Five Stars And The NFL Draft
There is always a great deal of emphasis put on five-star recruits, and for good reason. The pro “stars matter” crowd likes to point out that more five stars - by percentage - get drafted in the first round than any other ranking (four-star, three-star, etc.).
The “stars don’t matter” crowd will point to the fact more actual three-stars go in the first round than five stars, but obviously there are significantly more three-stars each year than five-stars.
This article isn’t intended to take a stand on the stars matter, or not, argument. The purpose of this article is to dive into the draft success of five-star players.
We’ll take a look at overall five-star draft numbers from the 2011-2016 recruiting classes (192 players) using the 247Sports composite ranking. There were actually 198 total five-stars, but six from those classes are still set to be in college in 2020.
We’ll also dive into more detailed numbers and also break down which positions have the most draft success among five-stars, and which positions are apparently the hardest to evaluate.
These numbers were intriguing. The first thing you see is there's a greater chance a five-star recruit goes undrafted than he goes in the first round. The odds that a five-star goes in the first two rounds (38.5%) is almost identical to the odds he gets picked in the seventh round or goes undrafted.
When you break it down even further you'll see greater success the higher in the rankings you go. For the rest of the analysis the percentage numbers are "hit rate," which is any player that was taken between rounds one through four. Anyone taken between rounds five through seven, or anyone that goes undrafted, is a miss.
Look at those numbers, with the Pct% being "hit rate."
The draft success rate for five-stars ranked between No. 1-15 is much higher than those ranked 16th or lower. Almost half of the players ranked between No. 1-15 were drafted in the first two rounds while just 27.6% went in the seventh round or did not get drafted.
Almost half (49.5%) of the five-stars ranked 16th or lower went in the seventh round or were not drafted, while just 29.5% were taken in the first two rounds.
The players ranked in the top 15 had a 62.1% hit rate while just 43.8% of the five-stars ranked 16th or lower were taken in the first four rounds.
Below is a graph showing how many of the players ranked specifically in certain spots in the top 10 were hits when it comes to the draft.
The asterisk with No. 10 is there are just five players ranked No. 10 in this breakdown. Alabama linebacker Ben Davis will still be on the Tide roster in 2020, but considering Davis has just 14 career tackles the odds are he'll be a miss.
This analysis got very interesting when I looked at it from a position-by-position standpoint.
This data shows that recruiting services have a far, far greater hit rate with defensive players. Or put another way, the services miss on offensive players far more frequently. While the success rate for defensive players is almost 60%, it's barely over 40% for offensive players, and its just 41.5% for skill players (QB, RB, WR).
Those three positions produced more undrafted players (30) than players taken in the first four rounds of the NFL Draft.
Cornerback tops the list, although this was an odd breakdown. Twelve of the 17 five-star corners were hits, and nine of the 17 were taken in the first two rounds, which are both outstanding hit rates.
The odd part is that not a single five-star corner was taken after the fourth round. Twelve were taken in the first round rounds while the rest went undrafted. None were taken in rounds five through seven. It was truly a hit or major miss at the position, but most were hits.
Linebacker was the worst position on defense, with just seven of the 17 five-star linebackers hitting in the draft.
Not a single offensive position had over a 50% success rate, and tight end and wide receiver were the two worst positions, although tight end only had three players.
Running back was another hit-or-miss position, with eight of the 28 backs going in rounds one or two, but 13 went undrafted. No other position had more undrafted players. Wide receiver and defensive end were next with 12 undrafted players.
Here's a look at which positions produced the most high-end draft picks (rounds one and two).
No position produced more first rounders than defensive end (nine), and a total of 16 defensive linemen were taken in the first round, with 23 total linemen going in the first two rounds.
Safety, cornerback and defensive tackle had the best high-end hit rate, with all three having at least half of their five-stars getting drafted in the first two rounds.
Just eight of the 28 running backs were taken in the first two rounds.
Not one single offensive position got to 40% when it comes to producing first or second round picks among the five-stars.
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