coordinator Todd Grantham said that's a move any of the Bulldogs' ends could make, including new recruits Brandon Burrows, Jalen Fields and Dexter Morant. Even prized prospect Garrison Smith, who played defensive tackle in high school, could find he fits better at end in Grantham's 3-4 scheme.

"Any of these guys you bring in, you get them working, then you evaluate and see where they can help you, wherever that may be," defensive backs coach Scott Lakatos said.

And for now, Grantham said finding a home for players who have yet to arrive on campus is a secondary priority.

“It’s kind of early because we’re still evaluating our guys," Grantham said. "Once we get our guys in place, we’ll figure out what the best matchups and best scenarios are.”

The process of evaluating the current Georgia players is one Grantham began several weeks ago, breaking down film on each player and working to decide where they might fit in.

The results aren't exactly in yet, he said. But they're not too far off, either.

“We’re getting closer," Grantham said. "It’ll be sooner than later, but nothing’s ever etched in stone. We’re going to start some guys out at positions and see how they handle it. But I can tell you that nothing is etched in stone right now, and we’ll be constantly tweaking it throughout spring ball and into the fall to get our best players on the field at all times.”

That's a plan Lakatos is on board with, and he might take it even a step further.

Film study provided an initial gauge, spring practice will add more, and the fall will see the arrival of the new freshmen -- but it might be years before everyone has found a home, and even then things will be re-evaluated with each new matchup.

"Sometimes people's ability correlates to what you're trying to stop and how they can help you that week may be different than the previous week," Lakatos said. "And then players change. Players develop at different rates than other players. So it's a constant evaluation of who the best guys are and what's the best situation."

IT WORKS BOTH WAYS

While the loss of a few longtime Georgia commitments, including receiver Da'Rick Rogers, before signing day was the primary buzz among fans and recruiting services this week, head coach Mark Richt took a more pragmatic view of the situation.

Georgia was lucky enough to hold on to its entire class a year ago, but Richt knows that's the exception to the rule. More often, he said, keeping an 18-year-old's mind made up is a difficult task.

"These kids are 17, 18, 19 years old and coaches that are anywhere between 25 and 65 are trying to convince them why one school is better than another," Richt said. "So it can be confusing at times. It can be very difficult at times. That’s why our policy has been to be very straightforward from the beginning, Don’t say something that won’t come true in the end. Trust is really the only thing we have to hold us together, I think.”

Richt said coaches get a good feel for recruits during the process, and they usually have a pretty good idea of which ones are sincere about their commitments and which are likely to bolt before signing day.

But the process works both ways, and even Georgia got in on the action this year, swiping offensive lineman Kenarious Gates at the last moment from Kentucky.

It's just part of how things work on the recruiting trail, and while it may have put a dent in the Bulldogs' rankings from recruiting services this year, it's nothing Richt is getting too upset about.

“If we feel like that kid is not 100 percent certain, then we’ll continue to recruit him," Richt said. "I think everybody does that. If you take a kid is solid, then you’re wasting your time and you don’t want to do that. Sometimes these kids make decisions based on emotion and they’re not certain what they want to do, so we’re going to continue. I think you have to.”

That explanation doesn't necessarily smooth things over with some of Georgia's current defenders, including Jakar Hamilton, who said Rogers' late decision prevented another player from being recruited as heavily and left his team in a bad position. Hamilton and teammate Bacarri Rambo both promised some retribution on the field should they get a chance to hit Rogers in a game.

When reminded that Georgia, too, had lured a commitment away from another school, however, Hamilton's mind didn't change much. Just like any hijinx on the recruiting trail, a little retribution is all part of the game.

"It happens a lot," Hamilton said of the de-commitments. "But your in the SEC. You're going to get hit regardless."

A POSITION OF STRENGTH

The loss of Rogers put a bit of a damper on Georgia's signing day festivities this week and, perhaps more importantly, it meant the Bulldogs' depth chart at wide receiver would take a hit going forward.

Georgia will have just seven scholarship receivers on hand in 2010 -- senior Kris Durham, who missed all of last season with a shoulder injury, juniors A.J. Green and Israel Troupe, sophomores Marlon Brown, Tavarres King and Rantavious Wooten, and true freshman Michael Bennett, who just signed with the Bulldogs on Wednesday. Durham will most certainly be gone in 2011, and there's a strong chance Green could depart for the NFL a year early as well.

“Depth is definitely an issue at receiver. I would say we don’t have, at this moment, a good number that I feel comfortable having," Richt said. "Usually during the season you’re probably going to play around six or seven (receivers) and that’s what we have right now, so everybody’s going to get their share. We need to stay healthy at that position.”

Of course, while the Bulldogs may be a tad thin at receiver, the tight end position is overflowing with riches, and that could certainly offset any shortcomings in the passing game, Richt said.

Georgia returns all three of its top tight ends from 2009 -- junior Aron White and sophomores Arthur Lynch and Orson Charles -- while junior Bruce Figgins is set to return from a shoulder injury that cost him last season.

Richt said he still plans to employ three-receiver sets on occasion, but the diverse skill sets of his tight ends makes them a prime option for offensive coordinator Mike Bobo's scheme.

"What you’re looking for in offensive football is a chance to have some mismatches," Richt said. "We’re blessed with four outstanding tight ends. We certainly have playmakers and good solid depth with guys that can really play that position. I think that takes a little of the burden off the wide receiving corps."

BACK TO BASICS

In what was no doubt the most unintentional highlight of Georgia's signing day for fans, the Bulldogs' normally reclusive offensive line coach, Stacy Searels, was forced to address an inquiry about injured left tackle Trinton Sturdivant during a question-and-answer session with fans.

Searels stepped to the microphone and attempted an answer, but his voice was noticeably hoarse.

“My voice is gone because I was hollering at somebody else this morning,” Searels said, to huge applause from fans.

Truth be told, however, Searels was thrilled to have a scratchy throat, too. It meant he was finally off the recruiting trail -- where the shorthanded Georgia staff has spent much of the past two months -- and finally back to the business of whipping his players into shape.

“On Monday and Wednesday we had our offseason program," Searels said. "It’s fun to get off the road, sleep in your own bed, and get back to coaching ball."

BIDING THEIR TIME

As for those players Searels has been busy motivating of late, the past three seasons have provided a big dose of encouragement as to what the future might have in store.

Georgia landed three offensive line recruits this year -- four-star prospect Brent Benedict, burly lineman Kenarious Gates and Kolton Houston, who enrolled in January and is already working out with the team.

