Hello: Alessandro Lorenzetti
Replacing Don Brown and the Jersey Boys with Lloyd Carr’s former players was supposed to mean a break from Northeast football, fields with fewer seats than your wedding, schools with law firm names, and impressive workout tapes. Lorenzetti is from the wilderness, sure, but one with closer ties to that Carr-era tradition of recruiting Quebecois who drop French dad jokes in their interviews. This one happens to have moved to one of those law firm schools in Connecticut, and is a 3-star offensive lineman, so back to the huge person who pumps iron in front of a camera phone then sits on the children of ESPN employees salt mines we go.
GURU RATINGS
| Rivals: 6-6/275 | ESPN: 6-6/275 | 247: 6-6/285 | 247 Comp |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3*, 5.6, NR Ovr, NR OT, (~3) CT |
3*, 78, NR Ovr, #44 OT, #51 East, #3 CT |
3*, 86, #932 Ovr #94 OT, #1 CT |
3*, .8635, #705 Ovr, #63 OT, #2 CT |
| 3.64 ➡ | 3.75 ⬆⬆ | 3.50 ⬆ | 3.64 ⬆ |
I’m experimenting with adding the listed sizes in the column headers so we don’t have to talk about them every time. I also added arrows to the ratings to show the general trend.
Lorenzetti’s ranking on ESPN is brand new—he was a non-distinct 3-star a few weeks ago and his page didn’t exist in May. 24/7 moved him up a point from an 85 this month. I don’t have a record of Rivals but I believe the “5.6” rating is new based on the fact that he’s not in their official Connecticut rankings yet even though the #3 guy has a 5.5. Clearly, Lorenzetti is prospect in the process of emerging from total obscurity.
He was also, like Mike Hart, a guy on his way to settling for Michigan State before Michigan intercepted. Lorenzetti was in East Lansing for his official on June 11, but stopped by Michigan on his way home. His workout for the Wolverines on June 14 earned an offer, and his schedule was rearranged so he could be back in Ann Arbor for Victors Weekend.
"The one thing that really stood out to me and the reason I wanted to go back and visit instead of going to Virginia Tech was coach Moore. He's just a really nice guy. I think I can do very well with him."
Plans to visit Duke and Vandy, and to work out for Ohio State and Penn State, were canceled in the aftermath. He also called everyone “nice” which is like hearing someone from my generation use the word “swell.”
[Hit THE JUMP for scouting, video, and the rest.]
SCOUTING
This is another one of those where you have dig deep through the layers of salt and grime. Taste 24/7’s moment of discovery:
…has nice workout tape and schools are paying attention. The 6-foot-4, 285-pound Lorenzetti debuts at 85 in the three-star range on 247Sports.
And the day Michigan thought they’d uncovered something:
Moved OL Alessandro Lorenzetti to 'top target': Michigan loves this kid. Had a great workout and will be back this weekend for an official.
Rivals’ EJ Holland on why Lorenzetti’s offers blew up:
The staff was aware of him and kept tabs, but it wasn't until Lorenzetti worked out in front of the staff that he earned an offer. Lorenzetti returned for Victors Weekend soon after, and the Wolverines were able to make a splash. While an under-the-radar recruit, Lorenzetti was seeing his stock soar during workouts this month.
There’s a good reason everyone’s sampling sweat deposits: Lorenzetti moved to America just in time for his junior season to be canceled, then grew another two inches and altered the proteins in his body, according to his Loomis coach:
"I would say he is just as athletic and flexible as any offensive lineman in this class in the entire country," Moore said. "He drastically changed his body. He showed up at 286, and we got him down to 268 and he's been slowly building his body back up.
"He plays extremely hard, very good work ethic. He can play all five positions on the offensive line. I think he is one of the very few guys in this class that can go from tackle to guard to center. He can literally play all five. He is one of the most versatile offensive lines in this class in the country."
The ECU offensive line coach was interested in that all-important “bend”:
"We spoke on the phone and he gave me an offer," Lorenzetti told PirateIllustrated.com, "He said he likes my overall technique and my bend. That was one of the characteristics he liked about me. This was the first time that I have spoke on the phone with him."
