Upcoming Football Recruiting Announcements to Watch
With the holiday weekend approaching there's some potential commits for Football worth paying attention to over the next week or so which, if they break UM's way, could begin to build the 2023 class out a bit.
June 30:
Charles Jagusah - 4 Star - Offensive Tackle from Illinois. All the CB are headed to ND, but this one came down to a UM vs ND battle. Expect him to land with the Fig Things but stranger things have happened.
July 1:
Collins Acheampong - 4 Star - Athlete from California. All the CB are headed to UM.
Jaxon Howard - 4 Star - Edge from Minnesota. The experts don't seem to have a clear pick here. 2 CB to LSU, but this one seems less clear. Rumors were that Miami (YTM) had been the leader. Michigan was very much in it for him, but not sure where he ends up.
Enow Etta - 4 Star - Defensive Lineman from Texas. UM has the crystal balls here, albeit not with the highest confidence levels. LSU, Miami (YTM) and UCLA were the finalists here.
Frederick Moore - 3 Star - Wide Receiver from Missouri. UM has the crystal balls heere. Moore seems better than his rating so far, for the star watchers.
July 7:
Amir Herring - 4 Star - Interior Offensive Lineman from Michigan. UM has the crystal balls here.
Others to watch in the coming weeks that haven't announced an official date but have indicated a decision is coming soon include:
Logan Howland - 3 Star - Offensive Lineman from New Jersey. Michigan is in his top 4 with MIami (YTM), Oklahoma, and Iowa. He's indicated a timeline of the next two weeks in recent interviews.
Semaj Bridgeman - 4 Star Linebacker from Pennsylvania. Michigan has the CB here and he's said he'll announce his commit date just after the 4th of July. Indications seems to have it that he's close to a decision.
There's still a lot of ways these could go against UM, so I'm not making the case for optimism or telling you not to feel your feelings about NIL and UNACCEPTABLE and all that. The program clearly needs some momentum, so getting some wins from this group could certainly help. They at least have some shot coming up to add some quality players into the mix. Time will tell.
Factor in also that we are coming off a ridiculously good season where we beat OSU, won the B10 and made the College Playoffs.
So... what happens to recruiting in the NIL era when we don't?
wear your hardhats kids..... soon the sky will be falling.
It would be darkly interesting to see Michigan have to "Moneyball" a recruiting class this year. It would show how good their scouting and "projection" are. It would also obviously force a close look at what other schools are doing.
uh, we've already been doing that... with our "diamonds in the rough" strategy to combat osu's 11 5 stars.
We love bragging about Ronnie bell and haskins, but if you look on the whole, that's not the standard.
This year appears to be a tier below even that.
Also, for the guys who said that Michigan was "holding back" commits because they wanted it to look good - i'm prepared to eat crow - but that looked like total bullshit.
If we can at least lock down Etta, Moore, and Herring that will be great. 3 of the 6 with commit dates that you listed. Ach seems like a Michigan lean, but with a final 4 including LSU and Miami I wouldn't be surprised.
Bridgeman should be ours, along with MyKeil Garden.
While I appreciate the OP's effort to be positive (or at least not negative), the tone of the responses was entirely predictable. Can't go a day on this board without a thread about how the sky is falling when it comes to recruiting.
Get at least two commits from the listed group and that's a good start to filling out the class.
Has Michigan even passed the starting line yet? They have been behind the entire off-season, and now are about to be even further behind after useless recruiting weekends.
Just self-mutilation mixed with depression and drowned in negativity. UM fandom at its finest.
Give us all of the high 3 stars and let these coaches coach them up to B1G10 champions.
Mike Dantoni, is that you?
We used to literally laugh at MSU fans who said stuff like that.
yes, but then they kicked our asses for 8 years (and still kinda doing it), beat OSU a few times, won the B1G 3 times, and went to a playoff, won a Rose Bowl
all with those lowly 2 and 3 stars
And then they bottomed out in 2016 with that strategy and Mel Tucker came in and saw with the current football landscape that model is not sustainable for success.
Not really, Mork started getting high rated recruits with low character and that is what ultimately doomed MSU football(especially in-state recruits). Then he just kind of gave up on the recruiting trail and the rest is history.
Tucker seems to be recruiting well (out of HS and from the portal) with bags of booster $$$. Let's wait and see if that is the model for success, especially if he keeps recruiting over HS kids with the portal and when lower paid teammates start outplaying the higher paid ones. He has had one good season when a Heisman candidate fell out of the portal and in to his lap. Jury is still out on that model IMO.
