OL Kyle Kalis Visiting Michigan This Weekend
Ohio State OL commit Kyle Kalis has been caught in the mix with the Ohio State allegations. He said that he was set to decommit from the Buckeyes until interim head coach Luke Fickell talked him out of it. Kalis then went on to say that he does have interest in Michigan and a few other schools. He told me tonight that he and his father will be visiting Ann Arbor this weekend. Here's a look at his film and what he had to say.
TOM: Is there any chance that you head up to Michigan this week for their camp?
KYLE: Yeah me and my dad are going up there this weekend to meet everyone for a visit. We're driving up Friday night then staying all day Saturday.
TOM: What prompted this visit? I know that you've been saying you are interested in Michigan, but why visit now?
KYLE: It's pretty much for the past few months I've become really good friends with Tom Strobel and he said I would love it up there, he fell in love with it. Tom was up there last weekend and he was talking about me with the coaches, they were joking around saying we could be roommates. I think Chris [Wormley] will be up there too [TomVH ed: I confirmed with Wormley that he is visiting this weekend]. I'm closer with Tom, but I am friends with Chris.
TOM: Is that important for you to have people that you already know there, too?
KYLE: Yeah, a big part of me liking Michigan is being able to come in with guys like Tom, maybe Chris [Wormley], being able to know that I'll practice with guys that are going to make me better.
TOM: I'm assuming your dad is an Ohio State fan too, what has he said about all this?
KYLE: He's actually not an Ohio State fan, he's indifferent. With him he's already been through this so he tells me to go with my heart. He's told me to get up there and talk with Coach Hoke, get up there and meet them in person.
TOM: What are you looking to get out of this visit
KYLE: The main thing is just getting a chance to sit down with Coach Hoke and a big thing is also to meet with the strength coach. I want to sit down with him and see his tactics. I also want to sit down with Coach Funk and maybe meet a few of the players.
TOM: Is this your first time up there?
KYLE: Yes, this will be the first time. Tom [Strobel] said when you get up there it's just a different place.
TOM: What's next after this? Are you taking any more visits?
KYLE: This summer I might get out to Auburn, Alabama, Iowa, or Miami. I probably won't get out to all of them, I want to enjoy my summer so we'll see.
Dude holds every play
Guy joins board, uses first post to bad-mouth guy considering Michigan.
What is it they say about Obvious Troll?
Say what you want, I'm a Michigan fan, just making an observation.
So we have 3 spots on the OL to some combination of Olson, Keenan, Diamond, Garnett, Peat, Banner, and Bars. Olson and Keenan both sound like they were blown away, we're the assumed leader for Diamond, and the others have all experessed serious interest. This is going to get interesting.
and let all these kids get on campus. Doesn't sound like we will though, which is unfortunate.
and I forgot Kalis now, the main feature of this interview. Not sure why we're so frantic to fill up so fast, but you won't hear me complaining about it.
Olson, Bars, and Keenan before any of the blue-chippers have a chance to visit, you'll hear me complaining a lot (which is not intended as a slam against those three kids, just as a slam against the strategy of taking those three kids in June when UofM's OL board looks the way it does).
I'' be in the same company. Obviously Olson, Bars, and Keenan are talented prospects considering that we offered them so early and pursued like we have, just the idea of having legitimate chances at these national prospects is too enticing and would provide even more excitement for the rest of the class.
What makes Bars or Olson not national prospects. Bars has a great offer sheet and Olsen has few offers because he pretty much told everyone he's only looking at high academic non-west schools. Well that eliminates the whole SEC besides Vanderbilt. O-line prospects are hard to evaluate and more than not, high star guys bust and mid ranked guys blossom. Braden and Stacey both may be 4* before the season is over. Regardless of who we get this Oline class will be very good
If Olson does commit to us, we might have to make sure people know how to spell his name right. This is painful to watch.
Mary-Kate or Ashley Olsen ? ? ?
I think I would actuaally go for Elizabeth Olsen, their younger sister. Between the anorexia and the coke, I think the Olsen twins are too high maintenance.
Suppose they decide that they want more than 6 OL commits, and sacrifice a RB/QB for the extra spot or two. By the looks of the offer board and the way they're going hard after OL, it wouldn't surprise me.
even if they don't take either a running back or a QB, they want a fullback, a WR, 3 more DL, 3 more OL, and a safety. That gets them to 25, which already may be more than they have room for. There's just not room in the class for more than 6 OL.
