For some reason they've really inflated the number of 4 stars over the last twenty years while keeping 5-stars mostly the same. If you go back in 247 and look at the composite rankings for 2003 (the first year they had composite rankings), there were 14 5-stars and 80 4-stars. 10 years later in 2013, there were were 17 5-stars and 100 4-stars. Fast forward another 10 years to 2023 and there were 17 5-stars and 124(!!!) 4-stars.

Basically the top recruits (the 5-stars and the top half of the 4-stars) have not changed, but the lower half of 4-stars are really just 3 stars from 20 years ago. It's silly.