Would you take offense if I said the idea was really, really stupid?

Please don't take offense at that, but I don't think there's an A+ coach that does not play the best lineup he/she can.  If the frosh is good enough to make my rotation/lineup, he does.

And I don't think there's a Top 10 player from any place but the immediate neighborhood who wants to play at, say, Northwestern, while that same player might be happy to be a role player at Duke or UCLA.

That said, I would favor some randomness into how much a recruit values commitments of minutes and starts.  There are clearly some players who would rather star at a midmajor from day 1 than spend a year playing 10 minutes a game off the bench followed by starting in year 2. 

I've heard this idea before, and I don't play D1, but I do think  it makes sense.  I think there are a LOT of players who would rather start at Northwestern, or more realistically, say, Alabama or Temple or Michigan, something along those lines, than come off the bench for UNC or Kentucky.  I think there would have to be some random element to it for it to really be a good feature, but it could at least help balance the power a bit amongst the Big 6 teams.  Probably wouldn't do a whole lot for the mid-majors.

lake, the point is that there are many top 10 recruits that are sitting on benches as freshman and no that's not realistic. in certain cases you have multiple top 20 recruits sitting on the same bench.  if you watch real college basketball at all you would know this simply does not happen.  so no, i don't take offense since your comment is baseless.  kids want to play not sit and it doesn't matter what is on the front of the uniform if they are elite.  that's a fact.

i can handle your disagreement, its your delivery that needs a little work.

I agree. I think that kevin is ignoring the frequency at which recruits surpass offers at elite schools in order to be the star at a lesser high-major or a mid-major. 

Case in point (2012 recruits): 

#19 Overall - Danuel House (Committed to Houston)
#21 and #23 Overall - Ricardo Ledo and Kris Dunn (Committed to Providence)
#20 and #29 and #44 Overall - Rodney Purvis and TJ Warren and Tyler Lewis (Committed to NC State)
#55 Overall - Robert Upshaw (Commited to Fresno State)
#61 Overall - Jordan Price (Committed to Auburn)

None of these, especially the first and second examples, would happen in RL. 

I like the idea, and I think that lakevin missed the point completely. The idea will help out some mid-majors, and their needs to be incentive to coach mid-majors if D1 will thrive in WIS. 

namshub, I understand your concern, but I think mandatory starts is the wrong way to go about addressing it, especially considering how strong a negative impact the low starting IQ's of freshman have. Anything that gives coaches less flexibility in how they coach their team is bad, and mandating starts is the wrong direction in my view.

IMO a better approach would be to require a minimum amount of recruiting effort in order to sign elite players, as myself and others have advocated before. Something along the lines of: 

5-star: $15,000
4-star: $12,000
3-star: $9,000
2-star: $6,000
1-star: $3,000
0-star: No minimum.

I think this would serve to realize your goal of better talent distribution by flushing out much of the excess cash that elite programs have, promote more battles, and force the elite schools to think more about what types players to target rather than just throwing $2K on the four nearest 4/5 star recruits and intimidating anyone else from battling them, because everyone knows they're sitting on $80-100K.

Prof's idea is one I've always been in favor of; mandatory starts I would never be in favor of.

I have no problem with mandatory starts, I think people really oversell how troublesome starting FR is - especially if they are elite and/or know the offense and defense.

Random follow up to that - is there any reason that adding offense/defense to FSS?  The service can tell us if they have their favorite schools, proximity preference and a pretty solid guideline on how much they can improve, but it can't mention if they played man or zone in HS? 

I think expectations of PT are perfectly reasonable - with a sliding scale, the same recruit might be looking for 10 minutes at an A+ UNC, 20 minutes at B NC State, Start + 25 at C prestige Charlotte.  Also, this info should be available in every eval - have high end schools actually need to use an eval.  If you had these expectations, there is also the potential to create an additional group of players for lower BCS/mid-major teams to recruit, impact SO transfers.

I would also add that a mandatory start requirement for an elite recruit would probably not deter me from recruiting him as an elite team, even if I had no intention of starting him. If the guy is that good, I know there's a chance he goes EE after his freshman season anyway. And whether I lose him after one season to EE or from breaking a start promise, I'd still rather have him coming off my bench for a season, than being on someone else's team. If I'm already at an elite school, and have no plans of changing jobs, I don't care about the rep hit.