Ah, Toby.
Well, I now know I won’t have to intentionally hit myself in the balls for 3 days in the next week; these will suffice.
LFG!
I hit myself in the balls multiple times every morning just to feel alive. Is that weird?
https://www.on3.com/teams/oregon-ducks/news/five-star-forward-mookie-cook-decommits-from-oregon/
Someone is outbidding Nike? I guess Michigan isn't the only school that has issues with top commits not honoring their word.
They also had 5* Dior Johnson decommit. Johnson has since fallen a bit in the rankings and is now committed to Pitt, so there is probably more to the story. I've been meaning to ask Matt about what happened there.
Maybe this will go so badly that we, i dunno, actually....change?
someone insert the ray liotta from goodfellas laughing GIF/pic here please.
Hope for the best, expect the worst, and you'll probably end up somewhere in the middle.
Acheampong is very interesting. Seemed like the guy was a Michigan lock (potentially even a silent commit) before his Miami visit. Dude was even logging into EJ Holland's Twitter live chats.
The buzz since has been that Miami has made up ground, yet nobody has changed their crystal ball (or even lowered the confidence as far as I'm aware). He's announcing tomorrow at noon, so you would think word would get out shortly. We'll keep an eye on it today. Hopefully the Michigan staff was able to talk him back into the fold during the week.
And I'm not sure Etta is for sure announcing tomorrow. Sounds like that recruitment is in good shape, but MSU is pushing hard.
Also, Jagusah just committed to ND as expected.
When a recruit mentions academics, and then equates Michigan, LSU and Miami. Bro.
When a recruit mentions academics and then puts Michigan, LSU, and Miami in the same group you know he's choosing either LSU or Miami.
When a recruit mentions academics, and then equates Michigan, LSU and Miami. Bro.
Delete
Seriously what recruits do we end up with? We aren't going to poach any kids late because what do we have to offer? A coach that doesn't want to be here and free tuition?
None of our commitments are solid because a million dollars coming from anywhere. Hell, western could steal one of our instate recruits by offering a few hundred thousand.
We are literally going to be left with the recruits that nobody wanted and then MSU can still come in, offer a measles 100k to a kid just so he doesn't sign here last minute to screw us over more.
Don't forget last year's OSU game and don't take JJ McCarthy for granted because you won't see things like this for the foreseeable future
No idea why this is being downvoted. Wouldn't be suprised to see the loser of Cade vs JJ be offered a nice NIL deal to leave Michigan. If I was at a different university and knew that we had a huge advantage over Michigan in that NIL department, I would most certainly test the waters with star players to see if I could get them to leave Michigan.
I may be too optimistic but I don't see either leaving until after the season even if one is clearly the leader heading into the first game.
From Cades perspective if he were to lose the job, he has no where else to go right now because the transfer portal is closed. Might as well stick it out through the season if JJ gets hurt.
From JJs perspective if he were to lose the job, he would still get plenty of playing time. And I think he would think he could push for the job as the season progresses. Then if he is still the backup after the years end maybe he transfers.
I think either case we get both for 2022 season. 2023 one will be gone for sure
Yeah this seems like the most likely outcome at the moment. And with our history of QBs getting injured, seems like there's always a solid chance for the #2 to see the field LOL
Because it is overly dramatic. I also downvote anyone who starts a post with "I don't know why this is getting downvoted".
Charles Jagusah just committed to ND
If ND is not paying NIL upfront, then they are kicking our ass at recruiting up and down the field. I don’t give a shit about ‘shiny new coach’ paradigm. If JH was so great then that should be pull enough. It’s not anymore. Evidence in the facts.
Spath (for whatever his info is worth) has an article saying NIL agents (because of course) are laughing at Michigan because their NIL approach is worse than MSU. Michigan basically won't allow agreements before the player commits (not sure if they're allowed before they hit campus). So they have no idea how much they'll get. If true it mean ND doesn't have to be paying players up front it could be as simple as telling the player they're guaranteed to make this much which is leagues better than what Michigan is doing.
ND & Michigan have the same, legal, NIL fund.
Both will not pay players to attend their school.
Both are NOT guaranteeing any NIL deals in the future.
The biggest difference is ND’s FUND was set up and explained more efficiently than Michigan’s. ND has faces & trusted names as the face of it & Michigan is still trying to figure out how to handle theirs.
