Alabama earns raves for recruiting class

NCAA Football Betting Lines

02/01/2012 - (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Alabama has the top recruiting class in the country, according to Rivals.com, after getting written commitments from 18 football players on National Signing Day.

The players who signed national letters of intent Wednesday joined eight mid- year enrollees to make up the 2012 signing class for the reigning BCS national champions.

The Crimson Tide have a strong overall group with 14 four-star student- athletes and three five-star players, including Rivals.com's second-rated running back, T.J. Yeldon.

Alabama head coach Nick Saban, while happy with the results, cautioned the perils of bringing in such highly-regarded talent.

"I say this every year, but recruiting is not an exact science," Saban said. "No one knows for sure how these players are going to develop in the future. That's certainly something we work hard on here, as coaches and teachers, is to help these players develop."

Texas, coming off another disappointing season that saw the Longhorns go 8-5 and 4-5 in the Big 12, had Rivals.com's second-rated class with 28 signees, including two five-star commits.

Florida, Ohio State and Stanford rounded out the top five, with the Cardinal building off back-to-back BCS bowl appearances by welcoming three five-star recruits in defensive end Aziz Shittu and offensive linemen Kyle Murphy and Andrus Peat.

"We are excited to welcome one of the best recruiting classes in school history," said Stanford head coach David Shaw. "We say that not because of how high this class is rated, but instead because of the combination of ability, intelligence, toughness and character in this class."

Rivals.com's No. 1 ranked player, 6-foot-6 wide receiver Dorial Green-Beckham, is staying close to home after the Springfield, Missouri, native chose to attend Missouri.

Florida State, Michigan, USC, Miami-Florida and Oklahoma ranked No. 6 through 10 according to the noted recruiting website.

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FOOTBALL BETTING : Crabtree's base deal: six years, $32 million

Football Betting

In the wake of the news that the 49ers have signed receiver Michael Crabtree after an extended holdout, there has been not a hint of the dollars to be paid to Crabtree.

And since this means that his agent hasn't leaked the numbers, it means that his agent feels no specific motivation to do so.

Possibly because his agent isn't all that thrilled to have his name on the deal.

So the numbers will come from sources other than Crabtree's agent. And we've gotten our mitts into them.

Per a league source, Crabtree has signed a six-year, $32 million contract. (The total includes guaranteed money, base salaries, and the one-time incentive based on achieving minimum playing time.)

The deal also includes $17 million in guaranteed money.

As reported elsewhere, the deal can void to five years based on performance triggers, wiping out a final year base salary of $4 million. But they won't be easily reached.

The source tells us that, in his first four seasons (including 2009), Crabtree must either qualify for two Pro Bowls, or he must qualify for one Pro Bowl in one year and he must participate in 80 percent of the offensive snaps in a separate year in which the team makes the playoffs.

In other words, if in 2010 he qualifies for the Pro Bowl and the team makes the playoffs and he participates in 80 percent of the snaps, he'll still need to make it to the Pro Bowl or achieve the 80-percent/playoffs in another season.

Since the chances of Crabtree making the Pro Bowl or participating in 80 percent of the offensive snaps this year is roughly zero percent, he'll have three years to get it done.

And it won't be easy. Frankly, he'll be hard pressed to make it to one Pro Bowl in three years with the likes of Larry Fitzgerald, Calvin Johnson, Anquan Boldin, Steve Smith, the other Steve Smith, Hakeem Nicks, DeSean Jackson, Johnny Knox, Percy Harvin, Greg Jennings, Roddy White, T.J. Houshmandzadeh in the same conference for sportsbook betting.

So, by all appearances, it's a six-year deal. And at $17 million in guaranteed money, the per-year guarantee is a tepid $2.83 million per year.

There's another problem with the deal -- it has no mid-tier incentive package. Instead, the additional $8 million that Crabtree can earn (pushing the max value to six years, $40 million) requires the kind of unrealistic, mega-star performances that no rookie is likely to ever achieve.

So while the contract paid to Packers defensive tackle B.J. Raji covers five years and pays $22.5 million, he has the ability (if he's a solid player) to make up the difference between his base deal and Crabtree's five-year, $28 million haul via the mid-tier incentive package in Raji's deal.

And unless Crabtree meets the performance thresholds necessary to void the sixth year, he'll be stuck under contract for another year at a base salary of only $4 million.

There's one other area of concern with the deal. Crabtree, per the source, received no option bonus. Instead, he has significant money tied to a fairly new device known as a "discretionary salary advance," which unlike an opition bonus is subject to forfeiture if Crabtree decides in a year or two that he wants to hold out for a better deal. (We're also told that the 49ers have included language that would make certain escalators subject to forfeiture, too.)

Meanwhile, the deal falls well short of the mark for which Crabtree and agent Eugene Parker were aiming -- the five-year, $38.25 million contract paid by the Raiders to receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey, the seventh overall pick in the draft.

Even if Crabtree successfully voids the final year, he'll make more than $2 million per year less on average than Heyward-Bey.

Thus, as we explained earlier in the day, this is a deal that Crabtree could have done in July, which would have given him a much better chance of making a contribution to the 49ers during his rookie year.

So while the final outcome can be described as win-win, the broader view suggests that it's really a lose-lose situation.

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