FSU football: Grading 2017 recruiting class in retrospect
By Kelvin Hunt
FSU football has had some highly regarded recruiting classes in the past five years, but the 2017 class was the last with true star potential.
Recruiting stars matter with FSU football or any other college football program. Don’t get it twisted and think you can win or compete for national championships with a team full of three star recruits.
Yes, it’s possible to win a lot of games with well coached three-star players, but you absolutely must have those difference makers to compete at the highest level.
The FSU football 2017 recruiting class was supposed to be one of the recruiting classes that would help the Noles compete for championships.
It was extremely top-heavy with four 5-star players with 11 players ranked in the top 200. There were seven players ranked in the top 100.
The class consisted of 12 blue chip players in a class of 23(one non-scholarship makes it 24) which equates to a 52 percent blue chip ratio.
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The only problem is the a lot of this recruiting class hasn’t or didn’t contribute much at all. In fact, the lack of development in this recruiting class is part of the reason the program is where it is right now.
It’s not all on the players, in fact I place most of the blame on the coaches who brought this class into existence. It’s absolutely a great class on paper with the difference makers needed to be elite.
A myriad of problems derailed this class from injuries, off-field problems and sheer lack of development. Let’s take a look at this class by categories.