On paper it appears as though Kentucky is catching up with the Auburns and Alabamas of the SEC. It all depends on what paper you’re looking at.
If you throw out college production and simply use recruiting rankings to evaluate talent, it’s easy to see why Auburn opened as a 10-point favorite over Kentucky. 247 Sports has ranked every college football team based off the talent from their composite recruiting rankings. Auburn ranked No. 12 overall and 5th in SEC, while Kentucky comes in at No. 27 and 11th in the conference.
The Tigers have two consensus five-star recruits on their roster and 44 four-stars, more than twice as many as the 20 four-star prospects suiting up for Kentucky this Saturday.