Could we be nearing our second 2014 commit?
Michigan will likely take only one quarterback in the class of 2014, and it appears they may be close to snagging that commitment. Wilton Speight (6,6, 220), a junior out of Virginia has been receiving interest from Michigan, along with schools like Alabama, USC and Georgia. Per Speight he was told by Michigan that if they offer they would like a commitment from him on the spot, so they can essentially wrap up their qb recruitment for the 2014 class.
Speight has been hearing from Michigan a lot recently, and he was told by Coach Montgomery that they would like to see him throw soon. Well, it turns out that soon will be Friday when Coach Borges makes a visit to see him throw. It's quite possible that Borges could offer on the spot, and a good possibility that Speight may commit on the spot.
This one could be interesting.
http://www.themblock.com/2013/01/wilton-speight-michigan-man.html
January 31st, 2013 at 7:59 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 12:02 PM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 10:05 AM ^
Eight-year-olds, Dude.
January 31st, 2013 at 6:02 AM ^
Quarterbacks seem to be a different animal. They often commit early and then turn on the recruiting charm, trying to lure other recruits. Since they're typically used to being leaders, they don't seem to be as wishy-washy. Just look at what Shane Morris has done over the past couple years.
January 31st, 2013 at 7:46 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 8:16 AM ^
Yeah, well...those guys were both guys with questionable levels of talent and commitment. Newsome transferred from Penn State to Temple to sit on the bench, Beaver left Tulsa to play at Midwestern State, etc. The Gardner thing was a no-brainer because he was a talented kid in Michigan's backyard, but I don't know that Rich Rodriguez had a great eye for finding both talent and character.
January 31st, 2013 at 8:28 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 8:36 AM ^
If they offered only one QB, that would be a first time it's happened anytime in recent memory. IIRC, the 2013 class has the fewest QB offers with just three - Morris, Kevin Olsen, and Riley Ferguson.
I think it's kind of a risky move. You should probably offer your first choice first, but if he doesn't bite soon-ish, I think you have to send out at least a couple other offers fairly soon. Otherwise, you run the risk of making the guys feel "unloved" while other schools are swooping in.
January 31st, 2013 at 11:09 AM ^
Maybe he misunderstood the coaches and this was what was meant? "We'd love you to commit when we offer, otherwise we have to move on" (as in send out more offers not stop recruiting this kid).
January 31st, 2013 at 8:11 AM ^
It also helped that Shane Morris lived close to Ann Arbor and is the twitter master.
January 31st, 2013 at 8:25 AM ^
Looking at Rivals, of the top 13 quarterbacks for 2013, none of them committed after May 22, 2012. The next couple committed in June.
January 31st, 2013 at 12:20 AM ^
I am not a big fan of this approach if it is indeed true.
I think we should have taken a second QB in the 2013 class (I am not sold on Morris being the long term answer), this means that we should take 2 in 2014 and possibly 2015.
Assuming Gardner doesn't get the redshirt for 2014 this is our depth chart:
RS JR Bellomy
RS(?) FR Morris
Not very ideal, but I guess thats why they pay the coaches the big bucks.
January 31st, 2013 at 12:28 AM ^
The problem with taking 2 qbs last year is, what guy who could start at Michigan wants to compete all 4-5 years against a top 5 pocket qb? You can rarely sign 2 elite qbs in one class.
Don't forget, Henne was a frosh when he started.
January 31st, 2013 at 12:32 AM ^
You are not "sold on Shane Morris being the long term answer"
Are you a Sparty? They call him "Jesus Morris" over there since he denied their offer of a scholly.
The thing is, you don't need to be "sold" for a few years.
Kid's got a rocket arm and it looks like he can lead.
We'll learn fast if he responds to the coaching.
January 31st, 2013 at 1:00 AM ^
I'm sorry having a differing opinion than you makes me a Sparty.
I've been a Michigan fan since the fourth grade, so I am not going to argue with that.
Honestly I hope I am wrong, but I just do not think Morris is going to be as good as Gardner is and will be.
January 31st, 2013 at 7:41 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 8:14 AM ^
Morris doesn't show the most consistency or the best accuracy. What good is throwing the ball 70 yards if it's not anywhere near our receivers?
