Good post, Oh8ch.
A football team really needs about 40 solid contributors; counting red shirts, that's 8 kids per class, or roughly one-third of each recruiting class. Therefore, no team needs to be truly great at recruiting; if you can hit on half, you should be consistently ahead of the game.
For example, last season the Buckeyes had a record 14 players drafted into the NFL: 6 were redshirts from the 1999 recruiting class; 7 were true seniors from the 2000 class; and one was an early-entry junior from the 2001 class.
Examining the 1999 class further:
24 players signed in 1999;
Michael Doss was the only true senior from that class to be drafted last year;
As mentioned above, 6 redshirts were drafted this year (Tim Anderson; Drew Carter; Adrien Clarke; Ben Hartsock; Craig Krenzel; B.J. Sander);
Thus, only 7 of 24 players (or 29.2%) from the 1999 class made it to the NFL.
If we add in the others who contributed but didn't get drafted (Bryce Bishop; Scott McMullen; Richard McNutt; Fred Pagac, Jr.), our success rate goes up to 11 out of 24 (or 45.8%). All in all, 1999 was an outstanding recruiting class, even though it produced only one true star (Doss).
Examining the 2000 class further:
24 players signed in 2000;
As mentioned above, 7 were drafted as true seniors this year (Will Allen; Michael Jenkins; Shane Olivea; Robert Reynolds; Darrion Scott; Will Smith; Alex Stepanovich);
7 players remain on the team as redshirt seniors (Jason Caldwell, Bam Childress; John Hollins; Josh Huston; Harlen Jacobs; Brandon Joe; Thomas Matthews) - of that group, Joe is the only starter, and the only player likely to be drafted; the other players have been slight contributors to this point.
Thus, it is likely that only 8 of 24 players (or 33.3%) of the 2000 class will make it to the NFL.
After subtracting Brandon Joe from the mix, if half of the remaining 6 players contribute something this season, then our hit ratio again goes up to 11 out of 24 (or 45.8%).
Classes of 2001 and 2002
The Tressel classes appear to be much more solid than the Cooper classes, primarily due to the fact that we are now suffering fewer academic casualties. It would seem that each of these classes will have a hit ratio of greater than 50%. That is why
OSU will continue to compete for NC's under JT.