While it's unlikely that any of the three will see the field -- just as last year's signing class of Austin Long, Chris Burnette and Dallas Lee failed to do -- that's not necessarily a bad thing, Searels said. It means that Georgia's starters are doing their job, and unlike years past, the younger players are being given an opportunity to develop before being thrown into the fire.

“The first two years (Searels was at Georgia) we started four true freshmen," he said. "These kids being able to redshirt, get a little bigger, get a little stronger, work in the weight room and develop and not just be thrown into the fire, I think it’s going to make the offensive line even better.”

AS GOOD AS ADVERTISED

Georgia's newest safety, Jakar Hamilton, arrived from Georgia Military College with a pretty impressive reputation. Grantham, Lakatos and the rest of the Bulldogs' staff had seen him on tape enough to know he had plenty of ability. But there's always a concern about how a player will react to a new environment.

In Georgia's first few days of offseason conditioning, however, Lakatos said Hamilton has gone a long way toward eliminating any of those worries.

"We watched him on video, and he's a very good player on tape -- very exciting, very physical, rangy, competitive guy," Lakatos said. "The encouraging thing is, the couple of morning workouts we've had, he's been that guy. I know that's different from being on the field, but he's a hard worker. And with his ability times the hard work, he has a chance to be pretty good."

A LEARNING EXPERIENCE

It's not just Georgia's defensive players that are going to get a quick study in Grantham's new 3-4 scheme. It's also the rest of his staff.

While Lakatos will be new to the scheme, he's not likely to be greatly affected by the changes to the front seven. Rodney Garner, on the other hand, is going to be getting a fresh look at preparing a defense, and he's excited for the opportunity.

“This is my first time coaching in a 3-4 scheme," said Garner, Georgia's lone holdover among defensive coaches from last season. "I’m excited about expanding my knowledge as a coach just like the players are.”

THANKS FOR THE EFFORT

For six crucial weeks of recruiting, Georgia's coaching staff consisted of just one full-time defensive coach. That meant keeping a full staff on the road talking to recruits would be a chore for all those involved.

But to avoid being too shorthanded, the Bulldogs activated three of their graduate assistants to head out on the road, too, and when Georgia finally wrapped up recruiting season Wednesday, Garner said its successes were due in no small part to the efforts of the graduate assistants.

“They played a very vital role," Garner said. "I think it was beneficial for them and it was beneficial for us. It gave them a chance to get out there on the road and enhance their resume, and I thought they did a nice job when they were out there.”

Protecting Their Turf

The mood from fans yesterday seems pretty mixed. On one hand, you have the fans who are calling Signing Day a major fail for Georgia. On the other hand, you have fans going out of their way to defend what happened. As usual, the truth is probably somewhere in between.

The fact is, Georgia did land some very good players, and particularly on defense, a lot of solid depth for 2010 and stars for the future will enter the program in June. That's good. And Da'Rick Rogers is just one player -- and maybe even one who has the old Nuke LaLoosh attitude to boot -- so his loss probably won't make or break Georgia's claim to future SEC titles.

On the other hand, I think there were two very big areas of concern, and both were addressed by a couple of commenters.

First, from Muckbeast, who wrote:

"Also, look at how few of the top instate players we signed."

And this is the one thing that bothers and concerns me more than anything else.

It seems like this was a HUGE year for GA High School players. Why did we lose so many of them? :(

Indeed, Georgia didn't exactly protect its turf to the fullest. We talked about this at length a couple of weeks ago in one our in-depth recruiting posts, if you'll recall, and yesterday's results really underscored what might have well been considered a concern beforehand.

Of the top 10 recruits in the state, according to ESPN's rankings, Georgia landed just one -- Alec Ogletree. Now, to be fair, the Bulldogs did manage to snatch up four of the next 10. And to be even more fair, the No. 30 recruit in Georgia is roughly the same as the No. 2 recruit in, say, Arkansas.

So to say Georgia landed just one of the state's 10 best recruits certainly isn't the same as saying Georgia didn't ink a lot of very good players from the state -- 13 in all, to be precise, and just one of fewer than three stars.

But there is something to be said for protecting the borders and bringing in the best of the best that Georgia's very fertile recruiting trails have to offer. And when you stack the Bulldogs up against the competition, it really doesn't look like they did too well and keeping their best and brightest close to home.

To wit:

School	# of State Top 10	# to other SEC schools
Georgia	1	5
LSU	8	1
Tennessee	2	4*
Florida	6	0
Alabama	3	4
Auburn	2	5
South Carolina	5	3

* State still has one uncommitted player among its top 10 recruits.

None of the big guns in the SEC did a worse job of keeping its top 10 recruits than Georgia this year, and only Auburn allowed as many to land at another SEC school. And, to be fair yet again, Alabama and Auburn were the only schools on this list competing with another SEC school within its state's borders.

Even if we look at some other top national schools, Georgia comes up lacking.

School	# of State Top 10	# to other conf schools
Ohio State	4	1
Texas	7	2
Oklahoma	4	2*
USC	4	2
Penn State	4	2

* State still has one uncommitted player among its top 10 recruits.

Again, the only school we've looked at with as much trouble keeping top talent at home has been Tennessee -- and the Vols lost their head coach just weeks before signing day. That's not exactly the company you want to keep.

And yes, I know the argument that was brought up the last time that Georgia has a lot of border schools hoping to poach the state for prized recruits. That's true. But it doesn't mean it should be acceptable, and this year Georgia had the double whammy of missing out on a number of the best and brightest and instead seeing those players go to the Dawgs' main rivals.

Oh, and speaking of rivals, that brings me to the next point that a reader made that seems to be one of the more salient arguments that there shouldn't be much joy in Dawg-ville today.

Posted anonymously:

We can spin it all we want but this is a day that I would rather forget! I ask one simple question: have we made up ground on Florida or have we lost ground? Dawg Nation needs to wake the hell up! I'm tired of the spin machine that is Richt and Garner on "they got who they were targeting". Give me a break..we got taken behind the woodshed today and spanked. All is not well in Athens.

OK, perhaps "salient" was too strong a term. But the commenter has a point. Did Georgia make up ground on Florida yesterday? It's pretty hard to make the case that it did, and given the fact that the Gators have two of the past four national titles and have beaten Georgia in four of the last five head-to-head games, that's a problem.