He also told them playing in the Big Ten was his childhood dream, which is pretty old school.
EJ Holland’s commit post also offered his impressions:
Lorenzetti is a really intriguing prospect that can play right or left tackle at the next level. … Lorenzetti certainly has the size at 6-foot-6, 275 pounds. He also has good length and a nice build. As Lorenzetti continues to progress physically and technically, he could end up being a steal for the Wolverines this cycle.
…but adds he believes Lorenzetti and Kevonte Henry, among the recent three-star pledges, are the most likely to move up the rankings.
Touch the Banner has the most comprehensive review of his film and is the most excited, giving Lorenzetti an “84” on his 100-point scale, which is basically a top-100 prospect:
As Lorenzetti’s body has matured, he seems to have leaned out a little bit and now he has a nice, athletic frame. He also possesses tremendous feet, with the ability to kick slide and the willingness to constantly slide and mirror defenders. When he gets underneath defenders, he runs his feet really well and finishes his blocks. He likes to get underneath shoulder pads and uses his hands really well to punch and fit defenders, keeping the hands inside to control linemen. He moves quickly up to the second level when necessary and does a good job working his feet to position himself and wall off defenders.
Magnus has been down on a lot of guys in this class, so it’s notable that he thinks Michigan’s found a Dude on par with Gio El-Hadi.
OFFERS
UMass was the only D-I team interested before last fall. Columbia and Toledo joined in January, Eastern Michigan offered in February, FIU in March, and then a wave of Power 5 schools came in late April, including GT, VT, Cuse, and Michigan State, who seemed like the leader for a time. Baylor and Vandy came in May and then in June he received offers from Penn State, Georgia, Duke, and Michigan, the latter three days after an official visit to East Lansing.
HIGH SCHOOL
One of the reasons Lorenzetti sounds older than his classmates is because he is a year older. Quebec still uses the old Canadian system of compulsory secondary education through Grade 11, followed by two years of prep school (they just call it “college” or “CEGEP” if it’s a public college) that serves as a bridge between high school and university. U.S. institutions consider the CEGEP years high school for counting purposes. Rather than attend a CEGEP, Lorenzetti chose to board at The Loomis Chaffee School, a prep school in Windsor, CT, which enrolled him as a junior last fall. Chaffee is a program on the rise; Don Brown recruited DE Paris Shand to Arizona last year, and Finnish 2023 OT Olaus Alinen, already 6-7/310, is a four-star who holds a Michigan offer—it’s notable that Lorenzetti is at left tackle with Alinen around.
Lorenzetti graduated in 2020 from his K-11 boys private school, Selwyn House, in Westmount, which is an affluent enclave of Montreal in the middle of the banana-shaped island of which 80% is Montreal proper. The enclave remains more Anglophone/Protestant than the city, but is also home to the largest historical Jewish community in Canada, and the only place you can get these wood-fired bagels that are worth mentioning whenever some loud New Yorker claims international bagel superiority.
The Selwyn House athletic teams are called the Gryphons, and the school is broken into four houses named after the first four headmasters, none of whom—to my knowledge—ever hid a giant Francophone-hunting snake monster in the basement, but I wouldn’t put it past them. They do play in the top league in Quebec, for what it’s worth.
STATS
Is OL.
FAKE 40 TIME
Claims a “5.9 forty-meter dash” on one workout video. That is 4.37 FAKES out of five in imperial.
VIDEO
This is from Loomis Chaffee’s spring game last year.
His longer highlight reel and Hudl page contents are from from 2019 at Selwyn House, against other Quebecois 15- and 16-year-olds, and before Lorenzetti grew two inches and reshaped his body, and they had him playing guard.
His social media accounts were recently deleted so I can’t show you the workout film. I had it in a tab but didn’t get to watch it before it went away. That’ll teach me to take my first vacation in two years.
