[Completely unrelated: Let's go win College Football Risk!]
Michigan reeled in one of their top linebacker prospects, and for the moment their highest-ranked defensive recruit of the 2021 cycle, on Saturday, securing a commitment from 3-star linebacker Tyler McLaurin from Bolingbrook, IL.
How they plan to use him isn't so clear. In recent years when you see a Cam McGrone-shaped (6'2/210) OLB on Michigan's recruiting board you can figure they mean to turn him into a middle linebacker in Don Brown's 4-2-5/bring-five system, where the MLB has to be able to blitz, cover all manner of RBs, and get to the sideline before they do. Your local blogger and more tuned-in recruiting analysts will then tut-tut the "he's just a SAM" crowd for getting their X's and O's mixed up.
I'm holding off on the tuts this time however because the film shows a guy who could be really good SAM.
GURU RATINGS
As of this writing Rivals sees a high 3-star who's already 6'3/215, 24/7 sees a medium-high 3-star who's 6'2/210, and ESPN as per usual sees the back side of their eyelids:
Rivals |
ESPN |
247 |
247 Comp |
3*, 5.7, #27 OLB,
#11 IL |
No Profile |
3*, 88, #37 OLB
#11 IL |
3*, 0.8789, #26 OLB,
#11 OH, #404 Ovr |
The rankings that do exist are pretty recent. Rivals first scouted him in December and put him the #19 player in the state, bumping that up to #11 after the senior film came in. 24/7 started with a nondescript 84 in mid-October, and went to an 88 in late January.
In my composite, as a SAM/WDE he comes in right under Chase Winovich with Shantee Orr and Noah Furbush in the area. If you rank him as an ILB he's in a thick pile of Kenny Demens, Charles Thomas, Cornell Wheeler, Joey Sarantos John Spytek, Elysee Mbem-Bosse and others.
[Hit THE JUMP for scouting, video, and the rest.]
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