Double Hello: Freddy Canteen & Brandon Watson
According to Adam Friedman from Rivals we apprently received commitments from both Freddy Canteen (2014 WR) and also his teammate Brandon Watson (2014 CB).
EDIT: Confirmed by Sam Webb.
#Michigan picked up commitments Freddy Canteen and Brandon Watson from Eastern Christian Academy
Well, well. Scott for sure to Clemson?
Does anyone know if these two were visiting this weekend? I'm not sure if they phoned in the committments or delivered them while in A2. I'm feeling pretty good about the Canteen commit; however, I'm not as sure about Watson. This may be as much strategic as tactical IMHO. Thoughts?
Glad to have them in the fold. The painful thing about following MGoBlog is that you hear about some players that love Michigan for a couple of years (Josh Garnett, Treadwell, Scott, Westphal, Damien Harris) and you put them on your mental future Michigan players list. If they don't come we tear our clothes and gnash our teeth. The world is over. Then there are the Channing Striblings of the world (Canteens and Watsons) who you've never heard of but the coaches like at camp and end up being really good. Unlike a three year period in our recent past, I trust that our coaches can evaluate talent and get the players that they want. I'm excited for this small school to play some actual games and to hear about what fantastic steals we got here. Hearing about Channing Stribling's senior year was a lot of fun. It's great having coaches that don't do their recruiting by reading rivals/scout/ESPN/247.
I have nothing against Stribling, Canteen, or Watson, but these camp offers don't prove that the coaches know what they're doing. At this point, all three of those guys could be complete flops on the field.
Fair enough, and with all of the talent coming in it might be hard for them to make the field. It will be interesting to see if Hoke and Co. have the same prognosticating/coaching skills as Beilein.
It remains to be proven out that the coaches can spot the diamonds in the rough that the recruiting sites haven't. (I trust them.) But I think they have proven that they can recruit. From reading this site, it seemed like RR had some rocky relations with the Michigan H.S. coaches. Everything I've seen on our coaches is that Mihigan and Ohio HS coaches love them including that Ted Ginn Sr. piece in the Detroit News.
Agreed. So the only offers/recruits/players that prove anything about our coaching staff's evaluation abilities are the ones who have seen playing time at Michigan already. The 2013 and 2014 classes are somewhat irrelevant as of June 29, 2013.
If it were obvious to everyone, I wouldn't have had to say it.
I'm sure the coaches do their homework, but let's not pretend that they only offer kids who are academically in the clear. Artavis Scott has grade issues, Aaron Burbridge had grade issues, Justin Turner had academic issues, Adrian Witty, Antonio Kinard, the list goes on and on.
Did they offer and recruit a disproportionate amount of busts? I'm just curious, because given any of the recruiting sites or any top college's staff, I'll assume the college coaches know far more than writers for websites.
I'm not making the argument that Hoke can't identify wide receiver talent. It might be true or it might not, but I don't have the inclination to do the research at the moment.
The point is not that he and his staff are bad at it. The point is that offers, by themselves, mean nothing. Just because a kid gets an offer at camp doesn't mean we should "trust the coaches" any more than if a kid gets an offer based on watching his games live or watching film only. Hell, the coaches might hit 80% on film offerees and then strike out completely on camp offerees.
At this point, there's no evidence to reach a conclusion either way. That's all I'm saying.
At a camp, hoke can say, Jabril, cover this guy with Wilton as his QB and recruit Y helping on the double team/ safety spot.
It's a more controlled environment, which means coaches can better evaluate talent, right?
Camps are a mixed bag. Yes, you can see if a kid can get separation, but you're also not watching a kid who's wearing 15 pounds of equipment, who's worried about getting nailed by a safety as he goes up for the catch, who's terrified when the lights go on. It is a more controlled environment, but that's not necessarily a good thing.
There are positives and negatives to game film, camps, etc. Perhaps these coaches are better at evaluating guys in person. Perhaps they're better when watching film. Maybe they're great or terrible at both.
Watson supposedly is 6'0" now, although if he's saying that, it probably means he's 5'11". Everybody exaggerates a little...
Let's hope they have reasonably good ACT/SAT scores. Eastern Christian Academy's teaching methods are pretty non-traditional. ECA sounds like a high school version of the University of Phoenix.
Word to the wise, just because someone posts a comment that you don't agree with doesn't make it "trolling". Gotta love this place
Maybe people just don't know the definition of "trolling."
To those who are uneasy about consuming one space on a limited roster with an unheralded recruit like Freddy Canteen, trust me-- there is no reason for fear. This kid has otherworldly footwork. When he gets on the field, he's going to be open 50% of the time no matter who is covering him.
Don't believe? Check out the video of him performing receiver drills: Even a football enthusiast who only played high school ball will immediately see and understand. Agility of this sort is extremely rare. And he's still working at it. Hard.
And based on every report I have read of the recent Michigan camp (where he was offered), this footwork translates into routerunning.
Can't wait to see Canteen in the slot. He's going to break some ankles.
Good pickups....we are really going after Maryland talent...