PREDICTION BASED ON FLIMSY EVIDENCE
This was a class expected to have more than its share of sleepers because of the COVID weirdness, and Lorenzetti was already a greatest hits of the recruiting industrial complex’s blind spots: Quebecois, mid-career transfer, no junior film, highest-ranked player ever at his school in Connecticut, and extremely short recruitment that didn’t reciprocate SEC interest. The only thing that might give me pause is he’s an over-ager who still needs to get stronger, but that’s a small concern if he was 285 post-rebuild in the year he would have been a high school senior. And remember this guy earned his offers by sending workout tape.
Michigan has loads of tackle-shaped objects on the roster who just got a free year of eligibility, but the Ryan Hayes/Karsen Barnhart/Trente Jones generation is already going to have their four-year degrees when Lorenzetti arrives. Most likely those guys are starting to clear out by 2023, when Lorenzetti is a sophomore, and competing with Jeffrey Persi, El-Hadi, Tristan Bounds, and classmate Connor Jones for an opening or two.
UPSHOT FOR THE REST OF THE CLASS
The pickup is especially important because 2022 OL recruiting has not been going well, especially at tackle—I expect Jones to move inside in college. That’s understandable considering the board a year ago was based on Ed Warinner’s tastes and connections. Sherrone Moore is still after a couple of whales in 5-star Washington decommit Josh Conerly Jr. and 4-star George Fitzpatrick, but Fitzpatrick seems to be moving on since he became a top Ohio State target. Michigan was very high for MN 4* Lucas Heyer for a long time but it now looks like Heyer ends up at Northwestern or Stanford, according to Lorenz. They’re also battling Texas A&M for Onwenu-like Washingtonian Mark Nabou, and Cass Tech lineman Deone Walker could have a future on offense or defense. I expect we’ll see a few more names come up as various 15-year-old tight ends from when we last played a football season emerge from the miasma.
Phenomenal summary, Seth. Love the québécois detail!
Yeah, but how was there no way to work a poutine joke in there? Trop sur le nez?
Also, Go Gryphons! (any AAGHers out there?)
Need to keep refilling the o-line with bodies, highly ranked or otherwise. That is all I have to say on the matter. Wait ~3 years to see if he is 'coached-up' to contribute.
PS... can I 'alter my proteins' to take 25 yrs of my old decrepit body?
Good to get someone from Loomis Chaffee School for the Rich. #eatitcillizza
emphasis on "OL recruiting has not been going well."
Not sure if this was the intention of your post or not, but I've seen a lot of "our recruiting sucks, these guys are no-names" on the last few Hello posts.
Seriously, can we chill on scoffing at commitments based on their star rankings when they commit in this cycle? The recruiting industry has not had a chance to catch up and evaluate the vast majority of this class for over a year. It is entirely reasonable to believe this cycle will create the most volatile change in rankings that we've seen.
Those concerned about star rankings should take a breath, let the evaluators catch up and observe guys in their senior season. There will be plenty of time for handwringing in the fall once the season is over if our board is filled with middling 3-stars. For now, let's just let the process play itself out.
To answer your question: No.
Two arch rivals are currently ranked 1 and 2 in the rankings, Penn State is at 8 and Rutgers is one spot ahead of us on 24/7. They're not struggling at this point in the cycle.
We are signing these kids (and God bless them, I hope they do well) but I am sick of reading that someone like George Fitzpatrick has put us on the back burner because of Ohio State(!!).
That never happened prior to 2008. We routinely plucked kids away from Ohio State and we were known for breeding O lineman. . .
We have been struggling to rationalize against our common sense for years now. It's what MSU used to do. And now if we can't even seem to beat them either.
I'm tired of it. And this participation trophy-bullshit mentality isn't helping.
3/4 of the recruiting industry has quit. It's 247 and then espn and rivals barely keeping the lights on with a skeleton crew (and scout or whatever the 4th one was just gone). Now add in a covid year and hardly anybody has seen hardly anyone play. The few, scouted, bonafide 5 stars are going to the playoff bagman schools. Almost everyone we get is going to be an unknown 3 star who blows up because michigan does their own scouting (out of necessity, see above) and is good at it. Times have changed.
Lol nope, nice spin though
You’re literally commenting on a thread referencing a kid who didn’t even have a profile on Rivals or ESPN, had an influx of P5 offers before committing to Michigan (when all of a sudden the sites decide to slap a ranking on him) and still calling it a “spin.”
