Good analysis, OR.   My first choice would be in agreement with you......make FSS less expensive for DII and DIII.

My 2nd choice is to leave it as it is.

The worst move they can make is to make FSS free.  One of fun strategies is to locate a good prospect in a sparce state, like Idaho.  If everyone can see the potential of those recruits,  that strategy is no longer valid.

Posted by Rails on 9/1/2010 7:53:00 AM (view original):
You should add, "In your opinion."  But you add to my point when you say that almost every coach you know scouts all the states in their immediate area.  That's my point.  Some teams are forced to spend much, much  more to scout the same number of recruits within a certain range based on how it's currently set up.  Actually that's my entire point.  I don't think it's overstated.  While some say it's added to the game, aren't the the numbers dropping? 

Why do I need to add "in my opinion", yet your post that I'm responding to (which was worded very strongly) needs no such caveat? What we're posting here about debated topics is inherently our opinion, no? (Aside from specific questions like, "Do ineligibles have to sit out at DIII, etc.)

Totally disagree that the notion that you would scout the states in your area is itself a shortcoming. Why would you not want to scout those states ... recruiting is so localized, I can't fathom why you wouldn't want to look at the full pool of recruits within 360 miles.

That said, I'm in agreement hat FSS costs should vary by division.

And yes, I think anecdotally the #'s are dropping, but I haven't seen anyone leaving because they don't like the specific issue you're talking about (except maybe you, lol). I can't say that no one's left because of it, but it's clearly not a primary factor.

Thanks OR.  [In my opinion] Another issue is the cheating with aliases if the lower divisions were free.  My vote would be to just allow a d3 team to see fss on d3 recruits.  Only after players drop would they see fss on those players.  That still wouldn't address the 70-mile rule or those that are potential drops that need a little extra help though.

But absolutely the costs make no sense both from a relative d1,d2 or d3 budget standpoint or from the standpoint that you pay for every single recruit in the state regardless of the recruits' level of skill (e.g. the cost for a DI school is the same for 45 recruits in a state even though only 10 might be DI recruits whereas another state with the same 45 recruits and the same costs might yield 35 DI recruits.  Obviously that's a huge advantage, not skill or strategy.

Daalt, that's my point.  Teams will naturally scout their local base, but my point is that some might have to scout 6 states to get the same number of legit recruits as someone else gets with 1-2 states and $10,000 less.  And since one is paying for kids that aren't in that school's division, it's a disconnect and yields huge advantages not derived from off the wall recruiting skillz or strategies.

(at the lower levels) Let's say after signings begin, we both see a couple of intriguing dropdown recruits from CA and TX.  So we each take a state to scout and one in CA has high potential and the TX ones have Low.  There was skill involved because I lucked out and recruited CA instead of TX even though all were roughly the same on paper before seeing their potential?  There's not skill.  I chose CA and you chose TX.  That's it.  Luck.  No skillz. I just don't think there is strategy involved in Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Mo.

To me the strategy is to ID who to target based on the potential of skill attributes.  That is, should I target a 550 guy with low, low, high, high , high , high or a 570 guy with high, low, high, low, high, high, low?

Thanks for calling me out on my opinion.  I've added that disclaimer at the top!  And you're right, hard to tell what the trigger is for people leaving--engine, FSS, other?  Probably a combo of many things or just one thing in particular.

Posted by Rails on 9/1/2010 1:08:00 AM (view original):
In addition to the other issues written about, there are two other issues that absoultely make no sense re: fss.  The 5 DII schools in Puerto Rico and the $200 minimum cost per state.  You guys are endorsing a system that allows all schools except five to be able to scout their local talent?  That blows me away.  And for states that have less than 20 recruits, a $200 minimum charge will still apply.  So for certain teams they are paying much much more per recruit than others.  Guys, Guys, Guys.  The current set up is so backasswards.  Strategy?  Try location, location, location.  It's all about location and dumb luck.  Strategy as some suggest as in choosing to scout a certain state to find a gem?  I'll scout state A, someone else scouts state B.  State A has a high potential recruit.  Goodie Goodie Gumdrops.  I win because I guessed right!  Michelob Light for me, the winner. 

Or if I have the highest prestige, I can wait and start getting dropdowns first and then make a guess as to what state to scout.  It's a guessing game--a random guessing game.  It's bad system, guys.  Costs don't add up, people cheat with duo IDs, etc.  Reminds me of the youth baseball season we had this past year when it was all about the adults starting on Day 1.  Well done with FSS, WIS.  Way to hit it out of the park.

