This recruiting season, I signed DL Allen Jones to my Penn team in Warner. I was surprised to be able to sign him, as he was a guy with solid cores and I expected the plethora of D1A schools who recruit Philly to be interested. On top of that, he was a SITL prospect. Apparently nobody bothered to scout him, or he just really wanted that Ivy league education.

I didn't need to promise him any PT or a start this year either, so he can focus on those studies while he takes a redshirt year.

Guess rates him as the #14 DL prospect in D1AA, but I would bet a good amount he finishes his career as the top DL in 1-AA. Does he have a chance to be the top overall DL prospect in Warner?

Here he is compared to the current top DL, Floyd Clark out of the University of Minnesota.

Name	ATH	SPD	STR	TKL	GI	ELU	TECH
Floyd Clark	79	58	93	92	83	72	86
Allen Jones	53	38	79	91	56	55	70
DIFF	26	20	14	1	27	17	16

As a 4 year starter, what do you think? Does he have a shot? I'll compare with another SITL player I have, 4 year starter at TE Dennis Reed.

Athleticism - Reed started at 48 and after 3.5 seasons is at 68. Expecting a growth of 5 per season for Jones would put him at 75. Through 8 games he's +3, so I guess he has an outside shot at matching Floyd Clark's ATH but it's likely he will come up a little bit short. I'll set a target of 75. (-4)

Speed - Not a position my DL spend a ton of time practicing, but I also don't value it as highly. Tough to compare here. He's +1 so far, so I think +15 for his career would be the max and that might be high. Target is 52 (-6).

Strength - He's at 79 right now and already +2. With SITL Growth, he could get to 92 or 93. His WE will get a lot higher, is it possible he could hit 95? Doubtful. Target 93 which will be a push or -1.

Tackle - I don't see any scenario where he's not at 95. +2

GI - In 3.5 seasons, Reed has gone from 69 to 85. From a lower starting point, Jones could get +5 per year giving him and end point around 80. Good but still -3.

ELU - I think he could get to 72, which would require +17. He's already +2 so there is a decent chance even that he could top it. I'll call it a wash at 74 to make things interesting.

Tech - Already +2, needs 16 more to match Floyd. I think he might hit 88, and I'm going to call that because I need to make up some points!

In the end, I have him coming out with ratings like this:

Name	ATH	SPD	STR	TKL	GI	ELU	TECH
AJ - Projected	75	52	93	95	80	74	88

I didn't look at the other player's he would be up against (some or a lot of them are currently HS Seniors). What do you think? Am I too optimistic (yes)?

BHazlewood, any idea what that his hypothetical rating might be?

I had a STL DL at IAA Columbia a couple seasons ago. I can't find it on gd reports to compare for you but your numbers seem good to me. Beast mode

This guy probably: http://guess.gdreports.com/player/history?player=10666090&school=101&world=4

If that's the case then all my numbers are a bit high probably since your guy had higher WE. Should be fun though. I'll try to keep the thread updated. I also have a SITL QB being redshirted. Hope I don't botch recruiting next season.

If he hits your projections, that would be 87.06

We still have playoffs to go, but Allen Jones's career was pretty spectacular.

ATH: 77, exceeded expectations of 75
SPD: 51, projected 52 so he might get there.
STR: 92, projected 93. He's been at 92 for a bit so I think he'll get this.
TKL: 95, got it
GI: 79, projected 80 and he might get that.
ELU: 69, projected 74 so this one fell short.
TECH: 87, projected 88.

He's one of the better 1AA DL's I've ever seen. I think pretty close to the 87.06 overall rating that was projected. He spent some time on the pine this season to get some younger guys some work, but he has 87 career sacks which seems like a pretty good number.

What was his GD rating as a recruit?

nitros

Sh@# Jeffn, you nearly gave me a heart attack. I read the first post and was thinking you landed an STL DL with your already stacked team!! Your Warner team is really, really good - beat me by almost 90 points in the final 4 when I thought I had a relatively good team.

Here is Jone's progression through the seasons:

Name	Season	ATH	SPD	DUR	WE	STA	STR	BLK	TKL	HND	GI	ELU	TECH		Base DL Rating	Def Tkl Rating	Def End Rating	Overall Rank	Position Rank	Class Rank Overall	Class Rank Position
Allen Jones	116	51	37	40	46	47	77	47	90	30	54	53	68		72.16	72.34	71.98	1265	DL 299	Fr. 62	Fr. DL 14
Allen Jones	117	57	41	47	48	53	81	42	91	25	59	57	73		75.64	75.88	75.40	591	DL 118	Fr.* 10	Fr.* DL 2
Allen Jones	118	63	44	54	58	59	85	38	92	21	65	60	77		79.10	79.43	78.77	154	DL 30	So.* 3	So.* DL 1
Allen Jones	119	68	47	61	69	66	88	34	93	17	71	64	81		82.14	82.54	81.74	22	DL 3	Jr.* 1	Jr.* DL 1
Allen Jones	120	74	49	68	78	72	91	29	93	12	76	67	85		84.80	85.30	84.30	3	DL 1	Sr.* 1	Sr.* DL 1

On a side note, I signed an STL DL this season - Dale Singleton with a 56 WE. It will be interesting to see where he ends and to see if my projection is close. The projection is based on not meeting Jeff in the first rounds of the playoff :)

Name	ATH	SPD	STR	TKL	GI	ELU	TECH
Singleton	70	42	69	88	62	40	51
projection	88	60	87	92	82	61	73

I have modeled growth over many samples and the growth best fits a parabolic curve which becomes asymptotic around 93-94ish. So while a starting value of 50 could grow at 5ish per season, a starting value of 88-90 would only grow by 3-4 total. The straight line growth starts to fall off to a curve between 70-75.

