Rivals Roundtable: Which cities are producing most elite prospects?

Today's Rivals Roundtable features a city theme, looking at which metro areas are overachieving and underachieving in churning out big-time prospects.

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Rob Cassidy (Southeast): It's Miami-Fort Lauderdale. That's a homer pick. I get it. Sue me, but it's true. And it's not just a one-year thing. Sure there are exceptions (2017), but most years the area is well represented in the draft. The reputation the region boasts has been earned over time. One down year won't change that.

Mike Farrell (National): I'll still say Miami although a case can easily be made for Los Angeles and perhaps Atlanta. But to me South Florida is still the place to go for elite talent and more kids seem to pan out from there when it comes to college and NFL success than anywhere.

Adam Friedman (Mid-Atlantic): The sheer number of five-stars that hail from Florida makes it the best state for high school football prospects in the country, and the most talent-rich area of the state is South Florida. So I'll go with the Miami metro area.

Adam Gorney (National/West Coast): The Tampa metro area is the current king of high school football prospects because of IMG Academy in Bradenton, Fla. Every coach in the Southeast and many from around the country venture to that area to recruit kids because it is the mecca of high school football right now. So many talented kids play at IMG now and more are going there in the years to come. If you're a college coach and you have a working brain, stationing yourself at IMG makes a whole lot of sense.

Josh Helmholdt (Midwest): The Midwest has several strong, consistent talent-producing metro areas, but nothing that can compare with the likes of Miami, Dallas or Los Angeles. If we're just looking at talent in the 2018 and 2019 classes, then Cincinnati and St. Louis would share the throne in the Midwest region. Over the last several years Detroit has been in that top tier as well.

Nick Krueger (Texas): Houston. Look no further than the state's premier 7-on-7 team, Fast Houston. It's one of the best in the country and is filled primarily with stars from the Houston and Cypress areas. Lamar High alone had four players in the Rivals100 Five-Star Challenge presented by adidas earlier this month. Manvel is another team loaded with big-time talent, and when you include the prospects in the Missouri City/Fort Bend and Katy areas in addition to Cypress and metro Houston, you have a huge swath of the state's talent in one spot. Just last year, Bellaire-Episcopal had two of the top seven players in the country in Marvin Wilson and Walker Little, and has one of the nation's most dynamic wide receivers returning this season in Jaylen Waddle.

Chad Simmons (Southeast): It is hard to go against Miami when you look at the number of Power Five prospects that come out of that area each cycle. The Miami Hurricanes have 18 commits and eight of those come from the Miami area with a couple others from just north of there. Each year it has top-end talent, depth and future stars on the next level. James Cook (Florida State commit) and Mark Pope (Miami commit) lead the way in 2018, but there is plenty of talent behind them. It may not have been as top-heavy in recent years, but when I think numbers, Power Five talent and top athletes, I think Miami first.

Woody Wommack (Southeast): I might be biased considering I live in the city but the Atlanta area feeds most of the SEC as well as several other conferences from around the country. The quality coaching in the area as well as a number of former professional players living in the city has created quite the incubator for elite high school talent. As the city continues to grow I don't anticipate the number of top prospects from the area to decrease anytime soon.

Rob Cassidy (Southeast): I'm not sure people that don't follow recruiting know how much of a monster the Atlanta area has become in the last decade. I'm a little too close to it, so it doesn't seem like a stunner to me, but I think the average fan would be taken off-guard when presented with the numbers.

Mike Farrell (National): I'll go with Charlotte. I know it's cyclical and Charlotte is still known more as a basketball area than for football but some elite talent comes out of there and people don't take much notice of it consistently.

Adam Friedman (Mid-Atlantic): The greater DMV area often is overlooked when it comes to being a high school football hotbed because there are so many other things that grab your attention in that region, but so many of college football’s biggest stars call this metro area home.

Adam Gorney (National/West Coast): I'm going with Mobile, Ala., although it's hardly a metro area. The home of the Senior Bowl, the Mobile area - and I'm including Daphne and Foley - produce a good number of really talented players including Julio Jones, T.J. Yeldon, Ryan Anderson and many others. The Crimson Tide unsurprisingly dip into that area for a lot of top talent and many other SEC schools go in there as well. And if you want some phenomenal oysters during a recruiting trip, Mobile is your place.

Josh Helmholdt (Midwest): Indiana is assumed to be a basketball state, but it has been steadily increasing its production of football talent in the last decade and Indianapolis is the epicenter of that talent production. The 2018 class represents what has become the new norm for Indianapolis, with four four-star prospects in the 2018 class and 14 of the top 20 players in the state coming from the city.

