Final Thoughts On This Recruiting Class
Every year I go over all the available information about Michigan's recruits, whittle it down to 1000-2000 words, and then hang on to those words for the season preview until such time as on-field production means I don't have to. Over the course of this process I have refined some opinions.
I feel better about…
Wide receiver. This is mostly about Cornelius Johnson and Erick All. Both guys have great size and shuttles in the 4.1-4.2 range; that change of direction was obviously a benefit when Johnson went to his all-star game and All enrolled early. Johnson in particular has an athletic profile and family background that make it very likely he's a competent or better multi-year starter as long as he stays healthy. All's quick rise and spring performance make it likely he can thrive as an outside WR—which is where I hope Michigan keeps him, especially given Quintel Kent's unfortunate situation.
Mike Sainristil's spring is something I (and everyone else) knew about before I embarked on this series but that is still a positive, and I can't tell you how much I love the idea of Giles Jackson in a winged helmet AND an offense that is designed to take advantage of deadly oompa loompas.
Kent was about to get a positive, Ronnie-Bell-ish review, too. I hope he can get back.
[After THE JUMP: the downside, but then more upside!]
I feel worse about…
The secondary. Dax Hill is Dax Hill and that's awesome. Quinten Johnson has a case as one of the more underrated guys in the class and has great testing numbers to build on. But Michigan took two corners a year after taking a lot of wild swings at the spot and neither guy jumped out as a slam dunk.
DJ Turner II and Jalen Perry both have some positives; neither gave me the warm fuzzies in the situation Michigan's in. Perry drew close to no mention over the course of spring when Michigan was begging for CBs to step up. Turner is a guy who had a ton of eyes on him over the course of his career and remained stuck in "he's okay" territory. I think you can suss out guys who are likely mis-ranked if you pay close enough attention—the sleepers of the year, discussed below, demonstrate this. The pattern of Turner's recruitment did not suggest he was an airball from the sites.
I'm terrified of…
My opinion about Zach Charbonnet. He's awesome, and he's going to be awesome, and that's exactly what I thought about Derrick Green.
I've tried to be vigilant about the things that hewed down previous highly-touted RB busts. It appears that none of them apply. Charbonnet has contact balance, unlike Green and Carlos Brown. His high school film has a lot of decisions he has to make at the line of scrimmage, unlike Kevin Grady and Ty Isaac. He's not going to struggle to stay on the team, unlike Kelly Baraka and Kareem Walker. He's about 1.5x Justice Hayes's size.
Even the injury issues that pop up as a red flag are less of one since the seemingly extended time out that went from all-star season through spring was just Michigan asking Charbonnet to wait on a meniscus surgery until he was on campus.
Sleeper check-in
For the record, previous sleepers of the year, with answers that would have been more correct based on the selection criteria (which has shifted over time) in parens:
- 2010: Jake Ryan
- 2011: Desmond Morgan (Frank Clark)
- 2012: Jehu Chesson and Ben Braden (Willie Henry and Jeremy Clark have arguments; FWIW Clark was "almost sleeper of the year" himself)
- 2013: Channing Stribling
- 2014: Moe Ways (Brandon Watson, and that's it, this was an awful class)
- 2015: Grant Perry (Karan Higdon, Jon Runyan Jr)
- 2016: Josh Uche and (sigh) Eddie McDoom (Josh Metellus, Sean McKeon, Mike Dwumfour are all > McDoom, YMMV with Uche)
- 2017: Joel Honigford (Kwity Paye)
- 2018: Luke Schoonmaker
- 2019: Charles Thomas (Sainristil DQed)
Jury's still out on the most recent three classes; all sleepers before that except Moe Ways and Eddie McDoom were starter-level players over the course of their career. In my defense there: 1) ye gods the 2014 class had nothing, and 2) McDoom might do some things at USF this fall and would probably be the starting H in Ann Arbor if he was still in town.
I feel dumb for not taking Paye, who checks the immigrant box and the "Don Brown recruits New England" box. Other than that… eh… not bad.
