Hello From The Future: Denzel Ward

That's great news. Another large and talented OL is always a good thing.

Go Blue indeed!

Wooooo huge OT!

me happy.  Welcome aboard.

Congrats! A good start to the day. There's gotta be excitement around the program today!

Welcome to the family, Denzel!

Where is Miss Upton, Mr. Justin Verlander?

Is it just me, or are we recruiting the state of Illinois really well?

Not that it's surprising since Tim Beckman doesn't have any night game jerseys to turn the tide with but still...

Potential is the key word on this kid. His size is unreal.

Welcome aboard!  See ya in a couple of years!  Go Blue!

Hello Brobdingnagian!

Welcome Denzel! O-line starting to look very good in the next few years.

Literally.  I trust the staff to teach him proper pad level.  That would be tough with such a big guy.

Somewhere Darrell Funk is smiling.

welcome aboard i seen you play.....you got it bro

or does he look a lot like Chris Wormley in that picture?  They should enjoying staring at each other across the line in practice. 

And they're both so handsome.  (Yes, I understand they can play some too.)

Welcome, Denzel! 

~Token Female Blogette

inpancakes in our future.

Hoke is virtually recruiting a OL of Paul Bunyan's

I'm truly blown away by how awesome the recruiting has been out of Hoke & Co.

They say these recruits come in twos. Who's next fellers?

Denzel.  We're happy to have you at Michigan.  Work hard, and STAY LOW.

That story about not knowing when to stop blocking reminds me quite a bit of a story about Michael Oher (current O-lineman for the Baltimore Ravens/former Ole Miss Rebel/Blindside guy)...Reminds me of this play specifically:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/24/magazine/24football.html?pagewanted=all

"The more he went on, the angrier Michael became, and yet no one noticed. Freeze ordered up plays that called for Michael to block a linebacker or to pull and sweep around the right end and leave the defensive end across from him alone. The first quarter and a half of the scrimmage was uneventful — until Freeze called a different sort of play.

Leigh Anne rose from her seat to beat the crowd to the concession stand and so had her back to the action when the people in the stands around her began to laugh.

“Where’s he taking him?” she heard someone say.

“He’s not letting go of that kid!” shouted someone else.

She turned around in time to see 19 football players running down one side of the field after the Briarcrest running back with the ball. On the other side of the field Briarcrest’s No. 74, Big Mike, was racing at full speed in the opposite direction, with a defensive end in his arms.

From his place on the sideline, Sean watched in amazement. Freeze had called a running play, around the right end, away from Michael’s side. Michael’s job was simply to take the defender who had been jabbering at him and wall him off. Just keep him away from the ball carrier. Instead, he had fired off the line of scrimmage and gotten fit — which is to say, gotten his hands inside the defender’s shoulder pads — and then lifted the Munford player off the ground. It was a perfectly legal block, with unusual consequences. He drove the Munford player straight down the middle of the field for 15 yards, then took a hard left, toward the Munford sidelines. “The Munford kid’s feet were hitting the ground every four steps, like a cartoon character,” Sean says. As the kid strained to get his feet back on the ground, Michael ran him the next 25 or so yards to the Munford bench. When he got there, he didn’t stop but piled right through it, knocking over the bench, several more Munford players and scattering the team. He didn’t skip a beat. Encircling the football field was a cinder track. He blocked the kid across the track and then across the grass on the other side of the cinder track. And kept going — right to the chain link fence on the far side of the grass."

At first when I was reading this, I was thinking, why would the coaches take such a raw, untested prospect who has played maybe 6 games of football his entire life?  Seems premature, and the lack of data on the kid is worrying.

But then I realized, what's more likely, especially given the type of offers that have gone out so far for 2014 (mostly national/elite level prospects), is that the coaches saw some really remarkable play while scouting him.  They clearly can recruit O Line so to take someone so unproven this early, I'm guessing they've seen some truly dominant play from him so far.  I'm going to go out on a (not so large) limb and say over the next year as his profile grows, he is going to be recognized as one of the top tackle prospects for 2014.

Great pick up, on this great weekend. Him and coach funk will be spending a lot of time together. Can't wait to see some video on him. And the best part is he has time to develop because of the GREAT recruiting classes before him

He may be 6'11 by the time he leaves campus

Does the part about him blocking the guy into the fence remind anyone of this: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVFEYxvjD74 

I think the fact that he's only played in a few games may be a blessing in disguise for Coach Funk, Mr. Ward hasn't had years of playing time to develop bad habits.  So he may be raw, but  he may also be extremely coachable and guick to learn.  Plus at 6'9" and room to grow, this kid is going to be a behemoth.

I want to see a lot of this.

"At his first game, he drove a player 20 yards down field into a fence because he was a little too excited and wasn't sure when he was allowed to stop, when his quarterback assuredly would be safe."