Nick Krueger (Texas): San Antonio. Cibolo-Steele was a state championship contender last season and has a number of its top playmakers returning again this season. Some talent in Converse, New Braunfels and Schertz also has plenty of names worth keeping an eye on as we head into the fall. Last year, five-star QB and Texas A&M commit, Kellen Mond came from IMG Academy, but he is essentially a San Antonio product and this year, guys like Caden Sterns and Tommy Bush have really helped draw more attention to the area. The total amount of talent isn't more than one would see in the DFW metroplex, but it seems as though there is more there than is given credit. The Tyler/East Texas region is also a strong contender for this question as well.

Chad Simmons (Southeast): Too many have slept on the Nashville area, but most are starting to come around. More colleges are sending coaching into the high schools in and around Nashville, more players are getting offers and more players are becoming stars in college. Jalen Ramsey was a five-star defensive back in 2013 and he really started the coming out party per se for this area. Since that time there have been more four-stars in Tennessee, the number of Power Five prospects in the state increased each year and, while numbers in Memphis have been going down, Nashville has gone up in a big way.

Woody Wommack (Southeast): From college coaches' perspective, the city of Nashville is starting to get more credit for the prospects it produces but I don't think the public perception has quite caught up with that yet. Last year the Nashville area had two five-star prospects and dating back to Josh Malone and Jalen Ramsey, the area has had four five-stars in the last five cycles. But it's not just talent at the top, the city continues to produce more FBS players every year and Nashville belongs in the discussion with some other cities for talent production, especially relative to its size.

Rob Cassidy (Southeast): I feel like Texas has a whole has taken a step back in recent years, but I feel like the Dallas metroplex in particular. Is it still great? Sure, but maybe not quite as stout as the "Texas High School Football" reputation leads people to believe. Don't try to tell anyone in the Lone Star State, though. Then again, those same people are also under the (very false) impression that their barbecue is good, so ...

Mike Farrell (National): Chicago is as overrated as it comes for me when talking about metro areas that have a reputation for top players. I think it's been down for about a decade more or less and it doesn't seem to be bouncing back. Yes there are good players from there but for top-end talent and depth of talent it's not great.

Adam Friedman (Mid-Atlantic): New York City has more than 8 million residents but seems to really lack good high school football players. There have a handful of top prospects from the Big Apple in recent years but there is so much untapped potential there. There are some very good high school football programs in New York City but it’s surprising, at least to me, that there aren’t more quality programs that have sprung up.

Adam Gorney (National/West Coast): One city that stands out to me is Milwaukee. There has been only one five-star in the city during the Rivals.com era dating back to 2002 and that was nearly 10 years ago in OL Josh Oglesby. The Badgers have done so well in the Big Ten and they've locked down the state going to places like Eau Claire, Brown Deer, Kimberly, Menomonie, Berlin, Pewaukee (for T.J. Watt, not J.J. Watt) and many other places in the state. But Milwaukee has not been a reliable hotbed of talent for the Badgers and it has to be a recruiting challenge for that coaching staff.

Josh Helmholdt (Midwest): When you consider New York and Chicago are two of the top three population centers in the U.S., it's surprising how little football talent they produce for their size. Chicago was hurt in 2018 when the two top-ranked prospects from the city - Houston Griffith and Verdis Brown - transferred down to IMG Academy in Florida. The Chicagoland area definitely produces more than NYC, but not near as much as its population suggests it should.

Nick Krueger (Texas): Dallas-Fort Worth. Yes, there is still a boatload of talent in the area, but things are always going to come down to Houston vs. Dallas and if one is dubbed the current king, then the other must be the 'surprising' second option. Especially in the top-tier of prospects, Houston wins battle for now, but there are a number of teams such as Allen, Bishop Dunne and DeSoto that have numerous nationally-recruited players. DFW also doesn't have the depth of four-star talent that the Houston area does, but in the next few classes, we could see a shift with some younger talent taking back the hilltop from Houston.

Chad Simmons (Southeast): When you think about Florida, you'd expect every major city to produce football prospects and to have to some depth. Yes, Orlando does produce some, and it used to be one of the top areas about a decade ago, but the numbers have decreased in a big way there. You still have a Derwin James or a Martez Ivey, guys that come from schools just outside of Orlando, but it is South Florida, then Tampa now instead of Orlando being that next area recruiters go to find blue-chip talent. Jacksonville and Tampa both have more talent than Orlando — heck, IMG Academy is producing more talent at one school than the Orlando area has in recent years.

Woody Wommack (Southeast): This is a tough question but I've been surprised that the city of Louisville hasn't produced as many products in recent years. The city is obviously known for its basketball talent and while elite prospects are coming down the line in the class of 2019, consistent talent production hasn't been the case in recent years for the city.