It's time we commence our 2020 stargazing, since we've had a slew of commits.

What this is: I like to check in quarterly to see the movement in recruiting rankings of Michigan's longtime commits. This is because how much they move and when can tell us things about a guy. Unfortunately at this point it doesn't say as much, but we'll be able to use this check-in later as a baseline. Also some of the rankings might have changed a titch since I wrote them down because they're always moving a little.

This is projectionable information because of the nature of rankings—sites tend to move a guy based on where he was before instead of re-ranking him entirely. In that context, a consistent climber like Dylan McCaffrey becomes a different kind of prospect than a Shane Morris, who started out in five-star range then slowly dropped back, but not far enough to fall into McCaffrey's range.

Previously: Feb 2019 offense/defense, July 2018

Quick reminder about gravity: Players drop naturally as more get scouted. The sites sometimes account for this by starting with five stars for just a handful then expanding the designation to more guys as the cycle progresses, but since my ratings count position rankings keep in mind everybody should end up a bit lower than they are now.

What the ratings mean: Every site has their own ratings. Refer to this if you're trying to compare apples to apples

Site	5*	High 4*	Solid 4*	Low 4*	High 3*	Decent 3*	3* Pile
247Sports	104-98	97-94	93-90	89-88	87-86	85-81	80-70
Rivals	6.1	6	5.9	5.8	5.7	5.6	5.5
ESPN	100-91	89-86	85-81	80	79	78-77	76-70
Composite	.99+	.98-.97	.93-.90	.89-.88	.87-.86	.85-.81	.80-.70

On with the show!

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QB J.D. Johnson

[247Sports]

Committed: 12/21/2018. Current ☆ average: 3.91

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	86 (#27 PRO), #767 Ovr	85 (#28 PRO), #661 Ovr
Rivals	5.8 (#8 PRO), #156 Ovr	5.5, not ranked	5.5, not ranked
ESPN	79 (#24 QB), not ranked	not yet rated
Composite	0.8929 (#16 PRO), #329 Ovr	0.8622 (#24 PRO), #560 Ovr

What it means: Only recently discovered by everyone but 24/7, Rivals shot him up to its top 138 shortly after signing day (which is when I captured the above). ESPN also came out with a ranking, though it's more in line with 24/7's, leaving Rivals alone in 4-star territory. The reasoning was obvious: Johnson was behind 2019 five-star Spencer Rattler, who's going to Oklahoma, last year. The re-rank came after the Adidas camp in late February.

Outlook: Johnson has some wiggle left since he's yet to put a full season of film out. If that film causes him to hold everywhere else and drop back to Rivals, it's a concern. If it's really good, ESPN and 24/7 should give him a bump (though ESPN often ignores guys after they commit so who knows).

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RB Blake Corum

Committed: 6/27/2019. Current ☆ average: 4.16

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	88 (#32 RB), #453 Ovr	88 (#31 RB), #363 Ovr	#327 Ovr	#282 Ovr
Rivals	5.9 (#11 RB), #135 Ovr	5.9 (#10 RB), #135 Ovr
ESPN	82 (#18 RB), #173 Ovr	not yet rated
Composite	0.9229 (#17 RB), #201 Ovr	0.9254 (#16 RB), #194 Ovr	#244 Ovr	#267 Ovr

What it means: We suspected Corum would be in the class for some time so I've been tracking him since last signing day. However he hasn't moved to anyone since then, really, except ESPN came in with a rating. That rating splits the difference between Rivals and 24/7 so it doesn't move the needle, really. His 24/7 slip over time means they rated him early (#82 in the class in their 8/15/2017 initial 2020 list) and have been pushing other RBs ahead of him ever since. This reeks of an early impression that hasn't changed, and since Corum looks like he's already filled out, it might be 24/7 thinks this is an early bloomer who's already showing all he can be.

Outlook: Corum is a three-star to 24/7, which I take as a wait-'n-see rating. They dropped him about 50 spots after their late February re-rank but haven't changed their RB rankings much, if at all. That coincides with an Under Armour camp that belongs to Rivals. `FWIW Top Billin', who's worth a follow if you're on Twitter, thinks this is one of the best RB prospects in the country.

