Fair enough I guess. But still...I assume most of the services do more than follow schools around. I know there's a sentiment among some/many fans that some/all services do this. I don't necessarily buy that. And if THAT'S the case...that most do their own research then I still think on field results v. recruiting rankings is better than cherry picking the underrated v. the overrated.
That said...if you started your own service and you had a kid ranked fairly low initially and then you find out that LSU, Bama, FLorida, USC, Texas and Nebraska have all offered...you'd be nuts NOT to re-evaluate the situation.
I have no doubt that there is something to the idea that the services are $ driven...and that they may, at times, cater to a fan base here or there.
Yes, obviously they do a certain amount of research. And I believe I have made the point in the past that if you knew that a proven talent evaluator rated a certain kid highly, it would at the very, very least, cause you to reconsider your rankings. But at some point, you have to add something to the discussion otherwise you are really not doing any evaluations at all.
But putting that point aside, I believe that the services do a fair amount of actual research and evaluation themselves. That is certainly true. But what I find is, that they sort of cheat to fill in the blanks. And the bias (and I mean here normal human bias, not agenda driven bias) stems from the fact that they extensively research some prospects and give the basic once over research to other prospects. THEN, they compare all of the prospects to each other in establishing a numerical ranking system. For example, suppose I live in Florida, know Florida HS football extensively, take great pains in evaluating Florida prospects, and then create a top 100 list where I then compare the top Florida kids to the top kids around the country and particularly Texas and California. How can I possibly make this comparison when I really haven't looked closeup at the kids from the other states? No matter how much integrity I may try to have in my Florida evaluations, the integrity breaks down in the larger comparisons even if my intentions are nothing but honorable. It gets even tougher as I rank the prospects down to 250 and beyond. And since no one has seen every single player in the country or is equally familiar with the style and quality of play everywhere in the country, that means no one person can do it. So now you have to have a committee of folks, and each member of your committee has undoubtedly different biases and evaluation beliefs even if they all agree to use the same parameters and are free of agenda driven biases. Add in the agendas and the fact that you need to make money and it is really an impossible task.
But the important thing to remember, no one service can possibly wrap their arms around the entire task. It is too enormous. That is why the evaluations of the coaches is more valuable to look at. Their task is much simpler, find players that will help them win and keep their jobs. If they are wrong (too positive or too negative) in their evaluations, they usually get fired.
The services are good for giving you a frame of reference. Coaching staffs subscribe to these services, not to evaluate players, but just to have a database to start from and also evaluate what their rivals are looking at. As a fan, I try to learn ASAP the biases of every evaluation service I read so that I have an idea of what they do well and what they don't. Of course, the problem is so often the services become a self-fulfilling prophecy, because the best athletes tend to follow them around. Then you have the which came first, the chicken or the egg situation.
The services are waiting for us to win big again. And when we do, I think we will see guys like Stanton catapault into the top 100 (or at least high in the top 250). Then we have the self-fulfilling prophecy at work again. See, we know what we are talking about. But notice in that scenario, they are really just following us around again.
