luke schoonmaker

[Patrick Barron]

Hello, fan of an NFL team. MGoBlog excruciatingly scouts every Michigan play, and scores them to inform our coverage. Since mi atleta es su atleta now, here we share what we're sharing.

Quickly: Solid, athletic Y TE with multiple years of production at Michigan and proficiency in many areas of the game. 

Draft Projection: Seems like a standard mid-round TE, probably 3rd to 4th round. Schoonmaker doesn't do much of anything that make NFL Draft scouts go crazy, but in a deep TE draft where players like Darnell Washington and Michael Mayer are the sexy names threatening the first round, Schoonmaker could be a great value pick deep in the draft. He's got elite athleticism for the position, with ideal speed, size, and strength to play TE in the NFL. He rarely jumped off the page at Michigan and his age (25 in September) likely limits his upside, but Schoonmaker feels like a solid high floor pick that a team will zero in on. 

NFL Comp: I am far from an expert on this kind of thing, but Dawson Knox and Cole Kmet are names I've seen thrown around for Schoonmaker. 

What's his story: Schoonmaker came to Michigan back in the 2018 recruiting class as a pretty low rated 3* out of Connecticut. At the time he committed, multiple sites didn't even have rankings of him and one had him in mid-major territory. As a senior in HS he transitioned from a left-handed QB to a more receiving-focused role, setting him up for his jump to college. When Schoonmaker committed to Michigan, he seemed to be comparable to two Michigan TEs at the time, Sean McKeon in that he was a low-rated, TE-shaped person from New England, and Zach Gentry in that he was a former HS QB moving to the position. There was good reason to believe in Schoonmaker's development as a result. Another reason was that he seemed to scream "Jim Harbaugh type of guy":  

image

Schoonmaker arrived at Michigan in the fall of 2018 and did the standard redshirt year at a program that was reasonably deep at TE. In year #2 he got on the field consistently as a special teamer, occasionally seeing time on offense and catching two passes, one of which for a TD. The third season in 2020 was abbreviated and again saw Schoonmaker mostly buried on the depth chart, appearing in all six games but not recording a reception. 

2021 was the breakout for Schoonmaker, though he was still below Erick All on the depth chart. He caught 17 passes for 165 yards, including 3 TDs, and really shined against Indiana when All was out with injury. That foreshadowed his senior season, when All went down with injury early in the year and Schoonmaker became the #1 tight end. His production doubled, up to 35 catches for 418 yards, though the emergence of true freshman Colston Loveland overshadowed Schoonmaker some by the end of the season. That was around the time that Schoonmaker battled injury and missed a pair of games (in addition to an early exit from the Fiesta Bowl). He did enough to earn All-B1G team according to the coaches, while Schoonmaker was a media honorable mention both seasons that he played significant snaps. 

Positives: Athletic, with good size for the position. Runs fine routes and has reliable hands, very few drops of routine balls. Does a lot of things well, grew into being an effective blocker over time. 

Negatives: Nothing that really wows you in the receiving game (not much circus catch ability), doesn't maul on the ground like some of the Michigan TEs he played with. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: What others say, grading, video, conclusion]

Turner waving goodbye to MSU [Patrick Barron]

Baker back? Interesting roster development for basketball after last night's Toledo game:

We’ll see what happens,” said Baker on if he would apply for a sixth-year.“Potentially.”

“Absolutely,” he said on if he would come back to Michigan. “If I got it, I’m back here.”

Baker played a total of 18 minutes as a freshman; bizarrely these all came in late February or later. Usually this would not be grounds for a redshirt, but who knows these days. The NCAA is in its Security Guard Meme phase. It could happen.

Grimace dot emoji. Sam Vecenie's latest Big Board has Jett Howard 20th and Kobe Bufkin 24th. Hunter Dickinson is 83. No commentary on any of them, so nothing to quote. But maaan this thing where the NBA grabs Michigan players before they have their AA-type season is getting old.

The guy who did the thing, nope. DJ Turner ran a 4.27 40 at the NFL combine, which is sort of impressive:

The Athletic had a piece on guys who rose and fell based on said combine and DJ Turner did not come up at all. I mean… I think… he's a corner? Right? One Michigan player did show up:

A lot of tight ends had big days, including Darnell Washington, who put on a show that will only help fans of his game build a case for his value and potential as a receiver. Sam LaPorta is an all-around football player that does a lot of things well and had a great day of testing. And even a prospect like Luke Schoonmaker continues to become more interesting because he’s a tight end who has shown he plays in-line and his testing numbers hinted there might be more to tap into as a receiver.

And fair enough:

Ben Herbert hive grows ever stronger. Rivals has a piece on Turner and Mazi Smith moving up in draft evaluators' eyes. If Smith blows it out of the water at pro day—which is likely—he'll move up further.

