Alabama Football: Nick Saban is college football’s GOAT recruiter

There should be no debate, even among those who are not Alabama football fans, Nick Saban is the GOAT of college football recruiting.

There is some debate over the GOAT college football head coach. Alabama football fans mostly choose Nick Saban though Paul Bryant still gets the nod from many. Other fans argue for a small number of other coaches going back as long as there has been college football.

The GOAT award for CFB recruiting should not cause debate. The winner is Nick Saban and no other coach comes close. To be clear, no measurement of recruiting can compare the era of unlimited scholarships to the modern era. Total scholarships were reduced from 105 to 95 in 1978 and then down to 85, in 1992.

There have been other top recruiters since 1992. Bobby Bowden, Pete Carroll and Urban Meyer are near the top of any list. None have accomplished close to what Nick Saban has achieved.

Massively detailed tracking of recruits and thereby annual team rankings is not new. The process started as grassroots efforts before exploding into big media business in the late 1990’s. The best measurement of team recruiting success is the 247Sports Composite.

Going back to the 2000 class, only four schools have been No. 1 in the annual team rankings more than once. They are USC (twice); FSU (twice); Florida (three times) and Alabama seven times. In the span of the 2000-2018 classes, covering 19 seasons, Nick Saban has been a college coach for 17 of the classes. In those 17 seasons, Saban’s teams have finished outside the top five in recruiting only four times.

His first LSU class in 2000 finished No. 21 and was No. 21 again in 2002. Saban’s first Alabama football class finished No. 12 and last season the Tide finished No. 6. The other years (minus the 2005 and 2006 NFL seasons) are listed below.

Nick Saban Recruiting Classes

• 2000 – LSU – No. 21
• 2001 – LSU – No. 2
• 2002 – LSU – No. 21
• 2003 – LSU – No. 3
• 2004 – LSU – No. 4
• 2007 – Alabama – No. 12
• 2008 – Alabama – No. 3
• 2009 – Alabama – No. 3
• 2010 – Alabama – No. 4
• 2011 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2012 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2013 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2014 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2015 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2016 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2017 – Alabama – No. 1
• 2018 – Alabama – No. 6

The record needs no elaboration. Simply stated, in the 85 scholarship era, no one has come close to the recruiting success of Nick Saban.

In terms of commits in the 2019 class, Alabama football has a big lead in finishing No. 1 again. Jimbo Fisher is well behind at No. 2 even having three more verbal commits than Alabama football. Jim Harbaugh, Ed Orgeron and Lincoln Riley are the next three but they are farther behind.

There are no guarantees in recruiting until the signatures are inked (and still faxed) but Alabama football at worst will finish in the top five for 2019. The most likely outcome is another No.1 class.

Next: 2019 Class Verbal Commits

Alabama football has an added advantage for the 2019 and 2020 classes. Recruiting experts are calling those two classes of Alabama high-schoolers a bumper crop of top talent.