In the lead up to Sunday’s Super Bowl XLIX match-up between the New England Patriots and Seattle Seahawks, much has been made about how few blue chip prospects out of high school there are on both these teams rosters. It’s an interesting thing to analyze considering National Signing Day is only a few days later on Wednesday. Perhaps the common perception is if you’re a prized college recruit, that talent will translate all the way to the highest level the game’s played at. Clearly perception and reality couldn’t be farther away from each other in this case.
It becomes even more apparent when you look at the starting lineups, both on offense as well as defense. The vast majority of the players who will take the field first and do that whole video profile thing where they state their name and the school they attended (a staple of NBC’s NFL coverage) were largely unheralded going into their college careers.
Where Are All the Five-Star Recruits?
Just to keep it simple, I’m going to be referring to the ratings from Rivals.com, a site I’ve regularly used over the years to research prospects and get my recruiting fix in. You’d probably be surprised to see where some of the household names in this year’s big game showed up in their rankings when they were merely high school standouts.
Perhaps the two most talked about players you’ll see in the secondary on Sunday, Darrelle Revis and Richard Sherman, were both three-star recruits ranked 46th and 65th nationally at their position. Sherman was listed as an athlete which essentially meant he played multiple positions in high school and showed potential wherever his college coaching staff at Stanford decided to play him. Though Revis was highly touted after his stint at Pittsburgh and was drafted 14th overall by the New York Jets in the 2007 NFL Draft, scouts were less sold on Sherman and the Seahawks selected him 154th in 2011.
Sherman’s compatriot in the Seahawks secondary, Kam Chancellor, has emerged as a key playmaker in that unit for the defending champions, especially in the playoffs. I bet you didn’t know that Chancellor was once a three-star player rated as the 27th best dual-threat quarterback in 2005 before he committed to Virginia Tech. One of the wide receivers he’ll likely be covering, Julian Edelman, was also a pass/run specialist at quarterback as a two-star prospect and led Kent State in passing and rushing his senior season.
The theme of plugging guys into positions they didn’t play in college will be on full display Sunday night as 11 starters currently have that distinction. Though the fullback position has diminished in importance over the years, both teams have former defensive lineman to go to at that position in the event of a short-yardage situation. Of particular interest in our case is James Develin of the Pats who played defensive tackle at Brown University and was about to put his chemical engineering degree to work before giving pro football a shot after graduating in 2010.
Do you remember the first touchdown the Patriots scored in the second half en route to a 45-7 blowout of the Colts in the AFC title game? Social media was abuzz over New England left tackle Nate Solder’s touchdown reception to give them a 17-point advantage. For Solder, catching passes while lined up in the trenches is nothing new. He was recruited to Colorado as a three-star tight end and was rated 35th nationally before eventually moving to the O-line. His teammate on the Patriots front Bryan Stork also played tight end in high school (three-star, 26th nationally) but eventually became a standout center at Florida State and has excelled at that position in his rookie year.
Sebastian Vollmer’s journey to Super Bowl XLIX is another interesting story. Not only was he 14 when he first started playing football, he played in Germany and wasn’t discovered by college coaches until he participated in a tournament in San Diego. Vollmer has a towering 6’8″ 320 pound frame and is another tight end turned offensive lineman in the trenches for New England. He spoke little English when he committed to Houston but in four short years turned into one of the top players in Conference USA. The Pats drafted him in the second round in 2009.
In total, the average star rating of the starters in this year’s Super Bowl the year they came out of high school was 2.96. 14 starters were two-star prospects or weren’t even rated, including Seahawks starting quarterback Russell Wilson. He committed to NC State amongst little fanfare and eventually transferred to Wisconsin where he would lead the Badgers to a Big Ten title his senior year. Keeping in line with the trend, Wilson fell way under the radar in a 2012 NFL draft class at quarterback that included Andrew Luck, Robert Griffin III and Ryan Tannehill. The third round draft pick only needed two years to be the first of those names to hoist the Vince Lombardi Trophy.
What are we to make of this? Are recruiting rankings flawed in some way, shape or form? Well, not really. College football recruiting evaluations are an inexact science for sure. However, I look at them more as a snapshot of what to expect from a player over the next four years or so. Plus, as your financial advisor has a tendency to tell you when discussing a stock, past performance is not necessarily an indicator of future results. Also, these rankings are meant to evaluate the top talent entering college for a given year, not to be a mock draft four years early.
It’s not like the evaluators are completely swinging and missing anyways. A good number of players who were four-star prospects will lace it up and start for both teams on Sunday. Pats tight end Rob Gronkowski was rated the fourth best tight end nationally before committing to Arizona. I’m sure you’re well aware of a certain Seattle running back who goes by the nickname “Beast Mode.” Rivals had Marshawn Lynch as its 2nd best running back in the 2004 recruiting class.
Vince Wilfork, a veritable mainstay on the New England defensive front for over a decade now, was among the most sought after defensive lineman in the country before embarking on a successful career with the University of Miami. Right behind him in the linebacking corps is Don’ta Hightower who was a top linebacker prospect in 2008. He committed to Alabama and won two national titles before getting drafted in the first round of the 2012 draft by the Pats.
For the Seahawks, cornerback Byron Maxwell gets much less attention as part of the famed “Legion of Boom” defense than Sherman and even Chancellor, but he was much more heavily recruited out of high school than the two. In a way, he experienced the good and the bad of the whole national attention thing. Maxwell was ranked 18th best nationally at defensive back by Rivals but wasn’t looked at as a promising pro prospect, getting drafted in the sixth round by Seattle in 2011.
Ultimately, there’s a certain intangible quality that oftentimes is the crucial determining factor as to whether or not a given player will realize success at the highest level. In listening to coaches, scouts, front office personnel, members of the media, etc. discuss the topic, raw talent is simply not enough to excel in the NFL or any other pro sports league for that matter. Plus, you can never underestimate the “chip on your shoulder” effect that overlooked players develop as a valuable means of motivation.
It could be argued that college football recruiting rankings are more weighted towards a given prospect’s measurable traits whereas those immeasurable things such as work ethic and obsessive dedication hold a great deal of value at the next level. It should also be noted that the NCAA limits the amount of time you can work on football in college, whereas in the NFL there are no such limits.
In the end, it’s those first-in, last-out athletes willing to spend that extra time in the film room and put in those extra reps in the weight room among other things whose performances stand out on Sundays. They’re the ones who inevitably get the chance to realize a lifelong dream and show what they’ve got on the biggest stage in American sports. We’ll all be watching even though I’m sure the non-sports fan probably just wants to check out the commercials.
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