If you look at ND’s ‘23 & ‘24 classes, all those kids are Michigan type kids. They are high academic, not looking for a payout, and Michigan offered.
Michigan just is losing the head to head battle with ND for kids that are UM/ND type of kids. In ‘24 already, Carr (obviously 100% UM kid), Swain (Michigan kid), Williams (family all Michigan fans).
If Michigan won the UM/ND type of kids battles they would have a top 5 class right now.
I'm calling bullshit on that. ND is recruiting at a historic level and you think they are doing so in this day and age without guaranteed NIL money? Lol. If the only difference between Michigan and ND's NIL is that it's explained slightly better like you claim, they wouldn't be kicking ours and everyone else's asses by this much
Nah, Marcus Freeman has and still is an absolutely elite recruiter. I don't know why people can't accept that recruiting is a weakness for Harbaugh. He isn't good enough to make up for bad press
I do believe Freeman is a better recruiter than JH but I don't for a second believe ND is hamstringing themselves in the same way Michigan is...
Recruits may change their minds when Freeman & ND get crushed in their opening and closing games next season.
I have this sneaking suspicion that people are going to have to reframe their thinking in regards to winning/losing and their effect on recruiting.
Which is to say I think Michigan started winning just in time for it to not matter nearly as much any longer. And recruits won't care about losses much as long as the checks clear.
I don't know. They are still athletes and athletes are competitors. Getting paid is great, but losing sucks. If Michigan can show that their players are doing just fine in the NIL market then that and winning would go a long way toward attracting recruits.
Anyone that only cares about getting a check cashed and not about winning wouldn't last very long on a Harbaugh team anyway.
I think you're forgetting that competitors feel they can make whatever team they're playing for better. I'm not going to pretend that the teams that have been winning recently weren't already paying players so hey lets get paid AND win. But now that other teams can more clearly show what they're offering monetarily there will likely be those who convince themselves hey I can help this team win and get paid. That could have really benefited Michigan but it won't because well that's The Michigan Difference.
They 100% are. ND fans claim they aren't but there is no other explanation in this day and age that they are recruiting this well. They have a good recruiting staff for sure, but there's no way they have the same NIL policies like ND fans claim
You know in LIFE hard work is generally rewarded.
For all the talk of ND NIL one thing rarely mentioned is that Marcus Freeman works hard at recruiting. He's NDs lead recruiter on EVERY prospect. He makes on avg of 10 calls per day.
More than NIL money NDs jump in recruiting has been due to having a cultural change at HC. When the HC is 100% in on recruiting he changes the culture by forcing the rest of the staff to match or exceed his effort.
Every coach on that ND staff knows that they better keep up with Freeman pace or else they'll be coaching someplace else.
One more data point about NDs NIL. They also have the #1 rated class for 2024 and that classes NIL market hasn't been set. They got IL WR Cam Williams yesterday and he GREW UP A MICHIGAN fan.
There's a pattern/trend emerging here.
For all the talk of ND NIL one thing rarely mentioned is that Marcus Freeman works hard at recruiting. He's NDs lead recruiter on EVERY prospect. He makes on avg of 10 calls per day.
One of the most shocking things for me about the JH tenure is that despite his reputation as a relentless competitor who would do almost anything to gain an edge (remember those quotes from opposing coaches about how Harbaugh would simply outwork you?), recruiting for the most part has been not only disorganized, but oftentimes lazy. I get we had some great ideas at the beginning (e.g. satellite camps) that got squashed by the NCAA, but after those first few years it was rare to get the impression that we were outworking anyone on the recruiting trail.
More than NIL money NDs jump in recruiting has been due to having a cultural change at HC. When the HC is 100% in on recruiting he changes the culture by forcing the rest of the staff to match or exceed his effort.
Every coach on that ND staff knows that they better keep up with Freeman pace or else they'll be coaching someplace else.
These quotes especially make me sick, because how many assistants have we had under JH that have straight up, openly loathed recruiting (Drevno, Brown, Warriner, Zordich, and I think guys like Pep and McElwain as well)? I would kill for some of that recruiting fire and holding assistants' feet to the fire to make sure they kept up.
Wake me up on NSD.
Edit to note: Etta's predictions low confidence is a result of three Sparty writers submitting 3, 1, 1. Not sure what to make of that.
Concert announcement