And when it comes to protecting borders, it's hard to argue that Florida didn't do it as well as anyone. The Gators have a pretty talent-rich state chock full of poachers, too. And yet, they landed six of the best 10 players in the state, and not a one got away to another SEC school. That's dominating the recruiting trail. And if Florida's goal is to dominate, it should be Georgia's goal, too.

And the bigger problem? Urban "I'm risking my life to coach you!" Meyer didn't just dominate his home state. He was pretty dominant nationally, too.

Another somber rundown: Florida pulled the No. 6 player from Connecticut, the No. 6 player from Georgia, the No. 3 player from Alabama, the No. 1-ranked players in Pennsylvania, New York and Maryland, and the No. 1, No. 4 and No. 8 players out of California.

In other words, there were eight states in which Florida got as many top-10 recruits as Georgia got in its own state.

In other other words, Florida dominated California -- a state on the other side of the country -- far better than the Bulldogs recruited Georgia.

In the end, recruiting rankings don't mean everything, but they do mean something. And whatever that something amounts to, Georgia fell behind by a good bit of it to the one team it needs to start catching up to.

(Side note: Yes, I realize this was a fairly negative post, so I'm sorry to bum you out. I'll conclude then, with this note from Firebrand, which I think also offers some good perspective on things:

"What gives me hope is that we went through a lot this off-season. And we had a bad year on the field, as well. Hopefully this season sets us up for a huge 2011 in recruiting. I think the 3-4 should excite Athletes across the state to come play some attacking football."

Indeed. Anyone who wanted coaching changes had to know the risks involved.

What happened yesterday was, in part, due to those risks. But the future has potential, as Mark Richt said: "We’re very confident and trying to do the right thing. We’re also confident in that a lot of NFL teams and college teams are moving toward this trend, so we’re moving to the front end of this trend.”)

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-stars	Combined	Avg.
Florida	1	28	5	16	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.)

Whitaker Talks About His Decision

I've been told by about a half-dozen people who know a thing or two about football that the perfect fit at nose tackle in Todd Grantham's new scheme would be Warner-Robins' defensive lineman Jeff Whitaker, who will be announcing his college decision on Monday. (He's also considering Miami and Auburn.)

The Telegraph's preps writer, Jonathan Heeter, spent some time with Whitaker earlier this week and will have a more in depth story in Sunday's paper (so be sure to pick it up!), but here's a bit of what Whitaker had to say about UGA and his upcoming decision.

On Todd Grantham:
“He’s a really great guy. I think he is going to do a great job with the defense. He's honest with you and shoots straight, and that means a lot.”

On Grantham's scheme:
“I’ve played some 3-4 defense. I feel comfortable with it, although it isn’t what we played most of the time. I think (Georgia) feels like I would be a very good fit at nose tackle.”

On Georgia vs. the other programs he's deciding between:
“The thing I tell people all the time is that Georgia will be great with me or without me. It’s a great football program, and they have a great coaching staff."

On his decision to announce his decision Monday rather than to wait until signing day:
“I wanted to get it out of the way before Signing Day. Signing Day is a day for all of my teammates who are signing, not just me. It’s about our Warner Robins family.”

And one more big reason to like this kid -- he told Jonathan that he won't be doing the traditional picking from a row of hats because he doesn't want it to seem like a slap in the face of the other coaches who recruited him. “I’m not playing games with those men when I make my pick,” he said.

Classy kid who's going to be a heck of a player.

One other thing: A few of you have asked about our coverage of signing day. Last year, I was in Butts-Mehre for the entirety of the day and live blogged the event. My plan was to do something similar this year, but with the construction going on at Butts-Mehre, the media has been pushed over to Stegeman. So... I'm not entirely sure how I'll be doing it yet, but I can promise you that we'll have full coverage (or as much as possible at least) on the blog as the day progresses. Mark Richt is scheduled to meet with media at 1:30 p.m. on Wednesday, so I'll obviously have updates from that as well.

Fun With Numbers: Wrapping Up Recruiting

Before we get too deep into this post -- which, by the way, will be lengthy for all of you who might have planned to get some work done today -- I wanted to clarify one thing.

I'm a fan of stats. I can remember forcing my dad to take me out to buy the Sunday USA Today every week during baseball season when I was 9 years old so I could get the full MLB stats. I started playing fantasy baseball when I was 13. I like numbers.

And when it comes to stats, and particularly, these types of posts, I tend to hear two types of negative responses:

1.) "These stats are flawed because they don't take into account X, Y and Z."

2.) "Numbers lie. I know what I see."

As to the first critique, you are right. Which is why I write this post with an all-important caveat -- I'm providing you with information and some of my thoughts about what the information means. But for it to be truly meaningful, you're going to have to think about it some, too. Stats, in a vacuum, really aren't worth much. They require you to dig deeper. I'm just trying to give you the shovel.

As to the second critique, you might as well just stop reading blogs like this and go back to enjoying the games on Saturday. And I don't mean that as a criticism. There's a lot to be said for the folks who just want to enjoy football as a diversion and soak in the atmosphere on game day. But while stats don't always give us the whole story, the numbers are far from meaningless. They do help us to understand deeper issues and peel away some of those oft-repeated memes that really do us no good other than to provide things for useless comentators to quote during games.

So that's my soapbox moment for this post. The numbers are well researched, and hopefully they help you gain a better picture of things. If you don't like the results, feel free to ignore them. It's worked for politicians for years. And if you're intrigued, feel free to dig deeper, and keep me posted on what you find.

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OK, we've gone through a handful of the results our pal Jim F. dug up in his extensive research of recruiting during the past couple of weeks. But today is the day we empty out the vault, and a day I get to use lots of charts and tables. Fun times.

So, I figured we'd start by addressing a few of the questions that you guys have brought up after the first couple of posts.

First up -- Recruiting rankings tell us how good a player is when he leaves high school. But how good are these guys when they leave college, and how is Georgia doing coachin' 'em up?

Hard to really quantify that, but let's give it a whirl. So, let's take a look at how many of the top-100 level recruits signed by each SEC school went on to earn All-Conference honors during their careers.

(*Remember, these stats include only players ranked by Rivals as "Top 100" players since 2002.)

School	Top 100 Signees	All-SEC (any)	Percent	All-SEC (1st team)	Percent
Florida	47	15	31.9	6	12.8
LSU	43	7	16.3	5	11.6
Georgia	35	5	14.3	3	8.6
Tennessee	32	7	21.9	3	9.4
Alabama	22	4	18.2	3	13.6
S. Carolina	14	2	14.3	0	0
Auburn	11	1	9.1	0	0
Miss. State	9	3	33.3	1	11.1
Arkansas	7	2	28.6	2	28.6
Ole Miss	7	1	14.3	1	14.3
Kentucky	1	1	100.0	1	100.0
Vanderbilt	0	0	N/A	0	N/A
Total	228	48	21.1	25	11.0

OK, so what do we see?