I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens. You gotta think that Diamond and Kalis should both be priority 1a and 1b given their offers (and commitment in Kalis' case) to Ohio State.
I wouldn't be upset about Olson. Josh Helmholdt from Rivals said that he has the best feet out of any OL prospect he has seen this year. Olson values academics and he turned down offers from schools that didn't meet his requirements.
I would love to get the 4-5 star guys since it looks better nationally, but I'm willing to trust the coaches. And who knows, they might change up the strategy with OL recruiting.
give more weight to recruiting rankings and offer lists than I do his opinion of Olson's feet. And even if Olson is turning down offers from bad academic schools, he doesn't have offers from UCLA, Notre Dame, Stanford, Cal, or (depending on his definition of a "good school") Florida, Wisconsin, or UNC.
I'm not saying he's a bad prospect, and he's a guy I'd be happy taking under most circumstances, but these aren't most circumstances. When you have a shot at 5 star guys (or high 4 star guys), you keep spots open for them.
Olsen said he only wants to go to a HIGH academic non-west coast school. So that eliminates UCLA, Stanford and Cal. And Florida and Wisconsin are not what he's looking for. The kid values education above everything else.
lists offers from BC, Connecticut, and UMass. Wisconsin and Florida are fairly equivalent to those schools. And no ND or UNC offers.
And he was thinking about going out to Stanford to camp to earn an offer as of like 2 weeks ago.
Again, he looks like a good prospect, but nothing about him screams OMG Shirtless. Normally I wouldn't care, but a lot of the guys we're in on are quite shirtless.
I feel like every time his name comes up, you have to bring this up and say how stupid it is that we offered him.
It's getting annoying. These kids read the board, and we offered him pretty early. Yes, I know coaches make mistakes. But they're coaches, and we're fans. I'm going to be a fan of whoever commits to the maize and blue, and I don't think we should be saying "OH GOD I hope we don't get this guy."
I said I thought he was a good prospect, and I said that in most circumstances I would be happy to take his commitment. He's one of the probably 500-700 best high school football players in the country, which is an awesome accomplishment. It's not a knock on him to say that he's a good prospect but that we have some great prospects interested in us and I'd like to see how things shake out with them.
I'm an attorney. If someone said "you're a good attorney, but you're not as good as the guys at Wachtell," I wouldn't be offended, because the guys at Wachtell are awesome attorneys.
I don't see the point of discussing recruiting at all on message boards if "I think there are better guys out there" is considered bashing.
that you argue a lot about stars and recruiting rankings, but that is not everything. Wasnt there a coach down south (I think FSU) that only recruited based on the sites and their stars and he failed miserably. Coaches can make mistakes but i would rather trust a coach, than a recruitin service...
LOL at it being FSU
Coker, right?
It was Coker.
I'd argue that that's because he wasn't picking up multitudes of top-250 players, but rather three-star players, where the area gets a lot murkier with regard to who is actually "good". Lest we forget, the guys at Scout and Rivals do this for a living (just like the coaches), so there's nothing to say they're not just as good at evaluating talent. I'm pretty sure the top-100, top-250, whatever each site uses, is probably pretty accurate. When you get into developmental prospects, or lower-ranked players, that's where the coaches' personal relationships, watching the players practice, etc. will help out a lot more. I may be wrong here, but don't recruiting sites work exclusively from film? So that would seem to suggest some variabily in the midrange players. But I think it's just silly to completely veto recruiting services in favor of coaches. There are coaches who pull in fantastic classes and are crap at developing them (Clemson). So all coaches aren't good, just like all recruiting sites aren't bad. No one is saying we don't trust Hoke/Mattison's ability to identify talent, but rather when a player seems to be universally highly-regarded by recruiting sites and other schools of comparable level to Michigan, they should be considered above players who are not as highly-regarded by the sites and schools. I'm not saying Keenan and Olson aren't good players. But we are not MSU, where we have to rely on coaching up sleeper prospects. This is Michigan. Let's go get the big-name studs.
Other than they're not coaches. Have one guy per region, (if every region is even covered). And almost never meet the kid's, or find out about their background in depth.
They may be close to evaluating talent, but I bet they're far worse in evaluating fit to a program. A kid who stabbed someone gets ranked just as high as the guy who carries a 4.0, if they're talent is the same.
You're right that it's silly to veto recruiting services in favor of coaches. They do a good job, and are right more times than not. But there's just as much going on in threads like this trying to veto coaches over what the recruiting services say. And that's just as silly.
