Recruiting Athletes

[rudyjuly2]

I personally love getting top rated athletes to commit. Its a bit like Christmas in that you never really know what you are going to get with a recruit in terms of his best position. If you see great throwing strength and accuracy it will probably be a QB and they tend to be skill players more often than not but its always interesting.

I had one player who was 6-2 230 and his overall rating was a 75. When I got him and started choosing his position he was actually better than that at certain spots. I'd never seen an athlete switch and get better than his listed rating. On defense, he was a 78 at either safety position and a 75 at LB. He was good at many postions although I settled on LB just because I had some studs at S and lacked depth at LB. Just a tremendous athlete.

Another thing I just noticed with athletes is that I have two 5* athletes in my Top 5 on my recruiting board. I've never gotten a 5* athlete before and had both of them in for visits one week. Since the game always has a pop up listing the top recruits when you bring them in I noticed the game listed both prospects as SS when announcing it. Kind of ruined the suspense as to their best position (one is 240 lbs, the other 195) but it was something I never noticed before. Probably because I don't get many athletes and they are not my top prospects.

[Cyros]

It's great when you actually get an athlete that is an athlete, unlike the 60 speed ATH that can only play QB...

In 07 I recruited a 2* ATH that was like 6'2 230. He could've played LB, FS, SS, QB, or HB. I ended up putting him as SS despite his 84 speed and redshired him his first year. His FR(RS) year he didn't start but he played as the nickel corner and was Freshman All-American. Started his sophmore year and was All-Conference. Junior and Senior year he was 1st Team All-American with a Jim Thorpe Award his senior year. It's a tie between him and a 3* QB I recruited for best recruit ever.

[VWarrior]

Quote: Originally Posted by Cyros

It's great when you actually get an athlete that is an athlete, unlike the 60 speed ATH that can only play QB... In 07 I recruited a 2* ATH that was like 6'2 230. He could've played LB, FS, SS, QB, or HB. I ended up putting him as SS despite his 84 speed and redshired him his first year. His FR(RS) year he didn't start but he played as the nickel corner and was Freshman All-American. Started his sophmore year and was All-Conference. Junior and Senior year he was 1st Team All-American with a Jim Thorpe Award his senior year. It's a tie between him and a 3* QB I recruited for best recruit ever.

Wow, what a somewhat coincidence! A couple seasons ago I recruited I believe was 3* ATH who had 84 speed and had him play SS because I was going to be thin at that position, redshirted his first year, then he started his redshirt freshman year and made the All-American Freshman Team.

[Maher]

You can actually do this with a lot of players, I've had WRs come in at high 70s and switched them to TE and boosh, they are in the low 80s with insane speed ratings for a TE. Talk about matchup problems.

[Solidice]

Quote: Originally Posted by Maher

You can actually do this with a lot of players, I've had WRs come in at high 70s and switched them to TE and boosh, they are in the low 80s with insane speed ratings for a TE. Talk about matchup problems.

i've also had some WR who also had QB abilities and actually made better QBs than some of my actual QBs, both throwing and running.

[Cyros]

Well, I know for the 360 for whatever reason EA decided that if you change position you lose speed. So I can't move a HB to FB without him going down to 68 speed or worse and it happens at other positions.

I wish EA would really let me switch around players like being able to move that fast undersized defensive end out to linebacker and reverse.

[BIG]

Anybody ever get a recruit that is listed around a 72, but turns out to be a 90 at defensive end? This has happened to me twice, and both of those guys were absolutely destructive in opposing backfields.

This one guy, I think his first name was Jamaal, was like 6'5" but skinny. He looked a hell of a lot like Jason Taylor. He was a 90 his freshman season, 96 as a sophomore, and a 99 the last two years (man was it a pain to convince him to stay for his senior year).

The main thing with an athlete defensive end like this is the speed. I'm not sure if these guys were in the 90's speed wise, but I know they were at least close. The downside is their tackling skills-Jamaal missed a bunch of easy sacks his first two years, but the disruption he caused was still solid.

I think this was back in the 2005 version of the game when I got these guys, and I am still searching for my next great athlete defensive end-and they are hard to find.