Well, for one, the idea of landing a top recruit isn't really as big a deal as everyone seems to think. Even if you happen to sign a top-100 level prospect, there's only about a 1 in 5 chance that he'll go on to be one of the three best players at his position in his own conference. So maybe we've overvalued this whole recruiting thing a bit.

Chris Low has some interesting numbers from the 2009 All-SEC teams for offense and defense that essentially shows how being a big-time recruit doesn't necessarily mean you're going to be a great college player, and coming in as an under-the-radar signee certainly doesn't prevent you from having a big impact.

There's an interesting book by Malcolm Gladwell that I'm sure a number of you have read called "Outliers." The book is essentially about how people become great at their craft. In addition to the numerous points about luck and hard work and opportunity and effort, there was one thing that sort of stood out to me. Gladwell concluded -- and this was backed up by a number of studies -- that you don't have to be the smartest guy in the room to be great at an intellectual exercise. You don't need to be a genius to be an immense success. Instead, you have to have reached a minimal threshold of ability, beyond which it doesn't matter how much smarter you are. In essence, a guy with an IQ of 130 and a guy with an IQ of 190 have roughly the same probability of achieving some specific level of success.

Perhaps that is true of these recruiting rankings, too. It doesn't matter that much if you're a top-100 guy. What matters is that you're good enough to be recruiting by an SEC team. If you have that much ability, then your odds of success really then become exactly the same as everyone else's -- the difference will be how hard you work, how lucky you are to avoid injuries, how many opportunities you get for playing time, etc.

Of course, when we get beyond that, there is still no doubt an element of a high-level recruits impact that is determined by coaching. And what these numbers tell us is that, for the truly high-end athletes, Georgia hasn't been particularly good at turning them into high-end performers.

Setting aside Kentucky and Vanderbilt, who have managed to ink just one player from this pool combined, Georgia is tied for eighth of 10 teams in turning top-100 prospects into All-SEC performers, and perhaps more importantly, the Bulldogs' staff has been successful at less than half the rate their arch-enemies at Florida have done. In terms of aggregate numbers alone, Florida has used its top-100 talent to create three times as many All-SEC performers as Georgia.

Now, football is no doubt the ultimate team game, but when your top competition is churning out two All-SEC players for every one that you do... that's a problem.

Also, one more note: There was only a marginal difference between the "elite" of the top-100 (i.e. 5-star guys) and the other top-100 players (i.e. the upper-echelon 4-star guys) who turned into All-Conference performers. In the SEC, 20 percent of 4-star guys went on to earn All-Conference honors, and 23 percent of 5-star players did.

---

OK, let's get back to those recruiting numbers for a minute. You might have been surprised to learn how few of the top recruits actually turn into All-SEC performers. I'll admit, I was.

But let's broaden the scope a bit. The thought behind a 5-star guy coming out of high school is generally that he has immense NFL potential, and the college experience is all about ironing out those details to get his game ready for the next level. So let's look at how our pool of elite high school talent in the SEC fared when it came time for the NFL draft.

Year	Top 100 Signees	Still in school	Left Early	1st rounders	Percent	Drafted	Percent
2002	30	0	0	0	0	10	33.3
2003	29	0	0	4	13.8	8	27.6
2004	23	0	0	2	8.7	8	34.8
2005	25	13	6	2	8.0	4	16.0
Total	107	13	n/a	8	7.5	30	28.0

*Note: "still in school" includes players who were still playing at the college level during the 2009 season. "Left Early" was used only for the 2005 totals as a means of differentiating between those still in school and those who weren't part of the 2009 NFL draft because of an early departure to the NFL.

Yikes! If you're a top-100 recruit, you have roughly a 1 in 13 chance of going on to be a first-round draft pick in the NFL. Actually, now that I think about it, I'm not sure if that's good or bad.

Of course, the fact that about 1 in 4 does go on to the NFL is probably a fairly favorable number, and probably tells us that, when the recruiting rankings turn out to be good, they turn out to be very good. And when they miss, they miss by a fairly wide margin. (Which, for the sake of fairness, isn't necessarily due to flaws in the recruiting services alone. There are tons of factors that go into determining whether a big-time recruit turns into an NFL player.)

In case you're curious, Georgia has landed 21 top-100 recruits from 2002 through 2006. Of that group, six were still in school at the end of the 2009 season. Of those six, Kade Weston and Reshad Jones figure to be drafted, while Bryan Evans likely won't, Akeem Hebron and Justin Anderson aren't yet draft eligible, and Nedarris Ward transfered.

So, of the 15 who have come and gone, seven went on to be drafted. If you add in Weston, Jones and Evans, Georgia is looking at a 50 percent success rate of turning top-100 players into draftable commodities. That's not too shabby -- but when you compare the NFL draft results with the All-SEC results, you might fairly argue that the players are being drafted more on talent than success at the college level.

And one more note -- Matthew Stafford and Knowshon Moreno became the first two first-rounders from this group last year.

---

We listed the number of overall top-100 talent at each school earlier, and Georgia hasn't exactly been in the same ballpark with Florida overall (the Gators hold a 47-35 edge total from 2002-2009) but what about the players the two teams had last year?

As it turns out, there really wasn't a huge difference. In fact, here's a run down of the number of top-100 recruits still in school among the SEC's teams.

Team	Still in school
Florida	29
LSU	24
Georgia	21
Alabama	19
Tennessee	17
S. Carolina	11
Auburn	6
Arkansas	4
Ole Miss	4
Kentucky	1
Miss. State	1
Vandy	0

As we've pretty clearly shown, a top-100 ranking doesn't necessarily make you a future star. But this list is a good indicator of who has had the most talent to work with, and while Alabama and Florida turned their talent into wins, LSU and Georgia probably could have done a might bit better with the ability of the players on their rosters. And hat tips are probably deserved for Kentucky, which has really had a fine half-decade in the SEC despite having virtually no top-tier recruits.

---

A few other interesting tidbits from Jim's research to pass along...

-- It probably comes as no surprise that the Southeast is a fertile recruiting base. But fertile might be an understatement. It's really the Octomom of recruiting bases.

Of the 800 total "top 100" recruits from this time period, 321 of them came from the Southeast region. That's 40 percent.

