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Top 10 States for NFL Talent

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BKOTH97

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Aug 29, 2004
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This review of the NFL Draft Picks since 1988 was just posted on USAToday:

http://www.usatoday.com/sports/football/nfl/draft-history-graphic.htm

I found the information really interesting, but I noticed something extremely interesting about the number of draftpicks from each state and thought I would do a quick analysis by the numbers. These numbers are based on where the individual attended high school, not college. Population numbers are from the US Census found here:

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/population/006240.html

California, Texas and Florida are always touted as the Football Kings when it comes to talent, well...this report doesn't back that up. Try Louisiana, Mississippi and the District of Columbia. I took the total number of draft picks divided by the population and multiplied by 100,000 to give me the number of draft picks per 100K in population for each state. I found some interesting results.

Top 10
Louisiana 5.01
Mississippi 4.55
DC 4.54
Alabama 3.59
South Carolina 3.26
Georgia 3.09
Florida 3.04
Hawaii 2.66 !!! This surprised me !!!
Texas 2.48
Nebraska 2.27


Bottom 10
Vermont 0.00
Maine 0.00
New Hampshire 0.07
Rhode Island 0.27
New York 0.60
West Virginia 0.60 !!! This surprised me !!!
New Mexico 0.62
Nevada 0.66
Massachusetts 0.68
Connecticut 0.74


So, where is the all powerful California? Try a pedestrian 15th at 1.93 per 100K...just two places higher than the United States Average (1.78). Also notably absent from the top 10 was Tennessee (19th at 1.52)

So, bottom line? The southeast is KING of High School, College and NFL football. Bar none..no question, end of discussion.

Talk amongst yourselves...
 
I find it intersting that some consider Alabama a small talent state, when it is actually #7 in this poll. Louisiana is surprisingly #6 easily. plenty of talent to stock SEC football rosters. I don't know much about louisiana and its sporting history, but i do know Alabama has produced some of the greatest athletes of all time (Jesse Owen, Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Joe Louis, Bo jackson)
The West Virginia thing doesn't surprise me, look at WVU's roster , they have like 10 of 85 from the state, I don't think any are starters. thats why I thought richrod would come to Bama, its hard to compete relying mainly on out of state talent. south florida will be the dominant big east school soon using leftovers (from the big 3) and non qualifiers.
 
VERY interesting, BKOTH97. Thanks for sharing, & a belated welcome to the board!

This really shoots a lot of "theories" down, including the one about Spurrier having slim pickens at SC. Makes you wonder why he isn't recruiting better..........
 
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One thing that stands out to me is that almost all of the states in the Top 10 are in the South and have warm climates, which could be a reason that the gap between the Big 10 and SEC has widened.
 
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I'm surprised by California not being in the top 5 as well. If you look at Rivals or even Scout they have atleast 5 or 6, 5 star players evey year.

EDIT: Oh, per Capita, I guess that makes sense then.
 
Per Capita is really the only way to measure something like this. California is only "talent rich" because of its size. If the land area of the southeast was all part of the same state it would blow away the pure number of picks by California. For example, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and Georgia. Add them together and you get about 1350 picks vs 699 for California. Land area and population of California and those states is about equal.
 
BKOTH97 said:
Per Capita is really the only way to measure something like this. California is only "talent rich" because of its size. If the land area of the southeast was all part of the same state it would blow away the pure number of picks by California. For example, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida and Georgia. Add them together and you get about 1350 picks vs 699 for California. Land area and population of California and those states is about equal.
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Yeah, California is a big state, but it also has the most number of people in the entire country.

I'm surprised by the rankings but I'm not going to whine about it. Some of y'all seem to have this anti-CA thing going just because they didn't end up in the top 10 or whatever. I find it a bit funny actually.
 
CaliforniaTide said:
Yeah, California is a big state, but it also has the most number of people in the entire country.

I'm surprised by the rankings but I'm not going to whine about it. Some of y'all seem to have this anti-CA thing going just because they didn't end up in the top 10 or whatever. I find it a bit funny actually.
Click to expand...

I don't think there's any anti-Cal. bias going on, we're just discussing how reality differs from perception.
 
TommyMac said:
I don't think there's any anti-Cal. bias going on, we're just discussing how reality differs from perception.
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It's just a set of rankings that are based on NFL numbers. It doesn't have anything to do with where they're from (although it does list by state). To me, it doesn't matter what state you're from, if you make it to the NFL, you're pretty darn good.
 
CaliforniaTide said:
It's just a set of rankings that are based on NFL numbers. It doesn't have anything to do with where they're from (although it does list by state). To me, it doesn't matter what state you're from, if you make it to the NFL, you're pretty darn good.
Click to expand...

I think you're missing the point. The point being that on a per-capita basis, the Deep South produces more NFL talent than other regions of the country.
 
TommyMac said:
I think you're missing the point. The point being that on a per-capita basis, the Deep South produces more NFL talent than other regions of the country.
Click to expand...

And as the original poster of this thread pointed out, that most people anoint CA, TX, and FL as the kings of talent (the perception), but when you compare their population to the number of NFL players they produce, it's really quite low when compared to a state with a smaller population (the reality). That's all anyone is saying here.
 
PDL:

That is exactly right. I was not trying to be anti-california, just trying to set the record straight. I get tired of hearing about how wonderful all of those prospects are coming out of California, Texas and Florida, when I know that we have recruits who are just as good right here in Alabama and Mississippi...on the otherhand, maybe I should just keep my mouth shut so that Alabama can continue to scoop up all of that talent as they load up for a NC run in the next few years.

Roll Tide!
 
S.CAR is a small state and anyone in columbia must fight with clemson for in state recruits. plus florida, uga and the tobacco road schools of n. car. tend to steal players. on top of that, columbia is a complete hellhole of a place to live. it is simply hard to recruit there. the best football players in the state come from places like north charleston and spartanburg high... which ummmmm isn't exactly known for their acedemic prowess. so i think while there is some very good talent, there is lots of competition, and there is a problem with lots of kids not having the grades.
 
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