As noted above I DQed Sainristil because by the time I was writing these up he was already the starting H. Zach Carpenter almost got the nod over Thomas, FWIW.
Other seemingly under-ranked guys
[Bryan Fuller]
Mazi Smith's composite ranking is just outside the top 100 because of some consistency issues in high school. I think a guy who shows up at his all-star game and is clearly one of the Bad Dudes in attendance, as just about everyone asserted…
Smith was able to impress mostly because he might be a bear (barely) passing as a person. Evaluation after evaluation describes Smith simply running over anyone put in front of him:
- "…one of the most physically imposing players in attendance. That has been most evident during several of his overpowering bull rushes."
- …had to be one of the stronger players in this game. He won numerous reps with straight power. You combine his power with pad level and that is a nightmare for the offensive lineman in front of him.
- "…a day full of showcasing his power, including barreling over the blocker en route to the quarterback on this rep."
- "…just kept pushing the man in front of him into the backfield all day. He was strong at the point of attack, he played with good leverage and he was tough to slow down. He looked like he got stronger as the day progressed."
- "…continues to impose his will against opposing linemen with the full gear on, recovering from an apparent loss to win the rep with sheer power."
…is probably a top 50 player even if he got bored throwing guys into the sideline. Especially when he's already 300 pounds and simultaneously draws the same level of praise for his twitch. Donovan Jeter:
“Want to talk about a monster? First day, upper body, I’m one of the strongest benchers on the team and he’s making the weight I’m doing look light and I’m sitting there like Maybe I need to reevaluate myself."
High school DL get tired; Smith is probably going to need a year to refine his technique and body before he takes off. I don't look at him as your garden-variety four star.
The other four-star who stood out as a mis-rank is Cornelius Johnson. Dude is 6'2", runs shuttles like a slot, paid off that change of direction at a heavily scouted all-star game, and also showed plenty of ability as a deep threat. His parents are the Huxtables. He doesn't put up 4.4 40s; that's almost the only flaw in his game. That he didn't crack the top 100 anywhere is almost solely attributable to his location—Connecticut.
This OL class is not that OL class
[Isaiah Hole]
I'll eat a lemon if Michigan doesn't get at least two multi-year starters out of this OL class. This is not the 2013 class, which rolled six deep but was swinging wildly at a few guys:
- Chris Fox annihilated his knee during his senior season and never recovered.
- Dan Samuelson was a small-school Indiana kid who almost literally never pass blocked who Michigan reversed course on late.
- Logan Tuley-Tillman was a major project who drew a "vast" variance in his recruiting profile.
They did bring in three guys who looked like good bets to hit, but the one who did—first team All Big 12 guard Kyle Bosch—did so at West Virginia because of personal issues outside the program's control. David Dawson was a long-term backup and grad transfer; Patrick Kugler started at center as a redshirt senior and may or may not have been a reason the Drevno/Frey line couldn't pick up a stunt all year.
This class doesn't have anyone with a first round left tackle frame, but it rolls five deep with good bets. Everyone except Jack Stewart is either a massively experienced college-sized interior OL (Rumler, Carpenter), a guy who rose like a thunderbolt over the course of the recruiting cycle (Jones, Barnhart), or a cycle-long target of Georgia and their ilk (Keegan).
OL being OL, one of these guys will medically retire and a couple more will fail to live up to expectations. But at least two guys are going to be anchors who start for multiple years. I put a lemon on it.
Biggest whiff
Julian Barnett. I don't know what was going on with the two Belleville guys in this class. Michigan didn't offer them right away and there was some consternation about that, and then they were MSU commits.
Given the OL class Michigan signed I'm whatever about Devontae Dobbs. I'm sure he'll be fine; I don't think he's a better long-term prospect than Barnhart. Michigan missing on a top-100 in-state cornerback (he's playing WR at MSU but he'd be a CB here) rankles, especially after the Lewis/Hill/Thomas run.
Zach Harrison and George Karlaftis are the other potential answers.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:12 PM ^
Thanks for the lunch time reading material. I agree with you 100% on Barnett, not sure why we weren't all over a top tier instate CB. Hopefully the young fellas get ready quick.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:32 PM ^
I also think Lance Dixon was a large miss.
August 15th, 2019 at 1:12 PM ^
In terms of talent, I agree, but I'm also not that worried about the Viper spot overall
August 15th, 2019 at 1:19 PM ^
Michigan's in-state recruiting trends under Harbaugh are weird in general. Every year there have been highly-rated recruits who, for whatever reason, either have seemingly no desire to go to M or draw very little interest from the staff.
August 15th, 2019 at 3:44 PM ^
Give the staff credit. They aren't gon a take another Brian Cole type who don't serious about things other than football. It's the Michigan way.
August 15th, 2019 at 1:52 PM ^
I'm fine with recruiting deadly oompa loompas.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:15 PM ^
His parents are the Huxtables
Whatever you do, do NOT take any of his dad's special secret recipe BBQ sauce...
August 15th, 2019 at 1:16 PM ^
For those who haven't seen it.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:16 PM ^
I guess it's a real good thing there isn't a team on the schedule that has 2+ good WRs until... PSU in October?
Ambry, buddy, get healthy.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:26 PM ^
Yeah if Sam is right on his prognostication from this morning and Ambry can have a target date of the first bye week, I'm not worried about the starting secondary. With the talk of Hawkins playing well, having a Hill/Thomas/Metellus/Hawkins secondary with Dax at NB (or swap Hawkins and Dax) seems fine to me. Depth is obviously the concern though.
No one before PSU seems likely to challenge the Ambry backup so even if Ambry has a slower recovery I think we could be fine. I don't have faith in the rest of the corners against elite competition but against the teams prior to PSU (hell even PSU only has Hamler as an established threat), I think they can hold their own.
But the longer Ambry is out and the longer Dwumfour goes without being healthy in fall, the more I get concerned about what were already my 2 biggest concerns.
August 15th, 2019 at 3:04 PM ^
I think two factors that play into the panic are 1) what happened vs OSU last year and 2) we've been spoiled with a pair of lock down corners for a long time now.
In reality, having a guy like Lavert Hill and just a guy opposite him is a situation a lot of teams would take in a heart beat. Yeah, every once in a while you face a trio of 4.3 40 receivers and a QB having a career day hitting everyone in stride and inexplicably facing zero pass rush and you get your guts handed to you, but you can make a lot of hay otherwise with that and get through the vast majority of opponents with scheme and a little luck because a receiver to DB mismatch is necessary but very much not sufficient for sustained passing success.
August 15th, 2019 at 10:05 PM ^
Well the lack of pass rush wasn't inexplicable but yes. OSU played below their potential all year. Then of course they played lights out and had a great gameplan against us :/
August 15th, 2019 at 7:44 PM ^
I’m still slightly worried about a team like MTSU (as an example, I don’t think they have the talent to do it) who is going to spread you out with three and four WRs. Situations where you’ll want a 3rd corner in addition to a nickel or be forced to have a safety cover a WR on an island.
Fortunately, Illinois/Penn State seem to be the only non-MTSU type team on the front half of the schedule with the potential to even try that.
The bright side, once Ambry makes it back our 3rd corner will be a guy with a few starts under his belt and a ton of snaps. Makes next season look a bit more appealing where we’ll return Ambry and then the corner opposite him will be a guy with a few starts.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:18 PM ^
it still blows my mind that it seemed like a possibility (at one point) that we could have had hinton, mazi, george k, and zach h all in the same class
August 15th, 2019 at 12:48 PM ^
Yep, then Purdue beat Ohio State in the game with the most memorable storyline of the season due to Tyler Trent's cancer battle probably sealing the deal on excitement in the future of Purdue and Jeff Brohm for Karlaftis and Zach Harrison watched Ohio state blow us out.