It's no wonder then that the SEC has been the best conference in the country during that stretch.

It's also worth noting that of all the regions, the Southeast also had the highest percentage of top recruits who stayed in state for their college careers.

-- Here's the SEC's draft breakdown from 2002-2006, if you're interested:

First round -- 11
Second round -- 3
Third round -- 5
Fourth round -- 2
Fifth round -- 4
Sixth round -- 2
Seventh round -- 5

Not drafted -- 58
Still in school -- 137

-- You won't be surprised to learn that, during the decade of the 2000s, the SEC produced more players drafted by the NFL than any other conference. It was the ACC, however, that led all conferences in first-round draft picks (thanks Miami and FSU!), producing 69 first rounders compared to 58 by the SEC.

-- Georgia ranks sixth among all schools in producing players who were drafted during the 2000s with 49 players being selected. The Bulldogs also rank sixth in producing first-rounders with eight.

As for that team down the road -- Florida has produced 47 total draft picks (putting the Gators seventh overall) and is tied with Georgia by producing eight first rounders.

The Gators should have an early edge for the new decade after this year's draft though.

-- You might want to know about success in the NFL after being drafted... well, Jim dug up a few numbers on that, too.

33 players were drafted from the SEC among "top 100" recruits. Of those 33, only seven have become regular contributors at the next level, with the jury still out on the rookies. (And by "solid contributors," Jim used Jerious Norwood as the line of demarcation. I was amused by that.)

Overall, Jim's math says only about 8 percent of all top-100 recruits will go on to be decent NFL players.

Oh, and the average pick for a top-100 recruit being drafted is 109th overall -- i.e. the beginning of the fourth round.

-- A quick list of "top 100" talent that ended up transfering during this stretch:

Ben Olson, QB (BYU to UCLA)
Willie Willians, LB (Miami to L'ville)
Ryan Perrilloux, QB (LSU to Jax State)
Mitch Mustain, QB (Arkansas to USC)
NaDerris Ward, TE (Georgia to Oregon)
Ryan Mallett, QB (Michigan to Arkansas)
Cam Newton, QB (Florida to Auburn)
Brandon Saine, RB (Ohio State to Michigan)
Willy Korn, QB (Clemson to TBA)
Nu'Keese Richardson, WR (Tennessee to TBA)

Bottom line on these guys... it doesn't usually work out well.

---

OK, well I hope you at least managed to kill a hefty portion of your work week with these posts, and maybe got a bit of additional information from it.

And if you're complete sick of these types of posts, don't worry. You're free for the next few days. But I am working on another in-depth analysis of a completely different topic that you'll be treated to sometime in the next two weeks. So you've got that going for you. Which is nice.

Fun With Numbers: The Battle in the Trenches

Last week I started posting some findings from an in-depth study done by our pal Jim F. on the top recruits and how Georgia fared in landing them. Most of the post dealt with where the recruits were coming from and how well Mark Richt and Co. protected the borders around the state.

I got a ton of great feedback from you guys on the results, pointing out some issues with the analysis (which was fair) and asking some deeper questions (which we'll get to).

First, here's some points from Irwin R. Fletcher:

The problem then is that you then diverge into thinking that state boundaries somehow indicate proximity. Just look at FSU. It is almost the same distance to drive to UGA from Perry, GA as it is to drive to FSU. Proximity isn't accurately defined by state lines.

Anyway, I think the percentages are a red herring. You can only take so many kids no matter how big your state is. The fact is that since there are fewer BCS schools in GA, the percentages are going to look worse. Texas has how many BCS schools? 7? Bama produces about half as many top 100 recruits but has 3 BCS schools...of course their percentage will be higher. It also explains why PA and GA have lower percentages...fewer choices for kids to stay in-state. (It also becomes an interesting thought when you think about how big a state like Texas and California are and how far these kids have to travel to stay 'in state.')

When you have states like Alabama producing half as many top 100 kids as Georgia, Bama and Auburn are going to have to 'get theirs' from Ga, too.

Fair points, all. I agree wholeheartedly with the notion that Georgia (the state) is poached routinely because many players in the outer borders don't see Georgia (the school) as their "home team." Of course, as Todd Grantham said last week, that's a battle he's going to start fighting.

“If we took the best players in the state of Georgia and within a five-hour radius of our school, and they come to University of Georgia, we can win the SEC championship and compete for a national title. And I think you can be better than Florida, you can be better than Texas and you can be better than Southern Cal if those players came to the University of Georgia.”

So while I think Mr. Fletcher does a fine job of pointing out a reasonable set of explanations for a perceived failure, I'd also say it's probably good news for Bulldogs fans that Grantham is setting his sights even higher.

There were tons of other questions raised by readers after last week's post, and I'm hoping to still hit on a bunch more in the next few days. (Seriously, we've just hit the tip of the iceberg in Jim's research.) But for today, I wanted to address just one.

This issue is brought to us from My2Cents, who wrote:

I think we will do fine in state and around the southeast. What I would hope from Coach Lak and Coach Grantham is to get some of the big lineman that come from up north and out in the midwest. There are also usually some good linebackers and skill players from those areas. The way we play next year will open the doors and tweak a lot on interest. We need to be better at which of the best of the best we pick.

Good points, but as it turns out, the bigger concern might be on the line on the other side of the ball.

Remember, this analysis covers all of Rivals' top 100 recruits dating back to 2002 -- or, for the purposes of this discussion, the best 800 high school players from the past eight years.

So, how might that list break down by position? Glad you asked...

Position	Total	Percent
Off. Line	112	14%
Def Back	110	13.7%
Receiver	94	11.8%
Running Back	92	11.5%
Linebacker	89	11.1%
Def End	87	10.9%
Def Tackle	67	8.4%
Quarterback	64	8%
Athlete	59	7.3%
Tight End	26	3.3%

* Two things are slightly deceiving here. 1.) "Defensive Back" is a bit of a general term. There's a big difference between recruiting a corner and a safety, so we may be being a bit broad in our terminology. 2.) "Athletes" generally end up as defensive backs or receivers, so by labeling them otherwise, we're sort of short changing a couple of categories.

Taking the aggregate numbers only, however, we notice quickly that offensive linemen make up a pretty hefty share of the best players coming out of high school. So, you might then assume that, since only eight schools in the country have secured more players from this list than Georgia, the Dawgs should have gotten a decent number of O linemen, right?

Wrong.

Of the 800 best high school prospects since 2002, Georgia has signed 35. Here's the Bulldogs' positional breakdown:

Position	Total	Percent
Off Line	3	8.6%
Def Back	4	11.4%
Receiver	5	14.2%
Running Back	4	11.4%
Linebacker	3	8.6%
Def End	4	11.4%
Def Tackle	4	11.4%
Quarterback	2	5.7%
Athlete	3	8.6%
Tight End	3	8.6%

In case you're wondering, of Georgia's "athletes," one became a defensive back (CJ Byrd), one became a running back (Richard Samuel) and one became a receiver (A.J. Bryant).

So, let's do a simple comparison here: The first chart essentially shows the talent pool of great prospects. The second shows Georgia's success rate in luring those athletes.

Now, where do we see a difference?

Well, on the plus side, Georgia knows how to grab a good tight end. And while that QB number is a little on the lower side, the stats for that position can be deceiving because you don't really need to grab more than one really good one every two years or so.

The biggest difference though? There's no doubt that it's on the offensive line.

In the past eight seasons, there have been 112 offensive linemen ranked among the best in the nation coming out of high school. In that span, Georgia has managed to sign just three of them.

Of course, your next question might reasonably be, "Who were they?"

The answers: Justin Anderson, A.J. Harmon and Chris Burnette.

Anderson spent a year at prep school and has been up and down in his success since arriving in Athens. Harmon and Burnette have yet to start a game (and Harmon opened on the D line, to boot).

In other words, since 2002, Georgia has essentially played without a single top recruit on the offensive line at any point.

This season, Georgia stands to add one more top-100 guy to their linemen cache with Brent Benedict, but he is one of just two O line signees.

On the other hand, Florida has signed six top-100 linemen since 2002 and Tennessee has inked five.

Now, it's fair to ask whether these O line evaluations were all that great to begin with. After all, the list of Georgia's top signees in the trenches doesn't include Clint Boling, and he's turned out to be pretty good.

But I think it's also fair to say that Georgia hasn't had nearly the success with O linemen it should have in recent years, so closing with at least one more this year might make for a big finish.

Oh, and while we're on the subject of positional success for Georgia, here's two more of concern: Defensive end and Linebacker.

Georgia's four "top prospects" at D end during the past eight years where Brandon Miller (miscast for three years), Marcus Jackson (injuries derailed his career), Toby Jackson (never qualified) and Charles Johnson.

That, however, should be changing this year with three four-star prospects joining the ranks and Todd Grantham's new look on D.

At linebacker, Georgia's three "top" signees were Akeem Hebron, Desmond Williams and Josh Johnson. Not exactly an impact group.

Of course, I think Hebron's name might be one that has a chance to float back to the surface as Grantham evaluates his personnel for the 3-4.

Notes: Howard's Legacy Stays With Lakatos

In his first few meetings with recruits in Georgia, the Bulldogs’ newest coach didn’t have to pass out copies of his resume for players to be familiar with his accomplishments.

Defensive backs coach Scott Lakatos, who was officially hired last Monday and spent his first few days on the recruiting trail last week, already had a few fans in the state after his Connecticut team thumped South Carolina in the PapaJohns.com Bowl on Jan. 2.

“I didn’t get called out on my accent at all,” said Lakatos, a New Jersey native who spent his entire career in the Northeast. “They were interested in UConn, and some of the guys down here, they know about our program. They saw our bowl game, and they were very receptive.”

Of course, while the big bowl performance may have turned a few heads in SEC country, it was hardly the most memorable part of the Huskies’ season. Unfortunately, the defining memories of 2009 were all about what UConn lost.

Junior cornerback Jasper Howard was stabbed to death in mid-October, leaving Lakatos and the rest of the Connecticut coaching staff to rally their team in the face of tragedy.

“We got that phone call at 3:30 in the morning, and that certainly wasn’t easy to deal with,” Lakatos said. “We had to get our team together. We had great kids at UConn. Somehow we managed to pull through that thing and get turned around and get the season back on track. But it was difficult.”

The Huskies lost three straight games in the immediate aftermath of Howard’s death, but as the initial shock wore off, the legacy of their fallen friend helped turn the season around.

“One of the things that Jasper was is, Jasper was a guy who showed up every day and worked,” Lakatos said. “He loved football, and his teammates knew that about him. They took it upon themselves that, ‘We’re going to approach this thing like he did. Let’s get ourselves ready every day and work.’”

The result was a four-game winning streak to wrap up an eight-win season – including that bowl victory over South Carolina.

On the recruiting trail, Lakatos said he hasn’t heard much so far about the tragedy he helped his team overcome last season, but that doesn’t mean players weren’t paying attention. In fact, while Georgia cornerback Brandon Boykin said he didn’t know a lot about Lakatos when his hiring was announced, the way Connecticut responded to tragedy spoke volumes about the Bulldogs’ newest hire.

“When I saw he was from UConn, that was the first thing I thought of, the guy getting killed,” Boykin said. “Just the way his team responded and getting to go to a good bowl game and actually win despite all that adversity that happened. The defense played well in that game against South Carolina, which was a great team that put up plenty of points against us. I knew that, and I liked that about him.”

ROUNDING OUT THE STAFF

New defensive coordinator Todd Grantham isn’t in a hurry to complete his defensive coaching staff, which still has one more opening yet to be filled.

Grantham said he expects the hire to be another linebackers coach – although he said it could be either an inside or outside linebackers coach – but there isn’t a timetable on the hire. The important thing, he said, is finding someone whose personality fits well at Georgia, and he’s grateful to head coach Mark Richt for giving him some say in making the final judgment.

“When you can have access to the hiring, I think all that’s a positive,” Grantham said. “Because coaching is teaching … so I think it’s important to hire good teachers and good motivators and guys who are on the same page to get things done.”

Of course, the hiring of a linebackers coach puts to rest any speculation about the possibility of bringing in a full-time special teams coordinator. That means Georgia will continue to divvy up the responsibilities for special teams among the entire staff – and that’s fine with Grantham’s first hire.

“I’ve been at UConn and coached on all the special teams except PAT and field goal,” Lakatos said. “I’ve had specific areas up there, so I’ve had access to those things. I did the same thing at Rutgers and was the special teams coordinator at Maine for a couple years. That’s coaching. It’s no different than defense. Make sure guys know what they’re doing and get out there and play fast and execute.”

CLOSE TO HOME

Lakatos is just beginning to get his feet wet on the recruiting trail, but he said the future isn’t likely to take him back to his roots too often.

