[CardinalSagehen]

During the 2021 and 2022 recruiting cycles, 1/3 of the football recruits so far are outside the top 1000, no football recruits so far are in the top 100, and neither of the QBs is a 4-star. There are more positive ways to frame the situation, and it’s plainly true that Stanford still recruits in the top half (really top third) of the conference. But the situation is not what it was 5 year ago, that’s for sure.

Very fair criticism.  If you go by players in the Top 200 in the country, an admittedly arbitrary cutoff point, the trend has been as follows:
2014 - 6
2015 - 2
2016 - 4
2017 - 8 
2018 - 0
2019 - 5
2020 - 3
2021 - 0
2022 - 0
Source: 247sports.com

We were regularly pulling 5-star guys or 4-star guys in the top 100 a few years back, and now any 4-star recruits are just lower on the list (200-300).  You can still win with high 3-star guys like Walter Rouse, Kyu Blu Kelly, and Nathaniel Peat - but it's even better when you have a mix of "can't miss" guys like Walker Little, Davis Mills, Solomon Thomas, or Colby Parkinson, combined with some 3-star guys that are under-appreciated or just needed more time to develop.  We aren't getting any of those "can't miss" 5-star or high 4-star types in the last couple classes.

[CardinalSagehen]

During the 2021 and 2022 recruiting cycles, 1/3 of the football recruits so far are outside the top 1000, no football recruits so far are in the top 100, and neither of the QBs is a 4-star. There are more positive ways to frame the situation, and it’s plainly true that Stanford still recruits in the top half (really top third) of the conference. But the situation is not what it was 5 year ago, that’s for sure.

Very fair criticism.  If you go by players in the Top 200 in the country, an admittedly arbitrary cutoff point, the trend has been as follows:
2014 - 6
2015 - 2
2016 - 4
2017 - 8 
2018 - 0
2019 - 5
2020 - 3
2021 - 0
2022 - 0
Source: 247sports.com

We were regularly pulling 5-star guys or 4-star guys in the top 100 a few years back, and now any 4-star recruits are just lower on the list (200-300).  You can still win with high 3-star guys like Walter Rouse, Kyu Blu Kelly, and Nathaniel Peat - but it's even better when you have a mix of "can't miss" guys like Walker Little, Davis Mills, Solomon Thomas, or Colby Parkinson, combined with some 3-star guys that are under-appreciated or just needed more time to develop.  We aren't getting any of those "can't miss" 5-star or high 4-star types in the last couple classes.