ESPN is ranking the top colleges in their ability to put top talent into the NFL. The way they did the calculation is to give one point for each player who was named NFL most valuable player, defensive player of the year, offensive player of the year or All-Pro (first- or second-team) and one point for each Pro Bowl appearance. They ranked all players drafted from 1979 to 2009. Here are the results ranked from 1 to 16:
USC
Miami
Pitt
Florida State
Tennessee
UCLA
Notre Dame
Georgia
Penn State
Arizona State
Michigan
Ohio State
Florida
Nebraska
Oklahoma State
Clemson
A quick look at this list raises a lot of questions but I will focus just one.
How can Pitt be ranked #3? and Ohio State #12?
There is no way that Pitt has been a better pipeline to the NFL than Ohio State over the last 30 years. While it is true that Pitt has had a few players with great NFL success (most especially Dan Marino) if you look at the last 20 years Ohio State has had 31 first round picks and 114 overall while Pitt has had 5 and 51. The thing is many of Ohio State's players have had successful NFL careers but weren't Pro Bowl caliber. In fact, Ohio State has had the most players on NFL rosters in many seasons during the last few decades.
My problem with this "study" isn't that their facts are wrong as much as they are misleading. A school doesn't need to put Pro Bowl talent into the NFL to be considered a pipeline. I'd make the argument that luck is as much as a factor in a school getting a Pro Bowl/Hall of Fame player as anything (see #15 Oklahoma State with Barry Sanders and Thurman Thomas for a good example).
I know ESPN does these things just to rile up the fans in the offseason but I wish at least they'd try for a bit more honesty in their "findings". Adding a games/minutes played factor into their equation would have made it a lot more relevant. Still it could be worse. Texas, LSU, and Oklahoma were left off the list entirely. I'm guessing their fans are a bit more upset at their rankings.
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