I said those guys never played, I was just listing talent that was ultimately on the bench and in practice. Whereas this year we have Brad as our last guy, those teams had Hawkins/Willis/Hood/Polson, guys who could actually contribute.
And I think it's unfair to retroactively discredit the freshmen on those teams. Fine, Dakari didn't end up as good as we hoped, but by every measure, he's a better "recruit" than Richards, for example. Same with Young/Knox. Same with the twins.
They may not have been what the rankings said, but going in, they were better players than the ones we have now, in what was considered a better recruiting class. That's kind of my point. We've seen these amazing classes full of 5 stars and top 10 players, but it's dumb to think all of those rankings are created equal or that we'll get exactly what we expect from everyone.