Rails, no disrespect, but you are totally misunderstanding the strategic aspect of FSS. its not about which state you pick (well, thats a small part of it). its about how many states you scout, and how much money you spend on evals, vs how much you spend on considering credit. not about guessing, or luck, but the strategic tradeoff. that trade off absolutely exists, and to me that is one of the 2 great things about potential/FSS. the other is increasing the importance of team planning.

now that has nothing to do with puerto rico. that is a ridiculous situation, i think everybody agrees. nobody is endorsing that, as best i can tell - that is not the issue we were discussing here.

i honestly think you are taking this a little too personally. people don't agree with you but thats no reason to let emotions cloud your judgement. its not a random guessing game, even which states to pick is very far from random. if you don't see that, you simply haven't looked closely enough yet! and to stop a small population of cheaters... that is a pretty bad reason to make a major design change, IMO. how many coaches competing for top teams in a division do you really think cheat?

Posted by Rails on 9/1/2010 12:20:00 PM (view original):
Thanks OR.  [In my opinion] Another issue is the cheating with aliases if the lower divisions were free.  My vote would be to just allow a d3 team to see fss on d3 recruits.  Only after players drop would they see fss on those players.  That still wouldn't address the 70-mile rule or those that are potential drops that need a little extra help though.

But absolutely the costs make no sense both from a relative d1,d2 or d3 budget standpoint or from the standpoint that you pay for every single recruit in the state regardless of the recruits' level of skill (e.g. the cost for a DI school is the same for 45 recruits in a state even though only 10 might be DI recruits whereas another state with the same 45 recruits and the same costs might yield 35 DI recruits.  Obviously that's a huge advantage, not skill or strategy.

Daalt, that's my point.  Teams will naturally scout their local base, but my point is that some might have to scout 6 states to get the same number of legit recruits as someone else gets with 1-2 states and $10,000 less.  And since one is paying for kids that aren't in that school's division, it's a disconnect and yields huge advantages not derived from off the wall recruiting skillz or strategies.

(at the lower levels) Let's say after signings begin, we both see a couple of intriguing dropdown recruits from CA and TX.  So we each take a state to scout and one in CA has high potential and the TX ones have Low.  There was skill involved because I lucked out and recruited CA instead of TX even though all were roughly the same on paper before seeing their potential?  There's not skill.  I chose CA and you chose TX.  That's it.  Luck.  No skillz. I just don't think there is strategy involved in Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Mo.

To me the strategy is to ID who to target based on the potential of skill attributes.  That is, should I target a 550 guy with low, low, high, high , high , high or a 570 guy with high, low, high, low, high, high, low?

Thanks for calling me out on my opinion.  I've added that disclaimer at the top!  And you're right, hard to tell what the trigger is for people leaving--engine, FSS, other?  Probably a combo of many things or just one thing in particular.

again... choosing which states to scout is not even close to eeny, meeny, miny, mo. that is not a rational statement...

Posted by oldresorter on 9/1/2010 8:34:00 AM (view original):
rails - I am more with you on this & your comment about location and dumb luck, I might change it to all about location and dumb luck for any given moment, over time more about location and knowledge, but hey, that is not important.

the one thing that 'floors' me about FSS, is money is allocated by division, hence 15k in d1 per scholy, 6.5k in d2, 3k in d3 - I don't even know anymore - is that right?  Yet, the cost of FSS is fixed across all 3 divisions, hence d3 use of FSS is the most difficult strategically, and in d1 it is really hardly a strategic factor.

d3 contains many coaches who are just learning what each screen does, let alone trying to compete with guys who have played a couple of hundred seasons who have many advantages already, even if new guys don't know it, the non proportional cost of FSS over the 3 divisions is not fair.  It would be kind of like charging everyone in america 10k in income taxes, bill gates would be able to pay that out of his wallet change, many retail workers would be paying 50% of their income, stuff like this needs to be proportional somehow to be fair.

That is why I would vote to either make the cost proportional to the allotment of money per scholy or make d3 (and maybe d2) free.  The vets playing d3 will still be able to apply strategy in many, many ways to beat the newbies senseless, probably getting most of them to quit because of how unfair it feels anyhow.

fyi its 5k in d2. 

the major difference between d1 and d2/d3 prior to potential was the level of competition. d1 has a ton of competition, d2/d3 have a pretty small amount. therefore, the amount of your budget as a % needed for considering credit is a lot higher in d1. for that reason, i think it is perfectly reasonable to expect d2/d3 to spend more of their budget on FSS.

that said, i agree this is probably all too complicated in d3. i am mildly in favor of making d3 a training ground, and simplifying the situation significantly - no FSS, no pulldowns, no dropdowns, that would all be fine with me. but that is the reason i would get rid of FSS in d3 - not because it is costly or whatever. because of its complexity, i can see how newbies should be allowed to get used to the game without it. and then, without pulldowns or dropdowns, they would not need to see d2/d3 recruits, eliminating the potential for cheating with alt ids in d3.

I am late to the game on this topic, but I do want them to make FSS free.  The strategic trade-off between conversing cash vs. seeing more players (more states) is an excellent part of the game, imho.

billyg's idea re: D3 is decent too. FSS at D3 is a little bit too burdensome.