The recruiting sites had no idea this kid even existed but we should trust their random ranking of him as a 3*? That’s kinda the point here. The sites are NOT very accurate when it comes to ranking individual players. There’s an endless list of 4*/5* busts and guys that were virtually unknown that ended up stars. But let’s let all of these P5 staffs know that their own evaluations were wrong and the recruiting sites that don’t know the kid exists are right.
So maybe, just maybe, we should give these coaching staffs who are actually going out and evaluating recruits the benefit of the doubt compared to recruiting sites who haven’t even seen the kid or even have a profile for them. Especially when you look at Harbaugh’s track record of taking these relatively unknown guys and turning them into highly productive players and NFL draft picks.
Not sure how you can cite track record of a staff when the staff has a lot of new guys and the recruiting department just had a massive overhaul as they weren't getting the job done.
And yes, every year there are guys who fall through the cracks. Probably more this year than usual, but rankings are proven more correct than not time and time again as the last teams standing usually have the highest percentage of 4 and 5 stars.
And this guy seems like a good get and checks a lot of the fall through the crack boxes as he moved late and was from a different country, but acting like that says something about the system as a whole doesn't make a lot of sense.
Because most of the staff has still been around here. The ones that haven’t, have a successful NFL background or are highly regarded college recruiters. So the track record still exists.
You’re ignoring what I’m saying in your second paragraph. The rankings aren’t accurate in their ranking of individual players. It isn’t a difficult task to look at a Trevor Lawrence/Justin Fields and say “wow, these are two of the best players in the country” but when you get down to the mid 4* and below, it’s a crap shoot. The last teams standing aren’t there because they have the highes percentage of 4/5*s, theyre there because they have the highest percentage of the no-brainer top kids. Once it gets down to the rest of these kids, their hit rate drops significantly.
They don’t have to be right, they just have to be close enough that over the span of an entire recruiting class (or an entire school’s scholarship count) they’re close enough that the law of averages balances those results out. You get enough 3*s that play like 4*s, enough 4*s that play like 5*s, and enough 4/5*s that play like 3*s that those rankings balance back out. But that still shows an inaccuracy in grading individual players.
The fact that the recruiting services don’t have a profile for a kid who has a handful of high level P5 offers and doesn’t create one until he commits says A LOT about their credibility. Throwing an arbitrary 3* ranking on him afterwards adds to that. This isn’t a one time thing. This happens often. It doesn’t mean the rankings are useless, but it highlights their flaws and shows that they shouldn’t go unchecked. They aren’t free of criticism and shouldn’t be cited as the end all-be all for judging how good a recruit is. ESPECIALLY once you get outside the top 150 or so kids that are obviously good.
This kid moved from Canada to a small school during covid. You're using that exception to make a declarative statement about the whole system. He received a generic 3 star until they scout him. Not an arbitrary 3 star ranking. There is a difference, especially this early in the cycle, coming off a year where teams didn't have seasons. The majority of 3 stars have been scouted and receive a 3 star, because that is what they are.
The rest of your argument is just a bunch of hypotheticals strung together that will never actually happen in practice. The hit rate on 4 and 5 stars is too high for there to be enough busts that hitting on enough 3 stars will render the rankings moot, especially for how low the hit rate is on 3 stars. You know it and that is why at the end you hedge with the "ESPECIALLY once you get outside the top 150." And yeah, for arguments sake, if you throw out the top 150 the hit rates get closer. The problem with that argument is that UM is trying to beat a team that gets a lot of top 150 guys. So you can't throw them out.
I think this kid is going to be good, so not directed at him.
"Good at it" seems a little delusional to me. Just because a player gets lots of playing time does not make him great.
Re: Our D-Line play the last 2 years, our Safety play the previous 2 OSU beat downs, our O-Line the few years prior to that. We seem to be one injury away from disaster every year, due to depth issues caused by lackluster Recruiting.
