Hello: RB Gaige Garcia
Committed!!! 〽️ pic.twitter.com/xH0iVHV8B6
— Gaige Garcia (@gaigegarcia23) June 24, 2019
He's committed to play both Football and Wrestle at Michigan. Both offers came within the last week.
He's a 5'10", 205lbs RB out of Catawissa, PA.
Currently unranked on 247.
No other big time offers. Basically his offer list is all Ivy League schools, Air Force, and Army
Junior year (from video below): 210 carries, 2042 yards, 38 TDs, 10.2 YPC
Ran a 11.54 100m race in track so that's about 4.61ish 40 speed.
Additionally, from his 247 bio 'Ever since he was a freshman he has run for no less than 1900 yards in a season including back-to-back 2,000 yard seasons.'
Mike Hart part duex?
That thought crossed my mind. His video shows an athlete with excellent balance and vision combined with a strong desire to not be tackled. To my untrained eye he is very Mike Hart-esque.
The types of schools that have offered him is of no surprise (I mean this as a compliment, lots of Ivys and service academies). I think as a football recruit alone, you'd probably also see a bunch of MAC offers and toward the end of the recruiting cycle possibly some lower level B1G offers. The kid can play football. He's not an elite athlete, either top end speed or lateral ability, but he does do some things really well. He has feet that churn for days, strong lower body, good vision, deceptive in the open field because he has good feet. You always love football players that know wrestling, they understand leverage and hand placement and have great football mentalities. I know people will look down on it, but he isn't totally different than Kurt Taylor, albeit probably a little better athlete.
The scholarship situation is a bit weird. It gives them an out if it doesn't work out with football. The season overlap makes dual-sport very difficult, particularly with how technique driven wrestling is and how much body composition goes into wrestling (so you are limited what you can do on the football side). It's probably not an offer I would have made, but this isn't like they offered a kid that couldn't play football at the D-I level. It's probably a bit of a reach, but the kid has some tools to prove people wrong in that regard too. And by all accounts is a good pick up for the wrestling program.
Great points. I noticed a lot of truly horrible angles taken on him. I'm not sure if it was his deceptive speed or not, but he took advantage of it. Amazing balance, strength, low running and vision with a little burst can get you a lot of yards and success. Also, looks like he has soft hands to go with his running. If he proves he block like Hart he could earn a 3rd down back type scholarship. Good hands, good blocking and good short term grind it out yards through holes. His offer list means he is probably a smart kid too, which can greatly help if they understand how to read a defense and follow blocks and hit a hole.
Happy for the kid. Can't blame him. He gets a big time offer and jumps on it...that is just 100% smart. Whether this ends up being a good get for UM is iffy.
Captain Obvious says "I would like to have elite talent in our backfield."
11.54 in the 100m is Agonizingly slow for a suppose a D1 running back!
What the hell is wrong with you people? I have to get out of here. The dumb is overwhelming.
By the way, here's a link to the time Saquon Barkley ran the exact same 11.54 100m time in Spring of 2015 as a senior in high school. LINK
Saquon Barkley was either REALLY bad technique wise, or got massively faster in college (unusual).
He ran 4.66 as a HS senior at 205 lbs.
He ran 4.40 at the combine at 233 lbs.
I would never expect to see that sort of change again.
Come take your lumps, Coldwater
And you are agonizingly stupid for a human being!
Are Michigan fans back to criticizing PWO again? Did people not learn from that embarrassing Jeff George Jr. meltdown?
" Ran a 11.54 100m race in track so that's about 4.61ish 40 speed. "
Probably pretty close - I ran 11.6 and 4.7
You were the fastest in a long line of Pescaderos
This has to be a PWO, right?
Edit: Ok, I read that Brandon Brown explained he's going to be on a wrestling scholarship and Football PWO. If he enters a FB game his scholarship converts to football.
I don't think so. Harbaugh doesn't usually offer PWO kids this early.
I imagine that if the wresting/football thing is true, there was probably some coordination between the two programs. Is this when wrestlers typically accept scholarships?
Also, it seems like he'll need to pretty rapidly make a choice. I don't see how a college student could possibly have time for both sports or how the wrestling weight management would work with a football diet/exercise plan.
Mike Modano was a wrestler/walk on running back back in 2006 ish.
Would have won the Lady Byng too if it weren't for Datsyuk.
For the 100th time, a kid can't be on scholarship for another sport (i.e. wrestling) and walk on (and play) for the football team. All scholarship count toward football FIRST period.
Yeah not sure why you're getting downvoted on this...
Lotsa putz's out there. Whatever. Tomorrow there will be another post asking if we can have a 5* OL get a scholarship as a 100m sprinter and walk on the football team.
Well, it was confirmed by Brandon Brown (as long as he doesn't play in a football game).
So maybe you shouldn't say it the 101st time - kidding :)
That makes too much sense and thus I'm sure the NCAA will make a new rule against this ASAP.
Could be like Tru Wilson, works on the practice team and if he's good enough eventually gets a scholarship.
Not saying you’re wrong but Gaige being the #4 197 pound wrestler in the negation, and Michigan’s high need for a top tier 197 I doubt he bulks up to a reasonable football playing weight. He will likely top out around 205. It’s a healthy cut and makes him a full bodied 197, but any more would likely cause performance to suffer. 205 isn’t a great playing weight for a big ten running back
Can he get a wrestling scholarship and then play football and wrestle? Would that leave a football scholarship open?
