Hello: Davion Rogers

GURU RATINGS

I'm a bit surprised that the recruiting sites list Rogers as an OLB, because it seems to be generally accepted to Michigan fans (and many analysts) that he'll primarily play with his hand down. Rivals's Greg Ladky took in a Harding scrimmage and evaluated Rogers like so:

Rogers is still pretty skinny, but is clearly athletic and very rangy. He showed some agility on a short catch a reaching up the field for a 10-yard gain. He needs to improve against the run and increase his aggressiveness in taking on blockers, but as he fills in his frame, he could be a monster off the edge. He will be fun to watch develop at the college level.

Ladky seems to think he's destined for defensive end as well, and ESPN thinks that, with some weight room work, he could be a special one:

Rogers has the chance to a very special player at the next level because of his natural tools. He has exceptional height for a safety or outside linebacker but could gain some weight and be a dominating rush end on defense. Flows, closes and has very good range for such a tall player.

His coach also talked to the Charleston Daily Mail back when he was a West Virginia commit, and gave glowing reviews (H/T UMGoBlog):

"He'll run down things from behind," Harding Coach D.J. Dota said. "If it's run at him, he pretty much destroys it. He's probably our best defensive player and our defense is pretty good. He's just been all over the field. He has that knack to find the football. We've asked him to do a bunch of different things this year and he's done a great job understanding what he needs to do for us,'' Dota said. "He's made a lot of great plays for us.

"He's a great blitzer off the edge. Really, anything you ask him to do he does really well because of his athletic ability, which is really shocking because of his height. He plays really fast."

Dota said once Rogers fills out his frame in the weight room, the sky is the limit.

"I think he can play at the next level - the NFL,the Harding coach said. "I think his game will only improve. His game has improved some much in a year. The mental knowledge, he understands what's going on around him."

The Destruction of All Runs is a trait that the unbiased sources don't attribute to him, so at the very least, that part may be his coach blowing hot air. HIs versatility and athletic ability, on the other hand, are apparent to seemingly everyone. From the same article, Rogers describes his own game:

"I've got the feet of a safety, I hit like a linebacker and the size of a defensive end," said Rogers in summing up his talents. "I get to the ball. No matter what I'm going to get to the ball. I'm determined to get to that ball.

Those positive reviews, are mostly backed up by third-party evaluators. It seems as though his largest upside is at defensive end (or maybe hybrid OLB/DE), but for what it's worth when Rogers committed to West Virginia they planned on playing him somewhere in the back seven, maybe even in the secondary(!):

Despite being as tall as the average defensive lineman, the coaches at West Virginia have narrowed their options to put Rogers at linebacker, or possibly in the secondary with Dorsey.

"They like me at linebacker, but they might look into playing me as a strong safety," Rogers said. "I'll do whatever they ask me to do. I just want to be able represent myself the best way that I can. I'm looking forward to any opportunity that they give me to play. I'm very excited."

The main reason for his low rankings despite the potential is the fact that he's a tweener right now. He weighs as much as a safety but projects as a defensive end or outside linebacker, which means he won't contribute right away.

He is reminiscent of Shawn Crable, though he might [ed: must] have thicker legs and is starting out of high school at much lower weight (205 or less against Crable's 230ish). Buckeye Planet has a Harding insider named "Worm02" who cites Crable in his assessment of Rogers' talent:

Last year was Rogers' first year playing varsity and the only thing that he played was OLB. Obviously, when you're dealing with a kid that tall, you can imagine him playing DE at the next level, so there are a lot of possibilities, but I could see Rogers' current frame being suitable for OLB. At this point, I won't say that he is better than Shawn Crable was in HS (that dude was a BEAST at Massillon!), but that's another tall guy who played OLB in college. Then again, Lamarr Woodley was a LB in high school who bulked up and moved down to DE in college, and he wasn't nearly as tall. That's a big dude though (he came to Warren with Prescott Burgess a couple times). Speaking of Burgess, he was a standout at SS in HS who played OLB in college and does so now for the Baltimore Ravens, and he was 6'4 at Harding. Davion is 6'6, but Burgess had a much bigger frame.

Though all three recruiting services give him three stars, Scout is the outlier in terms of ranking, as both other sites have him in the top 30 OLBs, on the cusp of four stars. Rivals has him one slot above OLB/DE tweener, almost-commit, and future Seminole Holmes Onwukaife, FWIW, so any complaints about that recruitment have been effectively mooted.

OFFERS

Rogers had a very early offer from Michigan State and then got one from West Virginia that he immediately snapped up. As such, information on who has been recruiting Rogers is sparse. Articles about committed recruits don't really talk about other offers until that recruit is soft, and Rogers has only been soft for a couple weeks.

He also received interest from regional non-BCS teams, including offers from Ohio University, and Toledo. Pittsburgh showed him interest, but never offered.

STATS

From the same article as above, Rogers accrued the following stats through 8 games:

Rogers, who has earned a three-star rating (out of five) from Scout.com, has 55 tackles, seven sacks, two interceptions, a forced fumble and fumble recovery for a touchdown this season for Warren G. Harding (5-3).

HOWEVA, Harding was never 5-3 on the year, as they tied their first game against East Cleveland Shaw, and finished the year before that article, with a record of 6-3-1 in 10 games. Take those stats as a rough approximation of his production this year.

FAKE 40 TIME

Rivals lists his 40 time as 4.6, and that's the only source I can find a reported time. For a future defensive end, that's pretty low, but as a guy who sounds like he could play safety if he wasn't so tall, it's not so ridiculous. I'll split the difference, and give it just two FAKEs out of five.

VIDEO

Rogers, like most Ohio prospects, has video available from ScoutingOhio:

PREDICTION BASED ON FLIMSY EVIDENCE