[The rest AFTER THE JUMP]

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RB Gaige Garcia

Committed: 6/25/2019. Current ☆ average: 2.94

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	81, not ranked	not rated
Rivals	5.4, not ranked
ESPN	not rated
Composite	0.8106 (#140 RB), #1939 Ovr	not rated

Outlook: Walk-on who'll probably be on the wrestling team but Brian has been raving about his film. Thing about wrestling is it's a make weight sport, which makes it really hard to shape your body for both.

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Slot A.J. Henning

Committed: 6/26/2019. Current ☆ average: 4.52

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	93 (#26 WR), #127 Ovr	#25 Ovr	#25 Ovr
Rivals	5.9 (#3 APB), #84 Ovr	#110 Ovr
ESPN	84 (#17 WR), #105 Ovr
Composite	0.9604 (#16 WR), #80 Ovr	#51 Ovr	#40 Ovr

What it means: There was a drop for Henning on Rivals—from #68 overall to #84 to #110—at the same time 24/7 dumped him 99 spots. That coincided with a mass of players whose junior years of high school were now available, and quite normal for guys ranked ahead of that point. It was also the moment Ohio State dropped out and this became a Michigan-Notre Dame battle. That often means they have an idea of what a guy is already.

Outlook: I believe Henning's rating has calcified as a top-150'ish player but he'll probably fall out of the composite Top 100 naturally as more guys are scouted. There's no positional uncertainty and he ain't getting any taller, and that appears to be the main complaint about an otherwise electric slot receiver.

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Slot/RB Eamonn Dennis

Committed: 6/24/2019. Current ☆ average: 3.76

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	88 (#41 ATH), #505 Ovr	not rated	not rated
Rivals	5.7 (#73 WR), not ranked
ESPN	78 (#44 ATH), not ranked
Composite	0.8789 (#34 ATH), #491 Ovr	#1058 Ovr	not rated

What it means: His rankings are commensurate with Sainristil's.

Outlook: Sainristil never climbed because he skipped the camps and stayed in Massachusetts.

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WR Roman Wilson

Committed: 7/2/2019. Current ☆ average: 3.97

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	91 (#43 WR), #218 Ovr	#856 Ovr	#790 Ovr	not rated
Rivals	5.7 (#76 WR), not ranked
ESPN	80 (#55 WR), not ranked
Composite	0.8927 (#59 WR), #332 Ovr	#1026 Ovr	#909 Ovr	not rated

What it means: Welcome, Roman. Barely on any radars until he camped last February, Roman is a good example of the elite athletes who turn up after their junior years and displace the earlier lists. His composite jump from 2/15/2019 to 2/28/2019 was 826 spots. Since then he's continued to climb towards the composite top 250 as various sites adjusted their rankings.

Outlook: The hard charge up the rankings has occurred, but Wilson's athletic testing numbers and willingness to camp are the kinds of things that sustain a rise in summer. He'll bounce up and down as other prospects emerge and camps get blown away by his speed, then drop in December when senior tape comes out on the rest of his class and Wilson's Hawaiian exploits aren't registering as much in the contiguous states.

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TE Nick Patterson

Committed: 9/9/2018. Current ☆ average: 3.74

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	87 (#24 TE), #667 Ovr	83 (#30 TE), #885 Ovr	83 (#23 TE), #718 Ovr
Rivals	5.7 (#17 TE), not ranked	5.8 (#5 TE), #201 Ovr	5.8, not ranked
ESPN	3-star, no rating	no profile
Composite	0.8738 (#16 TE), #538 Ovr	0.8748 (#10 TE), #458 Ovr	#691 Ovr

What it means: There's a lot of disagreement here, and a lot of recent movement, as Patterson leapt nearly 100 spots up the composite in late April—coinciding with 24/7 giving him a 362-place jump—and then fell 131 spots in mid-June, at the same time 24/7 themselves moved him up another 181 spots and four scores. ESPN meanwhile is slightly aware that there's a tight end named Nick Patterson in this class.

