DGDestroys

February 13th, 2010 at 7:13 PM ^

Yup he's being recruited as a wide receiver. Another WR (which admittedly may or may not have been mentioned on this board, I don't really know) that we offered this week was George Farmer, the kid who put up almost as good of numbers as his teammate Robert Woods (committed to USC, number 6 player in the nation according to rivals.com) in leading Serra HS in Southern Cal to a state title. Having said that... he's probably a USC lock.

mejunglechop

February 13th, 2010 at 7:46 PM ^

Well Jeremy Crabtree just recently said he thinks Farmer will be the top ranked recruit in the country overall. It makes sense even with having taken 5 wrs in the 2010 class to go after guys like him. (Not saying we shouldn't be offering Smith, just interesting to see us going after receivers that aren't surefire 5 stars.) With 5 WRs in the last class, limited scholarships this year and other pressing needs (I'm looking at you O-line and NT) you've gotta wonder how many WRs we're looking to take.

mejunglechop

February 14th, 2010 at 12:28 PM ^

If being a 5 star is your standard you're being unreasonable. Since Rodriguez has been here there have only been 10 five stars from California, 3 being in 2008.

Of those 10, Rodriguez seriously pursued exactly one: Dillon Baxter and he almost committed to Michigan.

big10football

February 14th, 2010 at 1:05 PM ^

Forcier was a "good" recruit out of California in my opinion; I guess "big time" is subjective and vague.

My point is simply that Rich Rod may not think that it is a good strategy to offer only (likely) 5-star WRs who live on the other side of the country. Rich Rod may or may not like Smith as much as Farmer, and he probably feels like he has a MUCH better chance of getting Smith than Farmer.

When every school in the country is on a California WR this early in the process, Michigan probably has no better chance of getting him than Oklahoma, Florida, LSU, Oregon, and maybe Washington, UCLA, and Cal. And Michigan definitely has a lower chance of getting him than USC. Why would Rich Rod limit himself to these recruits rather than offering players closer to home who have ties to Michigan?

spacemanspiff231

February 13th, 2010 at 7:47 PM ^

...Devaris Daniels. He's from Illinois and appreciates what Michigan and the Big Ten have to offer. He's one of the best receivers in the country and we actually have a decent shot at him if we recruit him hard enough. I don't mind offering more wide receivers as long as they're top standouts that have the size to play on the outside. While we recruited a lot of outside WRs in this past class, we could stand to gain at least one more top guy. None of the recruits we got in the last class really have the speed to break away on the outside and provide that consistent deep threat that our team so desperately needs in order to run this offense properly.

WolvinLA2

February 13th, 2010 at 9:07 PM ^

Agreed, DJ Williamson might not be the highest rated WR in the country, but if speed is what you're looking for, DJ Williamson is faster than most of the WR recruits this past year. He was the 100m champ, as a junior, for the largest division in Ohio. If he's not fast enough, I doubt we'll find someone who is.

spacemanspiff231

February 13th, 2010 at 11:49 PM ^

I agree that DJ Williamson has the speed needed but we have other receivers with that kind of speed already. Now, I'm not going to judge the kid already before he's ever done anything on the field, but I am going to go by all the scouting reports that have been done on him that say that he's not yet progressed very far as a receiver. Other than Stonum (and even he has not been overly impressive thus far, although last year was only his sophomore year), we don't really have any game-breaker wide receiver that can be a true deep threat. Someone that the safeties always need to account for. If we can't spread the defense out, our system can't work. Without that deep threat, opposing safeties will always play up close.

WolvinLA2

February 14th, 2010 at 2:04 AM ^

In your post above, you specifically said that none of our WR recruits this year have the speed to break away on the outside. Whether or not he has the most skill as a WR, Williamson certainly has that speed. Stonum has that speed, and so does Stokes. I wouldn't worry too much just yet that our receivers won't be able to keep the safeties honest.

Also, remember the OSU game where Nard Dog split out as a receiver and went deep? I wouldn't be surprised if that happens a handful of times this fall.

mejunglechop

February 14th, 2010 at 3:44 AM ^

Also, keeping safeties honest really doesn't have that much to do with one guy having a lot of speed. If a possession guy is consistently going for 12-15 yards the corner will get safety help. Roy Roundtree can stretch defenses.

aaamichfan

February 13th, 2010 at 7:56 PM ^

Massillon is such a big time program in Ohio HS football, that we should offer as many players(quality ones) as possible from there. Although some of us have been skeptical about the "star rankings" of our Ohio recruits, the recruiting net currently being cast into the state should pay big dividends in the future.

I really like the general recruiting approach taken by our coaching staff. I never could have imagined Michigan having this type of success recruiting in Florida, Arizona, and North Carolina.

The Other Brian

February 13th, 2010 at 7:57 PM ^

You have to think, considering the size of the class and the needs elsewhere, that we take probably two WRs max, so the coaches will be especially picky. Somebody like Arnett will probably have a spot for a while, and guys like Daniels and A.J. Jordan will probably be near the top of the wishlist too. Not sure where Smith would fall on the totem pole.