Looks Are Deceiving: H.S. Player Rankings Are Little More Than Media Hype
Loyalists for big-name schools are counting on remaining or returning to elite status next season. Typically, the follow-the-pack national media falls in lockstep predicting most of them will be back to at least near the top of the national polls. But welfare writers (accepting guesswork handouts from well-meaning but ineffectual middle men) better hope the recruiting gurus ranking high school hotshots emerge from a sorry slump. A textbook example is Buddy Hield, who wasn't a Top 100 recruit in 2012 but emerged as national player of the year as a Oklahoma senior. Meanwhile, at least Michigan State's Denzel Valentine, who shared national POY awards with Hield, ranked among the consensus Top 100 prospects in 2012 by RSCI (88th) but was outside the Top 100 by 247Sports (105th). NCAA consensus first-team All-American Malcolm Brogdon of Virginia ranked in the 90s in 2011 by RSCI and 247Sports.
What good are prep player rankings if the brainiac analysts can't come close to pinpointing a prospect who will become a college All-American in a couple of years? Three seasons ago provided ample evidence of rating ineptitude when four of the five NCAA unanimous All-American first-team selections, including national player of the year Trey Burke (Michigan), weren't ranked among the consensus Top 100 H.S. recruits assembled by RSCI the years they left high school. First-teamer Kelly Olynyk (Gonzaga) and Final Four MOP Luke Hancock (Louisville) weren't among the top 100 in 2009. First-teamers Doug McDermott (Creighton) and Victor Oladipo (Indiana) plus honorable mention All-American Russ Smith (leading scorer for NCAA champion Louisville) weren't among the top 100 in 2010.
The player pimps certainly are out of credibility. Burke, McDermott, Kaminsky and Hield pooled their previously overlooked assets to assemble a string of four straight national POY honorees. Burke wasn't included among the consensus top 100 in 2011 although every scout in this burgeoning charade saw him play on the same high school squad with eventual Ohio State All-American Jared Sullinger. Ditto McDermott with regal recruit Harrison Barnes (North Carolina).
Media hacks as confused as Bruce Jenner, apparently incapable of calculating the difference between AAU-pickup street ball and genuine team ball, should be deep-sixed when you compare Hield and Valentine against the following list of mediocre players ranked among the consensus Top 40 recruits in 2012: Chaquille Cleare (averaged 3.5 ppg for Maryland and Texas), DaJuan Coleman (4.8 ppg/Syracuse), Grant Jerrett (5.2 ppg/Arizona), Omar Calhoun (6 ppg/Connecticut) and Amile Jefferson (6.1 ppg/Duke). Exhibits A and B for the miscalculations are Nerlens Noel and Jahlil Okafor as the previous prime prospects are already on the Philadelphia 76ers' trading block.
As a cautionary measure, pore over this information again the next time some lazy broadcaster needing a drool bucket begins slobbering over a pimple-faced teenager without ever seeing him play firsthand and only using recruiting services as a resource. The dopey devotees intoxicated by recruiting services should simply be ignored for accepting as gospel player rankings dwelling on wingspans, weight reps, Soul Train dance moves and carnival-like dunk contests. How about focusing solely on whether they'll continue to improve against comparable athletes, boast the proper attitude to learn to fit in with teammates in a me-myself-and-I generation and make a major bottom-line impact on the game rather than strut-your-stuff swagger? When pass is considered a dirty four-letter word, the chronic over-hyping doesn't appear as if it will end anytime soon.
When Karl-Anthony Towns (Minnesota Timberwolves) and Willie Cauley-Stein (Sacramento Kings) became the seventh and eighth Kentucky product in a six-year span among the NBA's top eight draft picks, the gifted group may have pooled credit-hour resources for a single shared diploma (hopefully not useless AFAS). The pair of 2015-16 rookies and six of the other early Big Blue picks - including DeMarcus Cousins (Sacramento Kings), Anthony Davis (New Orleans Pelicans), Brandon Knight (Phoenix Suns), Noel (Sixers), Julius Randle (Los Angeles Lakers) and John Wall (Washington Wizards) - on seven different NBA teams combined for a paltry 183-391 record this season (.318), a winning percentage even lower than John Calipari's 72-112 worksheet (.391) in three seasons coaching the New Jersey Nets in the late 1990s. UK provided 22 undergraduate selections in the previous six years, averaging three first-round picks annually while combining to earn in excess of $85 million this campaign. But if winning on the NBA hardwood is more vital than the draft lottery, UK hasn't been more valuable. With Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (Charlotte Hornets) missing majority of past campaign because of an injured right shoulder, none of those 22 UK Calipari-coached undergrad draft choices started for a 2016 NBA postseason participant - 20 of them ranking among the top 26 recruits by RSCI from 2007 through 2014 (all but Cauley-Stein and Eric Bledsoe). Does anyone really believe 2016 UK undergrad defectors/projected Top 20 picks Jamal Murray, Skal Labissiere and Tyler Ulis will be premier playoff performers in the NBA next season?
Two-time NBA Most Valuable Player and three-point shooting sensation Stephen Curry (Davidson) is perhaps the premier collegian thus far this century. If you've got a life, you don't have time to go over all of the no-names ranked better than Curry when he graduated from high school in 2006. You'd have an easier task competing in the national spelling bee, trying to size up all of the issues involving Tulsa coach Frank Haith's checking account when he was at Miami (Fla.), discerning how much Roy Williams "earned" in academic progress bonuses at North Carolina or believing Rick Pitino's Sgt. "I-Know-Nothing" Schultz routine at Louisville regarding recruiting regaling.
Rating recruits - the ultimate sports distortion foisted upon dupes - is akin to believing government grifters telling the gullible masses taxpayer-financed Muslim extremist terrorism is workplace violence or fueled by a largely-unseen movie (such as Shrillary Rotten lying about video in front of caskets at Andrews AFB duplicating her honesty when describing dodging Bosnian bullets). Pilfering a propaganda-like phrase spun during the institutionalizing of political correctness to the detriment of the safety of the American people, the player ratings are authentic "man-made disasters." They need to make a dramatic turnaround comparable to the White House's post-marathon bombing appeasing administration lauding Cambridge/Boston area police after previous exploitation portraying them as "acting stupidly" when it suited their agenda. Amid the insulting misinformation overload, it might be time to visit Rev. Wrong's church and see if he is recruiting susceptible supporters by telling his captive audience "America's Chechens have come home to roost." Truth-escape artists and opponents of Tsarnaev receiving a death-penalty sentence can simply deny you ever heard or read such impudence.
The same play-dumb mindset comparable to the Benghazi stonewalling, VA executive comparing veteran care waits to long lines at Disney theme park, IRS conservative-group targeting and general incompetence, Shrillary's State Department IT chief unable to provide his emails or being willing to talk to investigators plus fondness for determining transgender dumping grounds applies to entitlement-era "ridiculists" stemming from recruiting service player ratings. Resembling Jason Collins' long-time fiancée, you look like a full-fledged fool by putting a significant amount of stock in these breathless rush-to-judgment projections spawning a slew of blue-chippers turned prima donnas. But don't muzzle 'em with a jock jihad or sound as lucid as the buffoonish Bomb Mom. Just give the sane a barf bag when clueless adults hold their collective breath to see if coddled scholar dons their alma mater's cap on TV announcing a college choice. Why can't we simply wait until the impressionable teenagers compete in an actual game on both ends of a college court against comparable athletes before rendering assessments on their ability at the next level?