Davonte Mills (‘21 DL) decommits
Not a great shock. I think many suspected he would not end up in the class.
F.
DT is a position of need, and with no DT commits now this is rough. Hoping we can get Deone Walker committed soon.
Do you think having a guy that might not ever see the field, or may end up transferring is better than just starting from scratch?
Michigan is a better position with DT's then they were when Miles committed. This makes sense and quite frankly should be seen as a positive development. Best of luck to this young man.
I guess I can see this point of view. I think I'd feel better about it if we had another DT commit.
We just need Cauley Ferrari to cash in on the NIL bonanza and we will get all the DT's we need.
This is me trying to read the proverbial tea leaves, but I think this suggests the DT board is shaping up to be pretty strong. If the staff didn't feel like we were in great shape to land some of the guys higher up the board, they would have been sure to keep Miles a priority and in the class.
Without question, there are conversations and handshakes happening behind the scenes that the recruiting industry and followers aren't privy to. I think based on this staff's re-found emphasis on recruiting and DT being a critical position of need, it's reasonable to think the writing on the wall simply indicated there was a numbers crunch ahead for Miles and so he decided to re-open his recruitment now rather than in the fall when scholarship availability was going to be more limited.
Let's certainly hope that's what is going on here, and definitely wishing the kid the best of luck and success where ever he ends up.
I like your optimism and would like to subscribe to your newsletter; although my shrew of a heart has been hurt too many times, he still wants to hope.
I think we land two of the three...
Walker
Shepard
Grant.
Would be awesome if we landed all three.
But judging from above if we don't land any of them, this shows how great things are.
Yeah, I guess the new staff isn't just taking anybody after all.
They must be done recruiting the DL.
I guess this is better now than having a kerfuffle near signing day.
Not shocking
What an odd decommittment post. Self congratulatory as hell. Not a big deal just weird.
Reminds me of the Chappelle Show Rick James skit where he's bragging about how he's the sexiest mfer ever.
One of the best lookin’ mothafuckas you’ve ever seen.
It reads like Michigan said thanks, no thanks to him & he's trying to convince them that they made the wrong decision.
I have nothing to back that up but that tweet is so over the top with "hey, I'm a good player and BTW I'm good at school too"
Ya, I see it the same as you. Whatever, but what a strange tweet.
It reads a bit like a guy who is being shown the door and is trying to get ahead of it. The part at the end with him listing his grades and measurements does feel a bit like someone who's worried coaches might have moved on from other schools and he's trying to get that recruiting cycle back up.
Again, wish him luck.
Very Strange. This reads to me:
I'm a great athlete
I play 2 sports
I can play on either line
I have good grades
There is no reason why Michigan stopped recruiting me
Between the lines I read -
I like to kidnap neighborhood pets and ransom them for M & M's and powerball tickets. I've also concocted a potion that turns ducks in turtles. For fun I like to dress up in a penguin suit, ride a bigwheel pulling a giant banner saying, 'Let's all emigrate to Guam!"
Anyone else get that?
Maybe, but he’s also a 16/17-year-old kid from a chronically troubled school who may be quite anxious to show others that he’s FBS material. He’ll grow and learn the nuances of tone, like most of us had to do.
Thank you, Joby, for being the first one to tell it like it actually is for a huge percentage of high school kids.
I wonder which one(s) of us here didn't have to go through some sort of process during our adolescent years to figure out such things, regardless of our socioeconomic, ethnic, etc. background. Some kids figure it out quickly; others have a little rockier road to navigate psychologically and otherwise. And some never get to that point.
Instead of the shade a few here are throwing at what Davonte Miles posted, how about remembering our own personal struggles as we navigated thru our teen years and try to apply it to what we think we know about Davonte.
I wish Mr. Miles continued success, academically, athletically and otherwise, throughout the rest of his time in high school and beyond.
Well said Rob.
The kid's pride is obviously hurt and he's probably a bit embarrassed right now. I feel bad for him.
Anybody who's ever been fired from a job or had a significant other tell you they no longer want to be around knows exactly how he feels right now and why he posted that.
I know I do.
I hardly think calling his tweet "odd" on a blog message board is the injustice you seem to see it as.
Not your post at all. That one is fine.
But a few others definitely are cringe-worthy. I looked at the entire thread prior to my own earlier post, not just what you had to say. Davonte Miles is moving on and there's no reason for some to bad-mouth him and or what the young man had to say. He thanked Coach Nua and Coach Harbaugh in his own words and took the high road, IMO.
What's more, I give him more credit for quite obviously writing his own decommitment post when it's sometimes fairly obvious that other kids have apparently had theirs written by public relations people or others.
His post is fine. He is telling his next suitors he is confident in what he will bring. Hope he finds the right place.
It’s a little defensive and exactly what you would expect from someone who didn’t have a choice.
Best case scenario for a response to be expected. Unless we want a Swenson situation. Good luck to him. Those dissing the kid need to stop.
Refresh me, please - why isn't this a shock? Or better, why is the surprise factor somewhat non-existent amongst the 'crootniks?
Not sure of the full story, but it's been mentioned that he and Connor Jones have been working to re-earn their offers/justify their commitments with the new staff. I suspect the new staff came in and thought they wouldn't have offered Miles or Jones if given the choice, but they decided to honor the commitments with the caveat that both had to re-earn their offers. Seems apparent that Miles didn't.
Head coach that recruited him, or OK’d offer and commitment, is still here so “re-earning” offers is just weird to me. How does that work? New coaches come to Jim and say hey coach if we were here we wouldn’t have offered this guy and he needs to do X, Y and Z to stay in the fold?
Yep. This is kinda special to Harbaugh as he gives a lot of autonomy to his assistants. If this sounds screwy to you, then you and Steve Wiltfong would get along well.
I don’t think it’s that screwy personally. I actually kinda like the concept of the head coach letting the guys who run a specific side of the ball decide which players they want in their system. Head coach can have veto power based on character and whatnot, but let the guys designing the defense and doing the playcalling decide who is the best possible fit to do that.
I think the head coach was letting his defensive staff recruit the kids that they thought fit said coaches system. This kid doesn't fit the system of the new defensive staff, so this staff said I would rather have that spot for a kid I feel fits my system better.
This has happened before, I think in Harbaugh's first year. There was an O-line commit (Swenson maybe) that had been committed to Hoke for a while, and Harbaugh's staff didn't like his progression in his senior year. I think he ended up at OU, so it worked out for him. Unfortunately this got a lot of scrutiny because it happened like 2-3 weeks before the February signing period. At least now the kid has time to take other visits and pick a school that is a good fit, and is not rushed into a decision.
Have to say if we go 6-6, 7-5 or even 8-4 this year we are going to see ALOT more decommits and transfers.
Well i just have to say that if Michigan does really good this year, we will see ALOT more commits and transfers in.
There, take that captain obvious!
Typically what happens with a coaching change
No shit.
wow, never occurred to me good players don't want to play on bad teams... crazy.
Who cares? We're getting Walter Nolen!
Yes, we needed him to decommit to make space for Walter!
It would be nice if you actually spelled the last name correctly.
EDIT: meant for above. This is what happens when you post while staring into the sun.
If it's supposedly not surprising, it's surprising that Seth didn't say he wouldn't be surprised if Miles decommitted during his July 14 recruiting review: