From what was alluded to last year and from Coleman’s comments after the Arkansas game, it was pretty clear that Skyy was told he would start and play a significant role in the offense. It would have been very hard to get any qualify transfer PG with a guaranteed backup role, playing 10 minutes a game (believe 0440 kept making this point last offseason)
I think the rankings coaches methodology here is just too simplistic. Coaches make bets, especially in recruiting, all the time. To then conflate that with on-court performance (especially relative to previous years) is just not a good way to measure skill or performance. Painter, for instance, went from 29-6 (14-4) in 2010 to 15-17 (5-13) in 2014. Did he get worse as a coach? Not likely, but a series of events led to those terrible seasons in the middle.
I think the question you ask yourself now is, “do you believe that a Brad Underwood team is going to be consistently top half of the league, and usually top 4?” My answer to that is squarely yes, even with whatever that offense was last season.