No. Miami did that in the early 2000s to get more players at each position and since then the NCAA ruled that all multi-sport scholarships including football count for football.
Yeah, it'd just be like an SEC school to turn that into a huge loophole where their shitty ass crew team or golf team had 20 football players so they could bring in a class of like 40 freshmen.
Miami is ACC
He can get a wrestling scholarship and practice football. If he’s good enough to play, and does so, then he becomes a football scholarship. Good luck to him!
No there are rules to prevent those shenanigans now, after teams had used that loophole in the past.
- Anyone who participates in football (appearing in an actual game that is, just practicing with the team doesn't count) is counted in that sport, even if he does not receive financial aid from the football program. An exception exists for players at non-scholarship FCS programs who receive aid in another sport.
- Participants in basketball are counted in that sport, unless they also play football.
- Participants in men's ice hockey are counted in that sport, unless they also play football or basketball.
- Participants in both men's swimming and diving and men's water polo are counted in swimming and diving, unless they count in football or basketball.
- Participants in women's (indoor) volleyball are counted in that sport unless they also play basketball.
- All other multi-sport athletes are counted in whichever sport the school chooses.
One exception is baseball. Believe it or not, if an athlete plays Football and Baseball they count for BOTH sports. Seems odd, but that's the case.
SOMEWHAT OFF TOPIC: How does this impact incoming freshman Joey Velazquez who's listed as a football recruit, but who also has committed to play baseball at Michigan? He's considered an elite baseball prospect and was named an All-Ohio Division 2 1st Team outfielder this season, his third season an all-state player. LINK
If he counts for both football and baseball at Michigan, but he's more likely to have a future in professional baseball, then would he (a) be treated as being on a full scholarship for football during the fall season, even if he doesn't participate in a game, and (b) if he spends most of his training time with the baseball team during the spring/summer season and he appears in regular-season games, be treated by the NCAA as if his football scholarship counts as a full baseball scholarship during the spring/summer season?
I love football players that wrestle. They come in with great hands, footwork and understand leverage. At worst, I would think he’d be a phenomenal pass blocker
As a former wrestling coach, I love the idea of former HS wrestlers playing football. With that said, it seems like it would be very difficult to be good at both at the college level. I would think that the diet/exercise plan for a college football program would interfere with the one for wrestling.
I think it will be difficult. Josh Hokit out of Fresno St is an AA wrestler and a backup RB. His sophomore year, he played quite a bit. Not as much junior year. Don't know their roster well though, so can't say if he just can't passed because of talent, hurt or just focused more on wrestling last year.
I would think that Garcia would probably wrestle at 197. His weight on 247 is listed as 205. I can't see him losing more than 10 pounds after football to fit under wrestling weight. He can't bulk up too much because then he's wrestling with the heavyweights and he's just too small, I would think.
I'll always think of Rob Renes who somehow played Defensive Tackle on a National Championship football team despite being 5'6", 230 pounds (estimated).
Welcome Gaige, way to GoBlue!
Guaranteed a great education, gets to wrestle and could very well see the field one day.
Plus he already has Julian "Cough up a Loogie" nut humper talking mess to him on twitter, that's got to be worth something right?
I like his film a lot. Running style reminds me a little of MJD (a few inches taller than MJD though). He has really good top end speed for as stocky as he is.
Have you seen any of his wrestling film?
This is the same school as Julian Fleming. He’s a top notch wrestler, and that program is a really good one that produces a lot of top notch athletes.
A Pennsylvania high school wrestler who finished first in the state in the 195-weight class in class AA, but who's unranked as a football running back, might be considered a greater priority for Michigan's wrestling team than the football team. LINK1 LINK2
The NCAA limits wrestling scholarships to 9.9 per year, so, like with baseball, lacrosse and soccer, the scholarship funds usually are divided among athletes who receive partial scholarships. LINK
Could it be that this offer for football was meant to help Michigan's wrestling team pick up a top-rated wrestler without having to allocate any wrestling scholarship funds to him?
I highly doubt Harbaugh is sacrificing a scholarship to help the wrestling team.
No. As stated multiple times, he'll come in on a wrestling scholly to wrestle and will be a PWO for football. If he plays in a football game, his scholly reverts to football.
I don't think so. If he's on a wrestling scholarship, he can start the football season on the team, then switch over to wrestling. If Harbaugh puts him on scholarship, I doubt he wrestles at all. Their seasons overlap quite a lot.
Here's the tweet where he received a football scholarship offer from Jim Harbaugh. He's here to play football (and other stuff, too).
Please don't get me wrong, I'm not saying the kid is lying at all, but since schools can't talk about scholarships there have been several instances of kids thinking they have committable offers that they really don't have.
I think he’s got a committable PWO spot. Like any player, he does not have a committable “you will see the field” offer. He still has to earn that, and until he does, which necessarily can’t happen until after he gets here should it ever happen, his scholarship will be for wrestling.
It’s actually a pretty cool opportunity for the kid. I’m sure people will be up in arms about Harbaugh finding a loophole to get this kid tho