The difference between the two, is if a recruiting service blows assessment on lots of players, no one remembers what happens the previous year and it's forgotten. If a coach does it, he's eventually fired. So who do you think puts more work into being right? (Let me know how many recruiting service guys you've heard putting in coach's hours other than signing day...)
and overall offer sheets more than I do the views of any individual coaching staff, including our own, just from a "wisdom of crowds" perspective.
I tend to agree with you here. Almost always the top tier players (5 stars, very high 4 stars) that are consensus on all the recruiting sites are usually a good indication as to how good that player is and should be regarded. I have no problem with taking somewhat lower players that coaches believe have great talent. But when there is opportunity to grab elite players when all it takes is to wait and see, I think it is needed to pump the brakes and ride it out a bit.
Is Hoke will have filled spots with less talent, plain and simple. Over the long haul recruiting rankings measure success save for a few outliers.
Agree 100%.
I'm not thrilled at all about the "first come first serve" thing.
Agreed, I have been very pro Hoke's strategy of offering early and getting commits early, but if we have a shot at Banner, Garnett, Peat, Kalis, and Diamond and we don't get them because of taking Bars, Keenan, and Olsen, I will be changing my tune very quickly. I do have faith in the coaching staff that they will slow the pace some though. It seems that they did something similar with Pittman (It could have been his grades, but I think once strobel took that spot, we really only have 1-2 spots left at DE, and I believe the coaches have Wormley, Washington, and Spence higher than him, so they slowed on him).
Same, especially because so many great prospects are waiting it out, I rather we wait for them too.
This is definitely getting interesting. Who are the guard/center prospects in this OL Class?
Ben Braden is a guard/tackle tweener it seems, and Joshua Garnett is the only true gaurd in the list above. There are others on the Offer List though, these are just the ones we seem to be hearing about most.
I don't really think we are looking for a true center for this class since we got Jack Miller last year. Ben Braden is looking to be a RT or an OG prospect. Scouting reports are that he is very very strong, but doesn't have the feet to play LT. Someone at the Michigan camp said he might be almost as strong as Chris Bryant and we all know that everyone was raving about how strong Bryant's strength.
Not enough strong!
Stacey will definitely be a guard. Braden could be a guard although if you listen to the guys at Scout talk about his performance at camp today, he'll be a tackle all the way. Kalis IMO would probably play guard if he somehow went blue. Another kid who I think might be better suited for guard although others will disagree with me is Jordan Diamond, again assuming he commits. We'll have a few kids that can play inside though. And an influx of tackles in this class means Posada and Bryant can stay inside where they're probably better off. Depth along the line will even out, we just need to bring in bodies this class, which doesn't appear to be a problem.
Yeah, Braden's pretty much a RT and a RT only. If he plays anywhere else, it's out of team necessity.
called out Ben Braden this morning, and his performance at the camp. Said he was a "stone cold beast", all of 6'5", 319 lbs., and muscle. His performance at the camp has been exceptional, and Webb says his footwork was outstanding. He sees a LT in Braden, and he'd be surprised if the coaches didn't either after his recent camp workouts.
Yeah, I actually wouldn't mind if we slowed it down a bit. Some of Kalis' comments seemed to suggest that he's seriously interested (if I was at M, I could practice with Chris and Tom... could room with Tom...). So him, Diamond, and then Peat and Banner? Peat has visited, Banner wants to visit. These guys are all top-shelf and I'm not sold on Olson or Keenan. Bars looks good, but I'd still rather have Diamond/Kalis/Peat/Banner.
Don't forget about Garnett, he still wants to get out for a visit too. He should definitly be on that Diamond/Kalis/Peat/Banner list
That we shouldn't close out our OL recruiting with 3 elite blue chip 4/5 star types, anything less will be settling. We are in a unique position to be very very picky here.
Winning.
Landing Mr. Kalis would be huge. It's nice that these recruits, even in one weekend visit, can see how amazing Ann Arbor is just as well as those who spent a big part of our lives there.
Looks like the wheels may come off the wagon in Columbus. If we were to pull Kalis, it is tough for me to think that we wouldn't also have a good shot at Dunn. Then it's a free for all. OSU better hope we can't pull Kalis to the good side, because if we do, I really think things could get ugly for them in a hurry.
Very pretty for us though. Very pretty indeed . . .
The osu shitstorm is a gift that keeps on giving. And also thank you to Tom Strobel for doing a great job recruiting for us.
Stop it, Tom! My heart can't take anymore!
In all seriousness, this is incredible. It's shaping up to be an awesome week.
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