I am skeptical if Morris is the long term answer, but I am hopeful. If he responds to coaching and can gets the timing down with his receivers the sky is the limit. But if he doesn't adjust well to the college game in a couple years, we're going to rely on Bellomy which I'm not comfortable with, or a player not on the team yet. I'm confident the coaches will figure it out.
January 31st, 2013 at 10:22 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 12:34 PM ^
But accuracy is hard to coach. See - Denard Robinson
January 31st, 2013 at 10:16 AM ^
Why would he be sold? No one has seen him play at Michigan yet. All there is a lot of recruiting hype and an underwhelming showing in the UA game (which is understandable given the mono and that QB's generally suck in these games).
January 31st, 2013 at 7:59 AM ^
Not sure if you saw Devin Garner in the State Championship game against Lowell but he was awful! I thought he would never amount to anything. Even looking at him this spring, I thought we were in major trouble. In two years, Shane Morris will be a very competent QB.
January 31st, 2013 at 10:38 AM ^
Agree. I saw that game as well and after the spring game I was yelling for Bellomy. It's weird how things turn out. I belive Morris has all the tools needed. My only gripe would be sometimes it looks like he is throwing a baseball, his motion/release is a little low sometimes.
January 31st, 2013 at 8:13 AM ^
What were you a fan of in the third grade? And don't say girls, because everyone knows they had cooties back then.
January 31st, 2013 at 12:31 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 1:40 AM ^
Is there any indication the coaches may be leaning toward one QB over another, or is it all speculation at this point?
January 31st, 2013 at 1:48 AM ^
He'll be one hell of a submariner one day...
January 31st, 2013 at 2:10 AM ^
I immediately thought of John Navarre and then I watched his film and saw how accurately he throws on the run, across his body, ran the option and scrambled really well.
He looks good to me, I trust our coaches.
January 31st, 2013 at 3:19 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 6:04 AM ^
Locker is/was a better athlete.
January 31st, 2013 at 7:40 AM ^
He's also only 6'2" or 6'3". He doesn't resemble Locker much at all.
January 31st, 2013 at 4:08 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 6:06 AM ^
The competition isn't very good. It's a small-ish private school.
January 31st, 2013 at 5:41 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 7:35 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 7:43 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 6:07 AM ^
Not a big fan of Speight. Accurate but not a great athlete, not a great deal of arm strength.
January 31st, 2013 at 8:41 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 8:47 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 8:51 AM ^
Arm strength is something that's somewhat difficult to improve, in my opinion. You've either got it or you don't. That's not to say that you can't add a little bit of zip, but the guys who are soft throwers generally remain soft throwers.
January 31st, 2013 at 9:16 AM ^
We use the shorthand "strong arm" to describe something that has nothing to do with muscle strength, because it's easier than describing all the mechanical motion that gives velocity to passing, i.e. the transfer of weight from back to front foot, torso rotation, and snapping motion of the arm, and most importantly the perfectly timed sequence of those things in a smooth delivery.
One of the interesting things about "throwing like a girl" (no offense, MGoLadies) is that it isn't because of weakness, it's because girls can't usually decouple the torso rotation from the arm motion sufficiently, no matter how physically strong they are. They synchronize the two acts too much, whereas even weak boys have a natural tendency to separate in time just a bit, so the ball leaves their arm with more snap and it doesn't have that shot-put appearance that girls tend to have.
It helps to explain why some skinny little beach-bully-targets (I'm thinking of dudes like former Steelers QB Tommy Maddox who never saw a weight room in his life) have cannon "arms" when chiseled Greek tricep gods struggle to throw a ball 30 yards. It ain't the arm at all.
All that said, I'm in favor of keeping the convention "strong arm" instead of "strong asynchronous weight transfer-torso rotation-arm uncoiling".
HAIL MISONOMER
January 31st, 2013 at 9:38 AM ^
I don't suppose you have sources for that? I agree with everything you're saying, so this isn't a "citation needed" situation; I would just love to see an extended scientific discussion of that. My research tangentially includes other non-muscular factors of athletic performance and I haven't seen this particular aspect treated in the literature.