Although Lakatos spent his entire coaching career in the Northeast at places like Connecticut, Rutgers and Syracuse, he said his priority now is landing the top recruits in his new home.

“If there’s a player up there that’s interested in Georgia that can help us win an SEC championship, then we’ll go back up to New Jersey or Pennsylvania or wherever it is to see what we can do to get them down here,” Lakatos said. “But my knowledge of this area is that there’s a lot of players in the state of Georgia, so if you can get the players in this state to stay here, you may not have to go too far.”

FIRST THINGS FIRST

Georgia defensive end Demarcus Dobbs is eager to see how the Bulldogs’ new defense will look in spring practice, but that doesn’t mean he’s looking ahead too far. With offseason conditioning about to begin, the grueling pace of mat drills remains first and foremost in his concerns.

“In the back of my head, all the excitement and everything is there, but I know we have mat drills coming around, and that’s been the biggest thing on my mind,” Dobbs said. “But as far as anticipation, I’m just excited to see what’s going to happen, and I’m ready to work.”

Fun with Numbers: The Best Talent is Home Grown

If the world of coaching college football came down to just, well, coaching, it would be hard to offer much criticism of Georgia's two most recent hires. Both have distinguished resumes, impressive pedigrees and a history of success. But what Todd Grantham and Scott Lakatos both lack is a track record of recruiting the SEC, and therein lies the obvious criticism of Mark Richt's choices.

Now... does having not recruited the South mean they can't recruit the South? Absolutely not. And given that they'll be recruiting for UGA and Mark Richt, a lot of doors will be opened for them regardless of their track record.

(Think of it this way -- I've never interviewed President Obama, but if I worked for the New York Times and they sent me to the White House, I'm pretty sure I can think up a few good questions to ask.)

Still, there's no doubt that recruiting is at the core of success. To paraphrase Bill Parcells, it's one thing to be a great cook, but you also have to have someone who knows how to buy the groceries.

So with that, I want to offer a huge (HUGE!) hat tip to our pal Jim F., a Bulldogs Blog MVP candidate* who I'm fairly certain spends more time thinking about college football than I do. Jim has done some exhaustive research on recruiting going back to 2002, and has graciously allowed me to sift through the results for the blog.

(*Side note: As reader Kathleen pointed out to me last week, I think we need "Bulldogs Blog MVP" t-shirts made up. Kathleen, of course, will get one for suggesting the idea.)

Given the sheer volume of work Jim has done, this just isn't going to fit into one post. So what I'm thinking we'll do here is go through it one dose at a time and see how long we can stretch it out.

(BTW... Jim has started his own blog which you can find HERE. Given the amount of info he's provided me with over the past year, you can rest assured he'll have lots of good stuff on his own site, too.)

Since we're on the subject of Georgia's new coaching staff, however, and the questions remain about how well they'll be able to recruit, I figured a good starting point might be to ask how well Georgia's coaches have already been recruiting.

So... here's what we've got: Jim has collected information on the Rivals Top 100 recruits each year dating back to 2002 (in other words, the top 800 recruits of the past eight years) and sorted them by where they came from and where they went. Let's take a look...

States producing the most top high school recruits:

State	Recruits	Pop Rank
Florida	120	4
Texas	107	2
California	101	1
Georgia	47	10
Ohio	34	7
Louisiana	33	22
Pennsylvania	33	6
Alabama	28	23
North Carolina	28	11
Illinois	21	5
Virginia	21	12

*Of note: Next up on the list is Maryland, Michigan and South Carolina with 20, then Mississippi and New Jersey with 19.

So, what do we notice right off the bat from these numbers?

First off, it should be no surprise that the three most consistent winners in the past decade have been Texas, Florida and USC. Those top three states combined to produce 41 percent of the Rivals Top 100 recruits since 2002, and have each produced more than double the No. 4 state on the list.

In fact, more than anything else, you could make a pretty valid argument that the biggest key to success for a college program is proximity to the top recruits. Take a look at the teams with the most wins in the 2000s (*BCS teams only):

Team	Decade W-L	State Recruit Rank
Texas	110-18	2
Oklahoma	110-24	17
Ohio State	102-25	5
USC	102-26	3
Florida	100-30	1
LSU	99-31	6
Georgia	98-31	4
Virginia Tech	99-32	10 (t)

Of the eight winningest BCS conference teams in the 2000s, all but Oklahoma pulls from a state that ranks in the top 10 in top-100 recruits produced. (And it's fair to say Oklahoma gets quite a few recruits from Texas, to even out that disparity. In fact, of Texas' 107 top recruits, 18 signed with Oklahoma.)

Add to it that Texas, USC, Ohio State and LSU don't really have an in-state rival that offers anything near the same level of success and you get a situation in which those teams not only have access to the largest number of top recruits, but also have a distinct advantage in getting them. Which leads us to the next question...

Who does the best job of keeping its local talent close to home?

Let's just look at those top producers of talent first:

State	Top Recruits	In-State	Percentage
Florida	120	80	67%
California	107	61	57%
Texas	101	70	69%
Georgia	47	25	53%
Ohio	34	23	68%
Louisiana	33	26	79%
Penns.	33	11	33%
Alabama	28	21	75%
North Carolina	28	9	32%
Illinois	21	5	24%
Virginia	21	14	67%

("In-State" = players who stayed in state for college, "Percentage" is the percent of overall top-100 players from that state who went to an in-state school.)

Given that Florida has three (and maybe four depending on how you quantify South Florida) teams who can legitimately contend for a BCS title berth, it's not surprising that a large quantity of its best players remain in state. There are plenty of options.

As we mentioned, Ohio State, Texas, USC and LSU lack a truly competitive in-state rival, but all have done a nice job of keeping talent in-state (as has Virginia/Virginia Tech and Alabama/Auburn).

With Illinois and North Carolina, the low number of players who remained in state makes some sense, too. After all, the Tar Heels, Duke, NC State and the Fightin' Ron Zooks are hardly programs that traditionally lure five-star talent on a regular basis. There are far superior out-of-state options for those kids.

The two states that really stand out on this list then are Georgia and Pennsylvania.

To address the latter, Penn State is really the only legitimate football school in Pennsylvania -- and really, one of the few in the Northeast, sad to say. So on one hand, it looks bad that the Nittany Lions aren't keeping talent in state. On the other hand, Joe Paterno can pull recruits nationally and, more improtantly, has a big edge throughout the entire region. He doesn't need to worry as much about closing ranks within the state because he really doesn't have to worry about competitors from neighboring states (aside from maybe Ohio State).