August 15th, 2019 at 1:01 PM ^
plus we thought Brohm was going to leave for louisville for awhile
August 15th, 2019 at 1:24 PM ^
Eh, Karlaftis was always going to Purude so long as Brohm stayed.
August 15th, 2019 at 3:51 PM ^
What will suck is when Brohm leaves this year for a better job.
August 15th, 2019 at 6:37 PM ^
Ojabo! Mazi and Hinton have me fired up. I think the potential is the best pair of inside guys I can recall in one class.
Julian Barnett is the crusher. The kid has serious size and athleticism at a position of need.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:23 PM ^
I can’t believe Brian thought D Green was going to be great. Even as someone as untrained as I saw his film and saw nothing that warranted his lofty status.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:27 PM ^
I'm not a recruiting guru by any means, but I also remember thinking his tape looked suspect. It was a big kid mainly truck sticking a bunch of kids who had 50-100 lbs less on him and then falling over a bunch on first contact. I was suspicious but shrugged and assumed the recruitniks knew more than me
August 15th, 2019 at 2:10 PM ^
There are different reasons that recruits get high rankings, some more valuable than others. In my book, the best by far is athleticism. Guys like Peppers, Gary and DPJ, athletic freaks who are balls of potential just waiting to be molded. While some develop better than others, their ceilings are sky high since for example, as the saying goes, you can't teach speed. Similar to this are players with prototypical frames and requisite athleticism, like for OL.
There's also polish, which isn't necessarily bad, but can be misleading. It's never bad to have an advanced player (assuming they were taught correctly, which is a valid concern with respect to college vs. high school coaching; it's much better to have a raw player than one who's had bad fundamentals drilled into him), but it's important to keep in mind not just where a recruit is in the abstract, but where they are in their development as well. Tate Forcier is a great example. Putting aside his academic and maturity issues, he wasn't a bad QB, but the problem was that he came in close to a finished product, and thus wasn't going to get much better than he was as a FR. It's a common concern with QBs; you look at a highly polished recruit (like you would most recruits) and think that he's near his floor, when in fact he's nearer to his ceiling. Not necessarily the end of the world, but you have to keep in mind that what you see if what you're going to get.
Similar to polish are the players that physically peaked early. Guys like Kevin Grady and Derrick Green put up monster numbers because they could literally run over their competition, but unlike the true athletic freaks they didn't have elite measurables that would translate to college. They just peaked early and/or dominated undersized competition, but again came in close to their ceiling and couldn't replicate their high school success against college level opponents. Red flags like weight issues (Green) are icing on the cake.
Thankfully Harbaugh's staff does a pretty good job of parsing what qualities are important and what aren't so important. For example, it's crazy to think that Grady and Green were 5*s and Charbonnet wasn't, but I'd take Charbonnet over the Gradys and Greens of the world any day. And guys like Devin Bush couldn't get into 5* territory because of his (lack of) size, but the coaches rightly saw first round NFL talent in him and he delivered in spades.
August 15th, 2019 at 10:08 PM ^
Forcier's problem wasn't on the field.
August 15th, 2019 at 3:48 PM ^
It'll be in the archives that very many here including yours truly were not impressed with his film, and that he seemed to go down on finger tackles..a few times it even seemed as if Green was pulling a Sonny Liston and falling down on purpose.. that's how bad his film was.
August 15th, 2019 at 1:27 PM ^
So you're saying D Green was who we thought he was?
August 15th, 2019 at 3:08 PM ^
I didn't see a 5 star but on the other hand, his HS film wasn't as much of a glaring red flag as you make it out to be. He did have fairly elite speed and quickness for a bigger back. The guy on the film and the guy that showed up were about 25lbs apart and that made all the difference. The lack of contact balance was only part of the problem, I think being able to maintain a plausible playing weight was the bigger issue. Really, the red flag should have been that he played 3-tech before losing a ton of weight to move to RB.
