COLUMBUS, Ohio – Anyone who watches recruiting, even on a casual basis, knows that this class of 2017 for the Ohio State Buckeyes could end up being one of the greatest recruiting classes in terms of the Rivals.com team rankings formula of all-time.

None of that matters once the players enroll and become part of the program, wins and losses will become the true measuring stick along with a hope of a few individual accolades along the way.

Take for example the recruiting class of 2002, the one that saw a last-minute commitment from eventual Heisman Trophy winner Troy Smith, only ranks as the No. 8 recruiting class of the Rivals.com-era (2002 to current), for Ohio State.

A top class does not mean top results long term. The 2010 recruiting class for the Florida Gators was statistically the No. 8 class (Rivals.com-era) of all-time as part of the Rivals recruiting rankings, and the four-year record for the Gators involving that class was a disappointing 30-21. Expand it out to five years and the record moves to an unimpressive 37-26. (We will have more on how the top recruiting classes of the Rivals.com-era performer long term later in this series).

The ironic part of all of that is that the class of 2010 at Florida was put together by none other than Urban Meyer. But the 2010 season was his final season. Two of Urban Meyer's Florida classes are part of the the all-time top recruiting classes, along with Meyer's 2013 Ohio State class. That means 30-percent of the list saw Urban Meyer as the architect and the Buckeyes are making an assault on that list in 2017 (granted, a solid 2017 Ohio State recruiting class could move the 2013 class off the list into 11th place).