I mean, our DLine play the last two years helped turn a relatively unknown Kwity Paye (BC, Rutgers and Syracuse were his other P5 offers) into a first round pick. So I’d definitely say Michigan is “good at it,” when it comes to doing their own scouting and unearthing those under the radar prospects.
The depth issues you mentioned aren’t really a result of lackluster recruiting, they’re a result of some unfortunate transfer portal departures. Every position where you cite a depth issue, you can point to the transfer portal and find a guy contributing/starting at another P5 school that left via the portal. Michigan is recruiting the requisite talent, they’re just not able to keep them here long enough to see the field. Then you’re left with young guys as your depth players and thats not a recipe for success.
DE play has been good but DT play has been bad. When you’re throwing Ben Mason and Jess Speight out there you’ve got serious problems
Agree with you on Kwity, but he was still ranked inside the top 500 in the composite. Now lets include some of the other sleepers that the coaches unearthed along the D-Line:
2017 - Paea
2018 - Welshof, Upshaw
2019 - Newburg, Morris
2020 - Jenkins, Lewis
Still early for the last class or two but there isn't a lot of production here. Combined with the higher ranked guys who have not done much yet due to various reasons and/or transfers, and I'd say that for at least this position group the coaches are pretty pedestrian at identifying talent.
No, Kwity FINISHED in the top 500 of the composite. At the time of his commitment to Michigan (late October 2016) he was ranked #949 in the composite. Putting him solidly in the “under the radar” type that the coaches unearthed and the recruiting sites followed suit later on.
If we’re going to give recruiting sites the benefit of the doubt and look strictly at final rankings (where they’re still way off base), then that’s even more reason to not get caught up in where a recruit is ranked in June.
https://mgoblog.com/content/hello-kwity-paye
As for the rest of those guys, it’s really early for ALL of them when you consider the fact that they were stuck behind Paye and Hutchinson up to this point. And many of them were high 3* recruits so it’s hard to place them in the category of being under the radar. These were almost all guys that were recruited pretty heavily from the get-go.
That never happened prior to 2002.
FTFY.
Yes, it did. To say we never lost a player or collection of players that we really wanted to Ohio State before year [X] is categorically not true.
Good for Rutgers for being one spot ahead of us in the rankings right now. Two weeks ago they had a higher rated class than Alabama, and that still may be the case. The logical thing to gather from that is the fact that no one is winning national championships based on their class ranking in June, rendering June class rankings effectively meaningless.
There are plenty of (trivial) things to be frustrated about in the world of Michigan football right now. The fact that some of this class' commitments have not been fully evaluated since their sophomore year of high school due to the pandemic is not one of them.
Serious question: Should we not go after the three-stars with offers from places like Bama, Georgia, and Oregon (as is true of three-star guys we have gotten or are likely to get in this cycle), in favor of kids who are ranked higher but don’t have the same caliber of program pursuing them? I’m genuinely curious about how much you trust the rankings in and of themselves
This is the correct way to evaluate the quality of the 2022 class in the absence of junior season film and camp circuits. Who are there other offers. Lorenzetti picked up some pretty dang good ones this summer, and was about to work out for another top tier program next week before he committed.
Personally I put just as much stock in the quality of offers from other programs as I do a star or class ranking. If a player is good enough for UGA, PSU, OSU, Clemson, they're probably good enough for Michigan too (Alabama is a little different with their recruiting board because there are "bama" offers and there are BAMA offers).
Agreed in general, and agreed on the "Bama offer" thing. I named them in this case only because Colston Loveland, the TE out of Idaho who recently got crystal-balled to Michigan, allegedly has serious, commitable interest from Bama. And guess what: He's a three-star!
there might be nothing more annoying in the world than some clueless whiner with the "i'm sick of" shtick.
There is one thing more annoying. A mediocre jack ass who is easily annoyed by someone telling it like it is. But I applaud your resiliency. 17 years without a big ten championship and counting requires.
ok, boomer
We can make a similar point without the "oh, damn, this guy is a no-name / low-rank" shtick. I say be positive toward the recruits / commits. If you want to make the point that our recruiting could be better -- and I am leaning toward that a bit whatever the circumstances are -- then that's fine, but I don't like to see negatives directed at the student-athletes.