August 15th, 2019 at 3:28 PM ^
I am surprised as well. Watching Green's high school film in comparison to De'Veon Smith's left me wondering if their respective recruiting rankings were reversed.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:26 PM ^
Derrick Green had no other reason to feel good about other than the amount of stars by his name. He had a history of weight issues and his film was bad for a 5 star RB.
Also, a note on the feeling worse section. DJ Turner has had quite a bit of mention since enrolling in the summer. Things may not be so bad there.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:35 PM ^
Unfiltered, ridiculously unselfconscious 'I told ya so' comments: always a fan favorite.
Quick, Jimmy, get this guy on staff!
August 15th, 2019 at 2:41 PM ^
The weight issue I think is another reason we can differentiate Charbonnet from Green. The dude seems like he showed up fully ready for the rigors of D1 RB play, but at the same time doesn't seem far off his ideal playing weight give or take 5-7lbs.
August 15th, 2019 at 12:58 PM ^
Getting excited about this year!
oh, and George Karlaftis...huge sigh. Saw his on BTN last night on Purdue night and Brohm was gushing about him. Bummer
August 15th, 2019 at 1:08 PM ^
I'm officially concerned about the future of CB position. After Levert and Ambry (hope he gets back soon), the position is THIN with talent. We have JKP (who is a S/CB hybrid), Gemon Green, Vincent Gray, Jalen Perry, and DJ Turner with only Andre Seldon committed in 2020. We HAVE to get Darion Green Warren or Henry Gray, or we better hope some of these guys are diamonds in the rough
August 15th, 2019 at 1:38 PM ^
Yeah, these posts have me feeling a lot less worried about WR going forward, but much more worried about CB. I really hope one or two of the guys from that huge class a few years ago develops; the radio silence on those guys is troubling.
August 15th, 2019 at 7:15 PM ^
Yeah I'm with you. For a coach who doesn't recruit any position other then CB I would expect better results from Zordich. We really have to kill it for corners this year and next recruiting wise or it's going to be a major problem.
August 15th, 2019 at 1:17 PM ^
I think my sleeper for this class is Gabe Newburg. He's got a great frame and athleticism and I can seem him being one of those guys who takes a few years to develop but like his 4th and maybe 5th years on campus becomes a huge contributor
August 15th, 2019 at 1:20 PM ^
I think DJ Turner is going to be good. Last fall I watched him more than hold his own with 6'4" Georgia commit George Pickens III, and it says something that IMG put him on Pickens for much of the game. He is a fighter and maybe more of an in-game performer than a standout with his measurables.
Also I don't think Harbaugh and his staff are easily fooled by big running backs whose high school numbers are a result of size and strength against lesser competition. In other words I would be surprised if we see another Derrick Green with this staff.
August 15th, 2019 at 1:39 PM ^
So, good class minus CB. Hopefully we can fill that void in 2020...oh wait. Maybe Brown just likes safeties to play CB? :/ Still lots to like here :)
August 15th, 2019 at 3:26 PM ^
Charbonnet has a Skrepenak-era quality line in front of him. He’s going to be just fine.
August 15th, 2019 at 8:45 PM ^
I gotta think Logan Brown was a whiff.
August 17th, 2019 at 10:04 AM ^
Another calming factor for Charbonnet; Oaks Christian plays one of the toughest schedules in the country every year. He excelled against a very high competition level.
August 17th, 2019 at 10:57 PM ^
We know this offer was from Clemson. Fuck you ... put an asterisk on those shit titles as they are SCUM bags. FBI agents in America take NOTICE ... Clemson pays players under the table and NO ONE IS PAYING TAXES ... IS THIS A FRAUD ? heck yes
https://gbmwolverine.com/2019/08/17/Michigan-football-rashan-gary-turne…
August 19th, 2019 at 8:11 AM ^
Hopefully the secondary can get itself on track or the coaches do a remarkable job at making up for their shortfalls because that is one scarily depleted area at a very important position right now.
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