[BostonCard]

I would say that if there is one position we want to disproportionately load up on, it is defensive line, for two reasons (both of which you have previously touched on).  First, DL benefits from “old man strength”, so excepting the periodic freak of nature like Solomon Thomas, you are going to want to have a DL comprised principally of juniors, seniors, and fifth years, which means under most circumstances, your usable pool is going to be about 40% smaller than the number of D linemen on the team (more when you don’t get your fifth year seniors back).  Secondly, as you mentioned, it is harder to project high school defensive linemen than it is to project other positions, so you just have to increase your n to increase your probability of having enough usable d linemen.  So, while you normally want a little bit below 1 player per position per year (so, two interior linemen a year), for DL, I think you probably are looking to alternate between 2 and 3 a year, which would give you 10 or so (maybe one or two more if you have some fifth years, or a little less with attrition), of which about 5 should be upper classmen.  That gives you some wiggle room if a couple of them are total duds (as inevitably will be the case).

BC

[BostonCard]

I would say that if there is one position we want to disproportionately load up on, it is defensive line, for two reasons (both of which you have previously touched on).  First, DL benefits from “old man strength”, so excepting the periodic freak of nature like Solomon Thomas, you are going to want to have a DL comprised principally of juniors, seniors, and fifth years, which means under most circumstances, your usable pool is going to be about 40% smaller than the number of D linemen on the team (more when you don’t get your fifth year seniors back).  Secondly, as you mentioned, it is harder to project high school defensive linemen than it is to project other positions, so you just have to increase your n to increase your probability of having enough usable d linemen.  So, while you normally want a little bit below 1 player per position per year (so, two interior linemen a year), for DL, I think you probably are looking to alternate between 2 and 3 a year, which would give you 10 or so (maybe one or two more if you have some fifth years, or a little less with attrition), of which about 5 should be upper classmen.  That gives you some wiggle room if a couple of them are total duds (as inevitably will be the case).

BC