In light of all of the NIL news, and how throwing cash at teenagers seems to be the new norm, I have a question about our scouting. This era of CFB reminds me of club football (or soccer) where the most successful clubs aren't those that splash the most cash, but those that are best able to identify and develop talent, therefore using their dollars most efficiently.

Another analogy might be international signings in Major League Baseball, but given the limitations on dollars used, the soccer analogy seems more appropriate, as there's nothing stopping a club like Manchester United spending $25 million on an unproven teenager. 

So, this is all to set up my question which is, how does OSU scouting and talent eval work? How many scouts/evaluators do we employ? Is there any kind of cap on this from the NCAA, like the 10 assistant coaches rule? 

I have a theory that scouting and player evaluation will become more important than ever in the coming years, given that recruits now have a bonafide price tag attached to them, rather than in the past, where OSU's legacy did a larger share of the talking. Questions like "Is Dylan Raiola at $5 Million a better use of a finite amount of dollars than Lincoln Kienholz at, let's say $750k based on what we've seen?" seem inevitable if they aren't already being asked. 

Regardless of one's feelings or opinions about NIL, it seems as if a bushel of economic and valuation questions will become more important, and obviously I want what everyone wants here, for OSU to be on the cutting edge (which I have no doubt they are.)

This could also introduce questions such as introducing risk via transfer likelihood, but that seems somewhat out scope for this post, and is perhaps best saved for another time.