Lebanese4Life wrote:maybe i shouldnt have said this class looks like one of JJ's but it is still average or worse compared to our conference mates' classes. their commits have more offers/commit. based on all the enthusiasm and the positive pub about our class i was at least expecting us to have a one that was ranked top 3 in conference. we need out-recruit the AAC if we wanna have a shot at P5
Your original question is a good one that should be addressed. Don't let statements above detract from your question. And, it has been answered well by members. Quite frankly I am amazed at the commitments SMU has picked up. I respect Stallion and some of the others on this board because they are on top of the numbers end of recruiting and I don't have the time to even try to do such. Nonetheless, I have been on the coaches side and know how hard colleges must work to move up in the recruiting wars. A primary ingredient is winning games. There's SMU 1-11 last year with a new coaching staff being laughed at by many players and fans. Yet, they have totally changed the mood and are picking up good players faster than anyone else. That is awesome!
Now I have a few other points. First, just looking at the raw numbers you were using no other team has near the number of recruits that we have. Thus you cannot read much into these figures. Ex: East Carolina has a higher average then SMU. However, SMU has 3 three stars and EC only has 2 (and no 4 or 5 stars). Those 2 raised their average higher than ours even though we have more 3 stars.
Second, many times coaches want a certain type of player and recruit a player another team might not want as much. Usually these kids are project recruits (however all recruits are projects to one extent or another). Have you noticed how much speed is being recruited. Stallion has done a great service pointing out the track stars on the list. Speed kills (on the football field too).
Finally, recruiting a player before he has his senior year is a bit like playing poker. You don't really know how the cards will fall and you really don't know how these kids will mature. Its a lot about how good the coaches are at choosing the winners. The good coaches make good choices and win games.