That leaves us with Georgia, which despite having two programs routinely ranked in the top 25, secures just 53 percent of its in-state talent.

Clearly we've seen the Bulldogs make some splashes nationally of late (Stafford, Moreno, Lynch to name a few) and they've gotten some steals in Florida, too (Charles, Murray) but how many are they letting get away from their own backyard?

Here are some numbers:

-- Nine "top" recruits, including three five-star players, have left the state of Georgia to go to a school in Florida since 2002 (six to FSU including one five-star, two to UF, both five stars, and one to Miami).

-- On the other hand, UGA has swiped just three "top" players from the state of Florida, none of which have been five-star guys.

-- Considering that Florida has produced nearly three times as many "top" players since 2002 as Georgia has, but has taken three times as many "top" recruits from the state of Georgia than UGA has from Florida, that's a problem.

(*And as a side note, here are the three UGA stole from Florida: Orson Charles, Aaron Murray and... wait for it... Bryan Evans!)

(*And if you're interested, here's who was stolen from Georgia: Cameron Newton (QB-Fla), Omar Hunter (DT, Fla), Jae Thaxton (LB, FSU), Justin Mincey (DE, FSU), Marcus Ball (LB, FSU), Antwane Greenlee (OL, FSU), Jarmon Fortson (Ath, FSU), Greg Reid (DB, FSU), Allen Bailey (DE, Miami)... not the most impressive list, so perhaps UGA didn't "lose" these guys as much as they "passed" on these guys.)

Anyway, the bottom line, of course, is how many players do you have? Here are the final results in terms of who got the top recruits (remember, there were 800 total)...

School	Top 100 Signees
USC	72
Texas	49
Florida	47
Fla State	47
LSU	43
Oklahoma	42
Miami	39
Michigan	36
UGA	35
Ohio State	35

A couple quick notes from this list:

-- Holy smokes! USC has landed nearly one out of every 10 top-100 recruit since 2002.

-- Miami, Michigan and Florida State have all been "down" during this time... and all rank in the top 10 in most high-end recruits.

-- Georgia ranks pretty high on this list (tied for ninth) and I'd saying calling Georgia the eighth or ninth best program in the country during this span might be a pretty fair analysis. (Although, to be even more fair, some of these recruits have yet to see the field for UGA and the wins earned in 2002 and 2003, for example, had little to do with the recruiting classes those years.)

-- But while Georgia is successful on the recruiting trail, what always seems to get overlooked is that their competition is successful, too. Twenty-one teams have landed at least 10 top-100 recruits since 2002, and of those 21, seven (or 33%) are SEC schools.

---

OK, that's about all I can read into this without going bug-eyed today. But I'm interested in your thoughts. What jumps out to you from these numbers? Are you concerned about Todd Grantham and Scott Lakatos' ability to keep UGA competitve on the recruiting trail? What happens if Rodney Garner leaves?

Again, this is just the tip of the iceberg on Jim's fine research, so we'll have some more on all this later in the week.

Practice Notes: All Is Calm on Recruiting Trail

With shakeups on the coaching staff and rumors about possible replacements cropping up at a frenzied pace, it might be understandable if Mark Richt was spending a lot of time putting out fires with recruits the past few weeks. As it turns out, however, he said things have been pretty calm on that front.

“Initially that was the majority of the conversation, but now we’re just continuing that relationship of them just being excited about being at Georgia and talking about the end of their seasons and school and finals and the holidays,” Richt said.

The most recent contact period with players ended last weekend, but Richt and his staff spent the previous few weeks getting in touch with their current commitments and letting them know as many details as possible on the changes to the defensive staff and the timetable for finding replacements. Once those initial conversations occurred, it has pretty much been smooth sailing, Richt said.

At last weekend’s end-of-season gala, Georgia hosted many of its top recruits and commitments, and for those on the defensive side of the ball, Richt spent some extra time with them talking about the future, but he said there has been virtually no concern on the players’ parts about what’s in store.

Coaches get another opportunity to contact recruits again in January, and Richt said he plans on making a round of home visits then – ideally with the new defensive coaches in tow.

“I’ve strategically tried to save most of my home contacts until after the bowl season,” Richt said. “And hopefully we’re going to get a chance to get out with our new coaches after that point.”

BANKS QUESTIONABLE FOR BOWL

Reserve safety Quintin Banks suffered a neck sprain during Sunday’s practice that could cost him a chance to play in the Independence Bowl next week.

Banks, who has battled myriad injuries in his career, had seen increased playing time down the stretch with freshman Bacarri Rambo out, but he suffered a sprained neck while making a hit during Sunday’s practice. He was taken to the hospital for observation, but Richt said the results were all positive.

“All his extremities are moving just fine,” Richt said. “He got discharged from the hospital last night. They evaluated him but everything looks real positive.”

Banks was also scheduled to start on several special teams units, and Richt said that could still happen if things improve throughout this week.

“I wouldn’t count him out right now,” Richt said. “We’ll just have to wait and see.”

SPECIAL TEAMS STAY THE SAME

Georgia will have plenty of new input on specials teams in its bowl game, with two graduate assistants handling kickoffs and tight ends coach John Lilly taking over punt returns, but Richt said there won’t be any drastic changes on either unit in terms of philosophy.

“It’s kind of like defense,” Richt said. “You don’t want to re-invent everything. It’s hard to do in such a short amount of time. There’s not a big difference.”

KEEP IN TOUCH

Former defensive coordinator Willie Martinez may be gone, but he’s hardly forgotten.
Several of Georgia’s players said they have spoken with Martinez since he and two other assistants were dismissed earlier this month, and cornerback Brandon Boykin said Martinez had a specific message for him.

“He told me he’ll call me if I’m doing bad on the field and critique me,” Boykin said. “We’ll continue to talk.”

Several players, including Boykin and linebacker Rennie Curran, said it was difficult to talk to their former coach after the changes occurred, but all said they hoped to stay in touch in the future. Boykin said he even planned to see Martinez in person.

“I’m not sure what he’s going to do, but I’ll probably go by his house and just see him,” Boykin said. “We have a good relationship and I want that to continue.”

EARLY ARRIVALS

Rodney Garner confirmed that two of Georgia's incoming commitments would enroll early in January. He said official paperwork has yet to be filed but he did not expect any complications.

One of the two early enrollees will be junior-college transfer Jakar Hamilton, a safety from Georgia Military College, according to his head coach Burt Williams. The other, according to Scout.com, will be Buford offensive lineman Kolton Houston.