TopDrawerSoccer Rankings and Verbal Commitments—Accurate? Useful?

[Anonymous]

My DD is starting to get serious about the recruiting process, so i was browsing TDS. It looks like people can upload all sorts of things to their player profile themselves, which made me wonder whether there’s any validity to the site’s rankings. And with the NCAA rule change, what’s up with freshmen and sophomores listing verbal commitments? I thought that was going away. The site seems to be the only individual player site out there open to public reading, so I guess it’s still the place people go for information on other athletes in their child’s grad year, but I’d be interested in hearing thoughts.

[Anonymous]

The rankings are pretty useless. Basically, if you get mentioned in a TDS article, you’re on their radar. Top ranked players are those listed as going to a national team camp but after that it’s a crapshoot. Just on the teams I’m very familiar with, l I’ve seen bench players be ranked above star players because the bench player got mentioned in an article (showcase event, star committed so only played a little and out of position). Goal scorers from teams that post box scores most likely to be represented bec most TDS recaps are just from “reporting” the top stats from the weekend games; only a very little is from eye witness reporting.

For commitments, a parent/ player has to first submit it to TDS before it’s posted but I don’t believe they follow up with the school to verify. Also, TDS will add commitments after signing days based on a school’s press releases or twitter postings.

[Anonymous]

So true. The articles that are "standouts" from the previous weekend's game/events are just lists of who scored the most goals in the games. Occasionally it's obvious that a player is being "promoted" or talked up (maybe by a coach?) when they don't have goals but it talks about something they did on the field that doesn't sound especially noteworthy.

TDS verifies the commits once the press releases are out for the senior class.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't pay too much attention to the rankings, but I've found the commitment lists to be close to 100% accurate (some kids end up at schools other than those they first verbally commit to though for a variety of reasons). The articles can be useful to give you a general sense of a player's background and accomplishments. Some will be written by TDS staff while others are clearly self-posted by kids or their families.

[Anonymous]

All kids in the IMG150 are good players. All can play D1. Those in the top half can certainly play on the best teams in D1. The order is off, as is any subjective list, aside from the top 5 or so, who are almost certainly there because of YNT invites. And kids not on the list now can still play D1, even at the highest levels.

[Anonymous]

The commitment lists miss a lot of kids. I know several 2020s who've committed to top schools and are not listed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The commitment lists miss a lot of kids. I know several 2020s who've committed to top schools and are not listed.

Commitments are self-reported, so those 2020's haven't added it yet. TDS only adds unreported commitments when the press releases come out. That's why so many 2019's are being added now.