After watching tonight's game against southern cal, I was motivated to spend some time on scout.com's recruiting database, with the idea to examine the level of talent that the leading candidates to replace Dorrell have had to work with. In doing so, I used scout.com, using its rankings of each team's recruiting class as a proxy for the relative level of talent that each coach's team has.

I start with UCLA as a baseline for comparison, and have included what seems to be the consensus top-3 coaches of Bruins Nation - Chris Petersen, Bronco Mendenhall, and Paul Johnson. In addition, I also have listed Mike Leach from Texas Tech as a coach that does have a solid following, and a rumored desire for the job.

For the longer tenured coaches such as Johnson and Leach, some may wish to use this as an indication of recruiting, though the realities that these coaches face in recruiting to their schools should not be forgotten, a service academy and the #3 team in Texas, respectively. I do think this information may be helpful in seeing what these coaches have done with a given level of talent. The data I have included spans the 2003-2007 entering classes (this season's true freshmen-redshirt seniors).

Scout.com class ranking, # of recruits, (# of 5 star/4 star/3 star recruits)

UCLA (Karl Dorrell)

2007. #36, 11 recruits, (1, 6, 3)
      
2006. #20, 22 recruits, (0, 6, 14)
      
2005. #24, 21 recruits, (1, 4, 10)
      
2004. #24, 26 recruits, (0, 4, 12)
      
2003. #35, 19 recruits, (0, 4, 4)

Texas Tech (Mike Leach)

2007. #44, 27 recruits, (0, 1, 13)
      
2006. #17, 34 recruits, (1, 7, 12)
      
2005. #36, 21 recruits, (0, 3, 8)
      
2004. #17, 26 recruits, (0, 0, 9)
      
2003. #37, 24 recruits, (1, 6, 8)

• Of particular note for Leach: 65 Offensive recruits, 64 Defensive recruits, with some recruits listed on offense and defense.
  
• Leach has signed about as many top-level recruits as Dorrell has over the last 5 years, though the larger number of recruits at Texas Tech causes the average rating/recruit to be somewhat less.
  
• The recruiting classes at Texas Tech have been on average at the middle of the Big-XII, though in the bottom half of the Big-XII south division, where Leach has to recruit against Texas, Texas A&M and Oklahoma, as well as a rising Oklahoma State.

2007. #42, 27 recruits, (0, 4, 11)
      
2006. #46, 25 recruits, (0, 2, 4)
      
2005. #53, 18 recruits, (0, 2, 3)
      
2004. #55, 28 recruits, (0, 1, 6)
      
2003. #59, 13 recruits, (1, 1, 3)

• BYU has a solid level of talent, particularly for a non-BCS conference program, its classes ranking 1st or 2nd in the MWC every year.
  
• Recruiting quality seems to have improved some since Mendenhall took over, with 1/2 of this fall's class composed of players with a 3-star+ rating from Scout.

2007. #57, 25 recruits, (0, 1, 9)
      
2006. #78, 18 recruits, (0, 0, 3)
      
2005. #73, 14 recruits, (0, 2, 4)
      
2004. #72, 25 recruits, (0, 0, 4)
      
2003. #73, 24 recruits, (0, 0, 0)

• Boise State has also done well with a level of talent that is very strong for its conference (top-3 classes in the WAC every year), but certainly below that of the out-of-conference teams that it has played against with success under Petersen.
  
• Together with the recruiting class verballed for next Fall (#61 overall), Boise's recruiting quality has improved under Petersen, and in the wake of last season's Fiesta Bowl campaign.

2007. #118, 13 recruits (0, 0, 0)
      
2006. #93,  39 recruits (0, 0, 0)
      
2005. #117,  8 recruits (0, 0, 0)
      
2004. #107, 11 recruits (0, 0, 0)
      
2003. #110, 11 recruits (0, 0, 0)

• Over the past several weeks, Paul Johnson has steadily moved up in my thoughts regarding the ideal coach for UCLA, to the point that he was challenging my long-time #1, Chris Petersen. After looking through the recruiting data and noting just what talent these coaches have at their disposal, Johnson has become my new top choice to coach UCLA.
  
• Except for 2006 - the ranking for which is boosted by the unusually large incoming class size - he has had one of the 10 weakest recruiting classes in Division 1-A each year, and yet won 8-10 games each year. I don't care what opponents those results come against, to have his level of success with one of THE least talented rosters in 1-A football has to tell you something about his coaching ability. Not one 3-star+ recruit on the team (compared to 70% 3-star + at UCLA, 52% at Texas Tech, 34% at BYU, and 22% at Boise).