How has that worked out for us the last 20 years?
You missed my point entirely. I'm not at all disparaging the athletes. I'm disparaging the recruiting efforts.
Idk, I think uncovering guys that other P5 teams are wanting that the scouting services aren’t even aware of existing is an example of good “recruiting efforts.”
There are different types of 3* which is why we don't stop at the rankings. This one is more like a Tim Bakabutuka 3*. If Michigan took a commitment from Lucas Heyer despite how much he has dropped down the rankings I think that you could say Michigan is settling. Since Sherrone is chasing 5-stars I don't know what gustave is really complaining about. They're recruiting the way he wants... getting 5-stars isn't easy.
The Rutgers thing is lol. Michigan just took a "four star" QB nobody else wants too. Gavin Wimsatt isn't a top 100 player. Schiano is being smart by going after overrated players because it's creating buzz for his program. I wouldn't take most of those players.
I think it's ridiculous to be mad at the program for Lorenzetti. Like I said in the article he checks off all of the blind spots for the recruiting industry. I think they lucked into a great find here. I was trying to figure out why Alessandro I was looking at so many Michigan schools, because I suspect there is some sort of Michigan connection. He's been going to some extremely good schools so quality of education is obviously a big deal for his family. I suspect if it wasn't he'd be a guy the SEC powers are trying to fight for.
As mentioned in a prior thread, I watched A.L. last week at a UK camp. Very impressive balance, bend and strength. No question imho he will be a 4* OL and highly regarded after his Senior season.
Nice (i.e., great) hair.
Swell (i.e., great) write-up.
LOL, I always associated the word "swell" with Wally, Eddie Haskell, and The Beav.
Never thought of Seth as being anywhere close to the early 1960's.
"whenever some loud New Yorker claims international bagel superiority"
I first encountered the NYC bagel-superiority complex in Berkeley, and it still seems to me based less on a refined palate than size. NYC bagels have become wagon wheels.
In my experience, no superiority complex was ever based on anything. Even in the case of sports fans, the loudest ones have nothing of substance to say and couldn’t tell you the first thing about why the uniforms they bandwagoned are successful.
I’ll bet some bagel shops in NYC are lovely. But that would be because of how they’re run, not where they’re located.
Montreal bagels have much bigger holes and are wood-fired, which gives them a unique flavor. Considering the best bagel places in Michigan are mostly named after New York I have to credit their bagels too. People who have only eaten Einstein's bagel-shaped bread or the flavorless dough circles in the supermarket really have no idea how good real bagels taste. It's like people who have never eaten European yogurt thinking they have eaten yogurt.
That Loomis OL has 3 D1 starters on it. Should dominate.
Great catch ! Look's like he is a mauler. Thank you to Sparty for bringing him to us.
Molto buono e benvenuto!
OL is notoriously tough to project, outside of the 5* guys at least...
Kid out of Canada, so lightly scouted and also covid...
who knows...kid could be the next Laurent Duvernay-Tardif.... or maybe not...only time will tell
F1 jokes aside, IMO, at the end of the recruiting year this will be a big addition to the class.
Welcome Alessandro!
At 6'4" / 285, yes. Pretty big, anyway.
He's 6'6"
Thanks for the link, Seth!
Aren't Trente Jones and Karsen Barnhart going to be in their fourth year when he arrives? Is this a comment on them graduating in three years?
Quite a few football players are able to graduate in 3 years now with the way they stretch out their course loads. Most (all?) take summer courses so they speed through those degrees.
Best Italian name for UM football since Andy Cannavino. Well worth the wait!
The fact that two of the recruiting sites didn’t even have a profile for the kid should tell us all we need to know about trusting the recruiting sites when it comes to their rankings of individual players.
There are times when they need to be taken with a grain of salt. Quit looking at just the rankings. Check the film, check the offers and judge based on the whole picture. There’s a REASON a player is ranked the way they are. Sometimes it’s a low ceiling, sometimes it’s a lack of scouting, sometimes the player just isn’t that good.
Dafuq is that picture, brah
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