The best DL I have ever had anywhere the past two years had 44 career sacks.
87 would be incredible.

Yeah Benzil I landed him and my QB (also SITL) in the same class 5 seasons ago and the result is this season's team which is by far the best team I've had. Singleton is going to be a beast, make sure to get him plenty of PT. This is my final season at Penn, going to give 1A in Warner another shot. The lesson here is don't ever turn down a SITL player!

Jeff, I am sorry to see you move up. I was looking forward to trying (with an emphasis on trying) to build a team to compete with your all out passing attack at Penn.

I have modeled growth over many samples and the growth best fits a parabolic curve

If you're using Excel, with limited models to fit the data, this is the same conclusion that I came to. However, a parabolic curve doesn't make actual sense. At some point, a parabolic curve would theoretically reach an apex and begin to decrease, which doesn't actually fit the player growth profile.

It turns out that a square-root model is a better and more accurate fit, with no such inconsistencies. Unfortunately, Excel doesn't have this as a built-in fit.

Also interestingly, the fit is not continuous over a given player's career. If you track growth and plot it for a full career, what you'll see is a serious of "stacked" square-root fits. At the beginning of each season, a new fit begins, implying that there are two orders of diminishing returns:

1. Higher attribute values grow less per game than lower attribute values
2. Within a given season, later games provide less growth than earlier games

So, #1 diminishing returns is continuous, but #2 resets every season.

Posted by jeffn48 on 7/26/2017 12:14:00 AM (view original):
Yeah Benzil I landed him and my QB (also SITL) in the same class 5 seasons ago and the result is this season's team which is by far the best team I've had. Singleton is going to be a beast, make sure to get him plenty of PT. This is my final season at Penn, going to give 1A in Warner another shot. The lesson here is don't ever turn down a SITL player!

I mostly agree that STL players are worth the extra money (if you are battling for them), but you have to consider the interplay between WE and Potential. Roughly-speaking, a STL player with a 20 WE will grow like an Average player with 40 WE - which is to say, not so great. In this theoretical example, I'd absolutely walk away from the STL/20 player in favor of, say, an Improve a Lot/50 player every single time.

Also, I wouldn't battle for a STL punter if the costs went much beyond what I'd typically spend on a punter absent a battle. There is some positional dependence on my willingness to spend extra for a STL player.

Posted by gt_deuce on 7/26/2017 11:57:00 AM (view original):

Posted by jeffn48 on 7/26/2017 12:14:00 AM (view original):
Yeah Benzil I landed him and my QB (also SITL) in the same class 5 seasons ago and the result is this season's team which is by far the best team I've had. Singleton is going to be a beast, make sure to get him plenty of PT. This is my final season at Penn, going to give 1A in Warner another shot. The lesson here is don't ever turn down a SITL player!

I mostly agree that STL players are worth the extra money (if you are battling for them), but you have to consider the interplay between WE and Potential. Roughly-speaking, a STL player with a 20 WE will grow like an Average player with 40 WE - which is to say, not so great. In this theoretical example, I'd absolutely walk away from the STL/20 player in favor of, say, an Improve a Lot/50 player every single time.

Also, I wouldn't battle for a STL punter if the costs went much beyond what I'd typically spend on a punter absent a battle. There is some positional dependence on my willingness to spend extra for a STL player.

Yeah that's true. I guess it's more a general guideline than an absolute rule and that applies for almost every strategy for the game. I've actually ended up signing some average potential LB's with WE ~60 and they've turned out to be pretty decent players - solid starters on good teams.

But the STL guys are why I always like to scout some undecideds towards the end of recruiting. You never know what you might end up with.

For K/P, they are all guaranteed to be 4 year starters with 100% PT so I really wouldn't battle for either of them under any circumstances.

Posted by gt_deuce on 7/26/2017 11:51:00 AM (view original):

I have modeled growth over many samples and the growth best fits a parabolic curve

If you're using Excel, with limited models to fit the data, this is the same conclusion that I came to. However, a parabolic curve doesn't make actual sense. At some point, a parabolic curve would theoretically reach an apex and begin to decrease, which doesn't actually fit the player growth profile.

It turns out that a square-root model is a better and more accurate fit, with no such inconsistencies. Unfortunately, Excel doesn't have this as a built-in fit.

Also interestingly, the fit is not continuous over a given player's career. If you track growth and plot it for a full career, what you'll see is a serious of "stacked" square-root fits. At the beginning of each season, a new fit begins, implying that there are two orders of diminishing returns:

1. Higher attribute values grow less per game than lower attribute values
2. Within a given season, later games provide less growth than earlier games

So, #1 diminishing returns is continuous, but #2 resets every season.

GT, Thank you for the informative response - much appreciated.

You are correct, the parabolic curve only fits to a certain point. I am limited by the tools I am using and have simplified the equations to where I can calculate them in Excel when I am planning my recruiting efforts... in that context, close is good enough - especially at D1AA where I am rarely picking up my primary target due to an unnamed coach at Akron in D1A :P

There are so many additional variables - red shirt season, number of games, playing time, starts, practice time and so on, that the added value of accuracy isn't warranted due to the uncertainty of landing them.

I will have to go play with some square root models though. I do run the model in iterations - growth per season and repeat... the hard part is predicting how many games I will play.

your number 2 point is one that I have not seen as I snap shot beginning and end and don't do interim tracking - will have to look at that.. interesting!