Rupp - Uncovered 100 Players with a preference to sign "whenever." 6 of those 100 signed, and only 1 of the 6 was a battle. 20 are undecided (no one is high or very high), so by definition would not be eligible to sign, and 74 are considering at least one team and have not signed. Of the 74 that have have a high or very high team on them and are not signed, only 24 are battles. So for players being recruited where only 1 team is high or very high, only 5 out of 55 signed.
Phelan - Uncovered 82 Players with a preference to sign Whenever. 3 of those 82 signed, and 2 of the 3 were battles. 24 of the 82 are undecided, and 55 of the unsigned "whenever" players are considering at least one team and have not signed. Of the 55 that have a high or very high team on them and are not signed, only 9 are battles. So, for players being recruited where only 1 team is high or very high (ie. no battle), only 1 out of 47 signed in the first recruiting period.
This does not take into account any recruits considering a team at High or Very High who did not actually offer a scholarship. But I figure that number is going to be pretty low, if any.
So the data is, if you are NOT in a battle for a "Whenever" player, the very limited data shows that the player will sign in the first period less than 6% of the time (6 out of 102). If there is a battle for the player, the player has signed in the first recruiting Period 8% of the time (3 out of 36).
Contrast this with this Dev Chat quote: "It's also important to note we discovered and fixed a bug yesterday involving recruits with the 'Whenever' signing preference that will result in them signing sooner. " This Dev Chat was on 9/27. I assumed that "fixed a bug" meant that the bug was .... well, fixed. Apparently it means that it WILL be fixed, at some point in the future. OR, maybe when they said "signing SOONER", they meant at the beginning of the 2nd signing period? I actually wish they would not put out disinformation. It is worse than having no information. I made strategic recruiting decisions based upon this statement from the Dev Chat. If I had been ignorant of this alleged "bug" and Wis "fixing" the bug, I would have recruited differently.