There's a rich, middle aged man that lives next door. Everytime you see him, he's on his phone. Talking about high school girls, True Life on MTV, and sports. Half of the numbers in his Rolodex are Miley Cyrus aged males. He's always going outta town to meet high school boys, spend a few hours with them, and trying to convince them to come live by him for the next 3-4 years. When one of the boys tells him "no thanks" you can find him either in a fit of rage, or openly weeping, depending on his mood. Soon, he will find out if the teenage boys he's been stalking for 3 years will have him. Or someone else. Pediphelia? Nope! National Signing Day!

It's a creepy old man's dream, the chance to stalk other people's kids who legally might not be able to have intercourse, and legions of "fans" ushering him on, convinced that some 18 year old who spends Friday night sneaking booze up to his bedroom to give to girls his age to take advantage of them is the key to a multi million dollar program. For these reasons, it's easy to make the over-generalized term "recruiting is overrated." But since there are few things I love more than facts (see: beer, women, debauchery, Ben and Jerry's ice cream), it's that time of year again to see if your feeble attempts at spinning the "recruiting is useless" tag because your team isn't in the top 25 of the rankings is truth, or myth.

I won't keep you in suspense any longer. It's myth. For once, not just because I say so. Because I did research. Actual, asses and elbows research. As stupid as the business of recruiting rankings is (basically, a few nerds who couldn't play football create a website and stalk high school kids who used to beat them up), there's a reality to it that it breeds success. After this column is dead and gone, below, I have compiled a list of each national champion from the past 5 years and the runner up. I'd have gone back longer, but Rivals keeps only 9 years archived. Trying to be more legit, I checked Scout. Same thing for them. Which is odd, since their rankings actually prove their worth.

In case you're stupid, or Ed Reed, one of the two...I'll show you what these rankings mean. Take Alabama, this past year's BCS national champion...

Rivals.com rankings in descending order from 2009: 1, 1, 10, 11

AVG: 5.75

-A 5th, redshirt year was not taken into account. The reason was that in today's college football, there aren't massive amounts of redshirt seniors, and it would have chopped an additional year off of proof, because I wouldn't have been able to get Texas' 2000 class.

-If there's a way someone knows how to get Rivals rankings prior to 2002, let me know, and I'll do the entire BCS era and a few years previous to it

-The only team to win a national championship with an average 4 year rating outside the top 10 was Texas in 2005, who averaged out at 11.75

-Of all the national champions, every single team had a class in that 4 year span that was either 1 or 2 ranked

-Of the national champions, LSU had the lowest ranked class at 22 in 2005, however, all 3 other classes were in the top 10

-Of the runners up, only Southern Cal in 2005 had a better average ranking than the national champion who beat them

-That same Southern Cal team in 2005 had the lowest 4 year average by far, at a 4.5 ranking

-Ohio State in 2006 had a class ranked 41st, which was by FAR the lowest of any runner up or champion. It dragged their average down to 18.75, which shows that no team was even outside the top 20 in average that played for a national title.

-Alabama in 2009 and Southern Cal in 2005 are the only schools to have multiple #1 rankings in a 4 year period.

-Despite playing in two NC games, Ohio State's highest ranking over each 4 year period was #9, in 2004

-Amazingly, (and I found this to be the most interesting stat) of the 10 teams noted, 7 of them had freshman classes that year in the top 6. What this says is that freshman depth is hugely underrated in building a national champion. Whoda thunk?

What all this shows, other than that I have too much time on my hands, is that as we enter February and get all foaming at the mouth over men who's voices have cracked only in the last 3 years, there's a reason. Their relative success ranking wise leads to relative success on the field. And it's not even close. There wasn't one example, other than the Ohio State team that got plowed in 2006...if you want to consider being in the top 19 an example...of teams exceeding recruiting expectations. When I was 18, being recruited by schools that I didn't know were actual colleges...seriously, Bellarmine?...or directional schools that no one knows exist....winning national championships wasn't on my mind. Cheerleaders were. And that part of it probably hasn't changed. They don't have hot girls and beer on welcoming committees for these recruits because they think the kids are worried about jewelry and winning only. And Lane Kiffin's wife doesn't dance topless for incoming SC kids because all they think about is a Rose Bowl berth...

But when a collection of kids ranked highly come together, it leads to success. So the next time your creepy old neighbor is having scores of 18 year olds over to hang out in his den, think nothing of it. It might net you a "national champions" hat in a few years. Unless he's wearing aviator glasses. Then call the cops. He's probably not a college football coach....

2009: Alabama

2009-06: 1, 1, 10, 11

AVG: 5.75

2008: Florida

2008-05: 3, 1, 2, 15

AVG: 5.25

2007: LSU

2007-04: 4, 7, 22, 2

AVG: 8.75

2006: Florida

2006-03: 2, 15, 7, 2

AVG: 6.75

2005: Texas

2005-02: 20, 10, 16, 1

AVG: 11.75

2009: Texas

2009-06: 5, 14, 5, 5

AVG: 7.25

2008: Oklahoma

2008-05: 6, 14, 9, 3

AVG: 8

2007: Ohio State

2007-04: 15, 12, 12, 9

AVG: 12.75

2006: Ohio State

2006-03: 12, 12, 9, 41

AVG: 18.5

2005: Southern Cal

2005-02: 1, 1, 3, 13

AVG: 4.5

Copyright ©2010 Teddy Dupay