So, by mandating starts, that would mean that no team could ever have more than 5 top 25 players on their rosters at one time without risking a penalty, even though rosters stretch out through 4 different years (Fr, So, Jr, Sr)?

In other words, if I get lucky enough to have a couple of top 25 players stay until their senior seasons, another stay until his junior season, and two more as sophomores, I would basically be penalized for recruiting a top 25 freshman since that would be 6 top 25 players and only 5 starting spots.  Yep, that idea blows.

Why don't we just jack up the value of starts (where all starts have a 20min PT guarantee) in recruiting. Have Start = 20CV or something, and if you don't fulfill your promise, the player transfers out, with the team that lost the battle last season having first ability to sign the recruit the following season. 

Posted by tianyi7886 on 7/19/2012 1:11:00 PM (view original):
Why don't we just jack up the value of starts (where all starts have a 20min PT guarantee) in recruiting. Have Start = 20CV or something, and if you don't fulfill your promise, the player transfers out, with the team that lost the battle last season having first ability to sign the recruit the following season. 

+1 , it's simple, no faults with this idea. Helps the small/mid majors D1 teams, and does a whole lot more.

Posted by dcy0827 on 7/19/2012 12:22:00 PM (view original):
So, by mandating starts, that would mean that no team could ever have more than 5 top 25 players on their rosters at one time without risking a penalty, even though rosters stretch out through 4 different years (Fr, So, Jr, Sr)?

In other words, if I get lucky enough to have a couple of top 25 players stay until their senior seasons, another stay until his junior season, and two more as sophomores, I would basically be penalized for recruiting a top 25 freshman since that would be 6 top 25 players and only 5 starting spots.  Yep, that idea blows.

I think you're being a little overdramatic here.  And remember, not everyone knows the cheat codes you use to keep your 1000 rated seniors to stay 4 years. 

The situation you describe would never happen.  I don't think we're talking about all top 25 players needing guaranteeed starts.  At most, we'd have 4-5 super frosh demand it, and the idea of elite freshman isn't new.  They would have to come with higher starting iq's, or maybe just a faster learning curve for IQ, but either way it would be a very small number.  You would also expect these players to play at most 2 years, and I think it would be appropriate to have them eligible to leave after 1.

However, I think guaranteed minutes, rather than starts, is the appropriate way to do it.  The problem comes when the mid major or lesser big 6 school loses a stud recruit, who should be thinking about maximum exposure to get drafted, to an elite school where he plays 2 minutes a game.    Say 5 stars want 15 minutes, 4 stars 10 minutes, everyone else has no minutes restrictions.  That, combined with professor's idea, would be a good system I think.

Posted by milkamania on 7/19/2012 1:42:00 PM (view original):

Posted by dcy0827 on 7/19/2012 12:22:00 PM (view original):
So, by mandating starts, that would mean that no team could ever have more than 5 top 25 players on their rosters at one time without risking a penalty, even though rosters stretch out through 4 different years (Fr, So, Jr, Sr)?

In other words, if I get lucky enough to have a couple of top 25 players stay until their senior seasons, another stay until his junior season, and two more as sophomores, I would basically be penalized for recruiting a top 25 freshman since that would be 6 top 25 players and only 5 starting spots.  Yep, that idea blows.

I think you're being a little overdramatic here.  And remember, not everyone knows the cheat codes you use to keep your 1000 rated seniors to stay 4 years. 

The situation you describe would never happen.  I don't think we're talking about all top 25 players needing guaranteeed starts.  At most, we'd have 4-5 super frosh demand it, and the idea of elite freshman isn't new.  They would have to come with higher starting iq's, or maybe just a faster learning curve for IQ, but either way it would be a very small number.  You would also expect these players to play at most 2 years, and I think it would be appropriate to have them eligible to leave after 1.

However, I think guaranteed minutes, rather than starts, is the appropriate way to do it.  The problem comes when the mid major or lesser big 6 school loses a stud recruit, who should be thinking about maximum exposure to get drafted, to an elite school where he plays 2 minutes a game.    Say 5 stars want 15 minutes, 4 stars 10 minutes, everyone else has no minutes restrictions.  That, combined with professor's idea, would be a good system I think.

The idea of mandatory minutes is probably not a bad idea. 

And the situation that I described is not only possible, but is a reality with at least two teams that I'm aware of in the ACC in Tark.