54b did a great job breaking down the recruiting business; its strengths, weaknesses, and so on. I've been meaning to post a link to this article, which GoHorns (who is one of BON's recruiting writers) reminded me of today in his comment.
In the column, SI's Stuart Mandel looks retrospectively at the "consensus" #1 recruiting classes from the last few years, analyzes their success, and then, blessed with the addition of hindsight, proposes who -should have been- ranked #1.
It's worth reading, and hammers home the point that so many of these recruits, no matter how highly touted, never pan out. I've never once agreed to pay the ungodly subscription fees that these recruiting sites charge. I'm not saying it's not worth your money if the content entertains you. But as someone who has a hard time getting too amped up over recruiting news, it never seemed worth it.
With that said, recruiting does matter, and we're grateful to have our two recruiting writers here at BON doing our dirty work for us.
--PB--