January 31st, 2013 at 10:54 AM ^
There was a fascinating report on NPR or Nova last year about "throwing like a girl," I'll try to find it, it's actually worth a post of its own some time (I don't remember a visual image of it, so I think NPR is more likely-- will post the link as soon as I turn it up)
EDIT: did a very quick Google search and didn't find the radio report, but there were a good number of articles on this phenomenon. This one from Forbes gets to what I'm talking about and probably does it better than my explanation:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/bobcook/2012/09/11/why-your-daughter-throws-like-a-girl/
Basically, they were explaining what "throwing like a girl" means, and evidently the biomechanics folks say it all ultimately comes down to the decoupling thing. So if the steps for throwing a ball are:
1. transfer weight back to front (as you coil up torso)
2. unwind with torso rotation (as you coil arm)
3. uncoil arm/shoulder (as you finish torso rotation and weight transfer)
Males, basically any males, are naturally inclined to decouple steps 2 and 3, which is what you have to do to generate force in the throw.
Females, by nature, do steps 2 and 3 simultaneously. They just can't help it. That's why they throw like girls and we snicker when they throw the ball back over the fence (and fail). Don't act like you don't snicker.
It's kind of the difference between shot-put champions, who are always muscular beasts, and javelin champions, who are always a little more wiry. Shot-putters want to synchronize 2 and 3 too closely, so they get this muscle explosion to propel the... uh, the shot. Or the put. Or whateva.
So you give a football to a shot-put gold medalist, he'll suck, not only because all the muscle mass makes his upper body too tight to create the whiplike wave action needed, but because he's trained himself out of the natural male tendency to decouple 2 and 3. A female shot-put champ will be even worse, because she never had the natural inclination to separate those to begin with. But if you pump up a woman with enough roids and weight training (East Germany or something), she'll start to out shot-put weaker males, because the weak male has lost his advantage over her in that motion. The weaker male still throws a football farther with ease to salvage his masculinity a bit, but he might still be embarrased by a really good female javelin thrower, or maybe a UM softball outfielder.
Javelin champs, on the other hand, fling footballs for miles (Terry Bradshaw was an NCAA champ javelin thrower, for example). They perfect the separate steps. But if you pumped them up on roids so they got huge and put a heavy cannonball in their hands, they would suck, because they still naturally want to decouple steps 2 and 3 without realizing it.
Decathalons notwithstanding, it's why you'll never have a person win the javelin and the shot-put, ever. One requires a synchronized explosion behind the object, the other requires a wave action going off in order, but not completely overlapping. Both create a lot of energy, but totally differently.
NOTE: I AM NOT SAYING THIS PROSPECT THROWS LIKE A GIRL. That is all.
January 31st, 2013 at 11:44 AM ^
Cool. I'm teaching a class on this stuff soon so I'll do some more research. Anecdotally, I threw both shot and disc in high school, the latter of which does require the "hips before hands" decoupling, and the former of which as you've pointed out doesn't. I was a lot better at disc. Interestingly, the a spinning approach to shotput does require a little bit of that decoupling, moreso than the traditional technique (I forget what it's called).
It's also important to note that a lot of "arm strength" is developed during development, as a kid who throws every day is going to end up with a lower degree of humeral torsion on that side, and therefore a greater ability to externally rotate the shoulder, leading to much greater leverage during the "catapult" motion of throwing. So even someone with a great throwing motion and great musculature might just be out of luck if they don't start early enough.
So yeah, if a high school quarterback has a "weak arm", it's a bad idea to assume that will improve very much after reaching college.
January 31st, 2013 at 1:52 PM ^
Gentleman (I presume), this is the most insightful and interesting discussion I have seen on this blog (I've been reading for a year). I focused on biomechanics at U-M but never had any discussion of this phenomenon. Thank you
January 31st, 2013 at 9:53 AM ^
I actually sought out in this thread, your opinion of Speight, because after seeing the film, I wasn't enthused, and preferred Cornwall's film much more.
January 31st, 2013 at 6:32 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 6:54 AM ^
Are we really judging a QB by one wobbly pass? If so, then Peyton Manning sucks.
January 31st, 2013 at 8:59 AM ^
January 31st, 2013 at 9:11 AM ^
Nobody has blown me away. I would tentatively say that Cornwell is the best I've seen of the guys we're recruiting. Still, I don't think you can judge a guy by one wobbly pass. I'm sure Cornwell has a wobbly pass or two that maybe just didn't end up on his highlight film. Peyton Manning throws wobbly passes all the time, but he's still damn good.