[After THE JUMP: CJ Stroud and words: never again.]

You deserve it, Ronnie [Bryan Fuller]

Watching Jim Harbaugh hoist the metallic football that is the B1G Champions Trophy last season felt like the coronation of a long, arduous journey. I felt a certain elation watching Michigan's destruction of Iowa, the feeling that we hadn't been there before. This year? Michigan's three touchdown defeat of Purdue felt almost ordinary, since we have been here before. That doesn't make it any less enjoyable. For the second straight year, your Michigan Wolverines are B1G Football Champions. After 17 years without a B1G title and 18 years without an outright title, Michigan has gone back-to-back in outright fashion for the first time since 1991-92. They have won 13 games for the first time in program history and are headed to back-to-back College Football Playoffs for the first time in program history. 

Pretty damn neat.

----

Michigan won the opening coin toss and deferred to the second half, giving Purdue the ball to start the game. It didn't go well for the Boilermakers. A screen pass to Charlie Jones was blown up by Will Johnson, foreshadowing a monster night for the true freshman corner. A screen for Devin Mockobee was stopped quickly and then Jaylen Harrell sacked Aidan O'Connell to cement a three-and-out. Michigan got the ball and asserted themselves quickly on offense. JJ McCarthy found Cornelius Johnson on a third down pass that went just enough for the first down and then connected with Ronnie Bell on an improvised 3rd & 6 completion that went for 16 yards. On the next play McCarthy jacked a ball up for Colston Loveland in the end zone. Loveland was double covered but the 6'5" tight end went up and got the ball. Touchdown Michigan, 7-0. 

Purdue's next drive was one to forget for the Michigan defense, a mix of zone coverage busts and blown tackles, with RJ Moten and Michael Barrett the worst offenders. Screen passes to Mockobee got Purdue going on the ground and then Charlie Jones started to settle in. Michigan's zone was the perfect recipe for Jones to get free, sitting down over the middle and QB Aidan O'Connell was laser-accurate in finding him. Jones had catches on three successive plays, going for 15, 14, and 17 yards and zooming Purdue deep into Michigan territory. A hand-off to Tyrone Tracy Jr. (with some trickery built in) got Purdue down to the 1 and Mockobee promptly punched it in to tie the score at 7. 

[Patrick Barron]

Michigan would go three-and-out on a drive set back by JJ McCarthy's attempt to throw the ball while past the line of scrimmage and Purdue embarked on another long drive. To be fair, it didn't look like it would be long at first. Michigan adjusted its coverage of Jones, bracketing him on a 3rd & 4 slant, producing an incompletion that made it seem as if the Wolverine defense was getting off the field. But Jeff Brohm dialed up a fake punt, one that juuuust got the first down, with Payne Durham barely getting the ball across the line to gain. Purdue's offense re-took the field, O'Connell hit Jones for 25, but once inside the red zone, Michigan clamped down. A botched hand-off at the mesh point got Purdue off their rhythm and a check-down pass on 3rd & long was bottled up by Johnson. The Boilermakers kicked a FG for their lone lead of the game, 10-7. 

The ensuing drive for the Maize & Blue would eat up 6.5 minutes of clock and see the Wolverines wrest control back. A balanced mix of rushing and passing got the Wolverines down into Purdue territory but the drive stalled out at the 30 as Purdue pressured McCarthy into a third down throwaway. Michigan sent out Jake Moody for a field goal, but Purdue would jump offsides and turn a 4th & 6 into a 4th & 1. This time it was the Michigan offense being given new life thanks to special teams and they re-took the field. With Kalel Mullings in as a mooseback, the Michigan OL gave him plenty of push for a first down. Donovan Edwards then got four straight carries, culminating in a 3rd & 4 from the Purdue 7 that saw McCarthy pressured, scramble, and completing a pass to Luke Schoonmaker for a TD. 14-10. 

Purdue would respond with their own clock-munching drive. They balanced the run and pass pretty well and converted a pair of 3rd & 1 plays with Dylan Downing rushes along the way. Faced with a 3rd & 12 a little bit later, O'Connell delivered a 20-yard strike to TJ Sheffield against Gemon Green. Michigan's defense slammed the door again after that and forced a long field goal for a shaky Boilermaker kicking game, but Mitchell Fineran drilled the 45 yarder to make the score 14-13. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: More recap]

welp got a real outlier of a QB number this week 

final nail in the PFF OL grading coffin

michigan state has been possessed by a fey mood

i'm so happy

let's all just remain calm but I think I figured out the Klatt take 

it's time to relax

grousing groused 

i'm perfectly calm, dude 

up and down but still positive 

it's all happening