The movement is more of a coming together: Rivals had Patterson a low 4-star and the #5 tight end and 24/7 had him in that low 3-star range of guys who usually go to MAC schools or Michigan State. Both sites now concur that Patterson is a medium-high 3-star—the kind that would in the bottom four of a typical Michigan class, or the top four of a typical MSU one.

Outlook: Context matters here, and the context is a TE prospect who's getting no other interest outside of the school where his brother's the starting quarterback. He has also picked up offers from UNLV, Cincy, and most recently Yale. However Michigan's interest hasn't waned—Sherrone Moore came and visited Patterson in June and coached a camp Patterson was at. The fact that they're coming to a consensus on Patterson now suggests they have a handle on the scouting and excitement should be adjusted to that 3.7-star range. The Rivals drop seems to be the most scouting-related, since it was their June camp. Keep an eye out for 24/7's ranking. If Patterson continues to slide this summer and fall, I think it's a sign Patterson isn't growing much from his listed 220. On the other hand, he had a huge junior year, and if the senior film shows more of the same and Patterson continues to put on weight, he could creep back into that low 4-star range.

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TE Matthew Hibner

Committed: 6/9/2019. Current ☆ average: 3.50

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	85 (#45 TE), #1047 Ovr	not rated	not rated	not rated
Rivals	5.5, not ranked
ESPN	76 (#17 TE-Y), not ranked
Composite	0.8485 (#46 TE), #1076 Ovr	not rated	not rated	not rated

What it means: Your annual who-dat TE prospect Michigan pulled from the East Coast. Hibner's right there with the last two in my composite:

Those ratings mean "We don't have any scouting on this guy but Michigan seems to like him so okay." This one may be from Virginia, not New England, and also listed an inch or two shorter than the other guys, but we're still in that realm where Michigan has done the scouting and the sites are hedging that Harbaugh knows what he's doing.

Outlook: Ironically I think the shruggie 3.5-star rating for Hibner is better news than the solidified 3.75 stars for Patterson. In other words I like the "We don't know who this is but Michigan seems really excited" potential more than I like the "he's probably good enough to play D-I ball" consensus.

Erick All used to be in this category but the sites got a look at him and shot him up to the 3.9s (with Eubanks). I'm not totally confident that will happen with Hibner, but if it does it's reason to get excited—a 3.75 based on potential is better than a 3.75 based on floor.

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OC Reece Atteberry

Committed: 6/23/2019. Current ☆ average: 3.89

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	90 (#4 OC), #266 Ovr	#118 Ovr	#108 Ovr	#207 Ovr
Rivals	5.7 (#51 OT), not ranked
ESPN	79 (#47 OT), not ranked
Composite	0.8863 (#6 OC), #390 Ovr	#235 Ovr	#232 Ovr	#279 Ovr

What it means: The big drop was 108 spots in the composite on 2/28, which was when the composite added a huge number of guys who appeared on the scene as juniors. Reese's ratings have been pretty much steady over the entire course of his recruitment. He was just out of the top 200 in March 2018, and is just out of the top 250 now to 24/7, the one site that calls a guy playing center who projects to the interior on a team with two tackle commits in the class a center. Rivals and ESPN tend to put all but the squat heavies into their tackle rankings, and that makes a fairly strong consensus look more off. The ESPN "79" and Rivals "3.7" mean about the same thing, which would be an "89" to 24/7, so the latter is higher on him.

Outlook: Offensive linemen don't tend to move very much, but we could see ESPN and Rivals decide to flip him inside and raise his ranking to coincide with a projection to the interior. That wouldn't move Atteberry a ton, but since he's already on that four-star borderline, a raise to either of those two sites might get him over the hump. I think he's more likely to move up than down—Notre Dame has been fantastic at scouting OL prospects, and wanted this one badly. If the two sites who list him at tackle don't bother to check in again the drop will be gradual and minimal. ESPN still has him listed at 262 and an inch shorter, which means they got their last info awhile ago.

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OG Micah Mazzccua

Committed: 2/25/2019. Current ☆ average: 3.60

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	85 (#90 OT), #1,050 Ovr	85 (#89 OT), #812 Ovr
Rivals	5.6 (#68 OT), not ranked	5.6, not ranked
ESPN	79, #28 OG, not ranked	3-star, no rating
Composite	0.8622 (#65 OT), #758 Ovr	not rated	not rated	not rated

What it means: Micah is one of those guys who got added in the big Feb 28 group, pushing a bunch of other OTs and OL ranked as OTs down in the process. Since debuting at #842 he's been falling steadily—about a spot per day—settling finally in the 1050s. This entry into the ratings coincided with a move from a nowhere Philadelphia Catholic to the Biff Poggi Five Star Factory.

Outlook: Mazzccua is pretty raw but is playing his projected position at a school that should get all kinds of attention. There's room for a blowup into four-star range, or the industry could leave him at tackle and forget about updates because guys who start this low often get trapped down there, and the people scouting his school have a bunch of other prospects they're paying attention to.

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OG Zak Zinter

Committed: 5/16/2019. Current ☆ average: 4.09

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	90 (#25 OT), #329 Ovr	90 (#28 OT), #332 Ovr	not rated	not rated
Rivals	5.8 (#16 OT), #157 Ovr	5.8 (#16 OT), #147 Ovr
ESPN	80 (#13 OG), not ranked	not rated	not rated	not rated
Composite	0.9083 (#23 OT), #273 Ovr	0.9207 (#21 OT), #134 Ovr	#421 Ovr	#756 Ovr

What it means: Buckingham Browne & Nichols of North Andover, Massachusetts sounds more like a law firm than a high school, and of course it took scouts quite a long time to get around to an opinion on the very large #2 prospect in the commonwealth. Again Rivals has been the most interested in scouting Massachusetts, putting out data on Zinter months before 247 or ESPN gave him more than a cursory 3-star. While he's a universal 4-star, I think ESPN rating him as a guard brought down the composite, since nobody changed their opinions since.

By the way, the consensus of this site is Zinter is a guard. He plays guard now, and played center previously, and Michigan fans don't need a reminder of what it's like to play centers at tackle out of necessity. Foot speed is the common knock, bend and physicality are plusses, which means pay no attention to that 6'6" frame: guard.

Outlook: Notre Dame, which is awesome at scouting offensive linemen, made this a major battle, which is always a good sign. But the time for camps is over and Zinter is probably done trying to travel places to show off. We'll get senior film but from BB&N of NA, MA, and it will be at guard, so I doubt we'll see much movement. He'll hang on as a four-star, and end up behind all the other four-stars.

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OT Jeffrey Persi

Committed: 6/25/2019. Current ☆ average: 3.89

	July 2019	Feb 2019	Dec 2018	July 2018
24/7	87 (#43 OT), #542 Ovr	86 (#64 OT), #593 Ovr	#502 Ovr	not rated
Rivals	5.8 (#35 OT), not ranked
ESPN	80 (#33 OT), not ranked
Composite	0.8850 (#34 OT), #394 Ovr	#521 Ovr	#615 Ovr	not rated

What it means: Persi had a 300-place rise in 247's ranking in May after falling the same amount over the course of Feb-April. I wrote about that leap in his Hello:

Those four-star rankings (and a 300-spot bump from 24/7) coincided with his appearance at the Super Lineman Tournament in early May, where he won all but one rep, mostly using his elite length.

It's invisible in the overall rankings because the drop came in that period when a ton of rising seniors are getting evaluated and added to recruiting lists while we're all distracted by basketball. A previous rise came after Persi's appearance at The Opening. The sites are trying to play catch-up while Persi continues a conversion from tight end that began fall of last year, but they've been pretty aware since December.

Outlook: Persi is such a classic Frey-type that where he ends up ranked probably just says how much the services pay attention to the phenotype. If he's 285 by next February we could see a climb into the top 250s. More likely he ends up where he is now: that low 4-star hole where he's not in the top group that gets a ranking. Years of reserving the five-star spots for guys already close to college weight is working against us. A slow climb like we saw from Jaylen Mayfield would be an excellent sign.

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Next time: Defense.

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Here's a screenshot of my spreadsheet so you can compare where the various sites have the class right now:

Class of 2020:

Class of 2021: