Huge football recruiting weekend
I posted a list of players visiting Michigan this weekend, and it's a very impressive list. Most of the elite in-state guys are on there, along with some out-of-state visitors like J.J. McCarthy, Tyler Morris, and Derrick Davis, Jr.
I wouldn't be surprised if Michigan got a commitment or two this weekend.
January 25th, 2020 at 8:39 AM ^
Beat Illinois! See you at the game Croots!
LFG.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:41 AM ^
Take them to the hockey game tonight also. It might just be an exhibition, but should still be fun.
January 25th, 2020 at 8:41 AM ^
Wow, that's a lot of stars for what seems like a random weekend in January. Any reason they are all visiting this weekend? Thanks for the update, Magnus.
6.5.0January 25th, 2020 at 9:02 AM ^
There's almost always a huge recruiting weekend in January or two. There's not much else going on (bowl games, All-American games, etc.), AND the coaches are looking for a home basketball game for something to do. This is Michigan's first home basketball game of 2020 to take place on a weekend.
UPDATE: This same weekend in 2019 was a weekend where Michigan got visits from AJ Henning, Braiden McGregor, Michael Carmody, Rashawn Williams, Theo Johnson, and others (LINK). In 2018 it was Devontae Dobbs, John Emery, Jr., Rick Sandidge, Mustapha Muhammad, and others (LINK).
January 25th, 2020 at 9:49 AM ^
Man, our hit rate from these weekends seem to be low. Hopefully this year changes that since a lot of our top targets are from in state
January 25th, 2020 at 11:36 AM ^
Thanks for that update. I now know not to get my hopes up.
January 25th, 2020 at 11:39 AM ^
A month long dead period for recruiting just ended.
January 25th, 2020 at 8:46 AM ^
mags, i have 2 questions for you
1. outside of crystal ball picks, who do you think we might ultimately get out of the list you compiled?
2. one of our sons, the next one up to go to college, is growing a lot and his body is in what i would call a big state of flux - taller and thicker. also, he never comes off the field and plays any one of 4 positions on D, and two or more on O. in general, how does a kid like that get looked at by college coaches, and how would a kid like that maximize his recruiting since he's changing so much and plays at a number of different positions?
January 25th, 2020 at 8:52 AM ^
Have his head coach put together a film cut-up for him, create a Hudl page, and blast it out via email or whatever to all the college coaches he knows. Might also help to create a recruiting twitter account where you post his clips sometimes. But, I would start with his head coach.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:09 AM ^
In addition to that, get him to some camps. Pretty much every school will host a camp of some kind. DII schools as well. Doesn’t necessarily have to be the BIG camps. Michigan has offered quite a few players who showed out in the smaller camps our staff has attended in recent years too.
I don’t know how old your kid is, but starting there is definitely up there in terms of getting noticed.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:06 AM ^
It’s 2020. If a kid is that good, it will be impossible to hide from scouts. I suppose the difference between an offer from the bottom of FBS or FCS could be pretty close.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:17 AM ^
You say that, but with the rise in technology the scouts are getting lazier. They’re only evaluating players that come to them or go to their camps. They miss out on even evaluating a lot of really talented players all the time.
They don’t go to high school games anymore, unless it’s a matchup between two powerhouses with multiple D1 caliber players. So if you aren’t sending them your tape and you aren’t going to their camps, they have no idea who you are.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:29 AM ^
"You say that, but with the rise in technology the scouts are getting lazier. They’re only evaluating players that come to them or go to their camps. They miss out on even evaluating a lot of really talented players all the time."
I disagree with this. Just because they're not coming to high school games as often (in some cases) doesn't mean they're lazier. Instead of getting 500 highlight films and going to a few games, now they're watching 2,000 highlight films (due to Hudl and social media), going to a few games, AND doing satellite camps.
Farmers didn't get lazier when the plow was developed. They just got more efficient and were able to farm a larger parcel of land.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:35 AM ^
Good analogy, especially in the "fertile grounds" of recruiting.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:45 AM ^
Plus each one contains a fair amount of manure.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:36 AM ^
What about Trap God's previous point "It’s 2020. If a kid is that good, it will be impossible to hide from scouts"? Do you buy that?
January 25th, 2020 at 10:44 AM ^
Eh, that statement is a little too generalized for my liking. Good players frequently fall through the cracks, from high school all the way to the NFL.
Just look at Raheem Mostert of the 49ers. Not an elite recruit, played for a mediocre college team, put up decent/unspectacular numbers, bounced around the NFL...ran for 200+ yards in the NFC Championship game. Jimmy Garoppolo is another one in the same backfield.
Literally nobody (in FBS) wanted Ronnie Bell, and now he's the best receiver on a 9-4 Power Five team.
There are going to be guys drafted from the FCS and D2 levels this year that will turn into solid players.
So no, I don't really buy that take. I think chances are better now for "under the radar" recruits to get noticed, but it's never going to be 100% or even close to it. For every 5-star bust (think Derrick Green) there has to be somebody "underrated" who steps up to fill the void.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:47 AM ^
But again, that’s relying on the recruit to do a lot more of the work in regards to film.
Again, they dont go to games unless it features a couple D1 caliber players, which takes most recruits out of the view of the scouts. Scouts have also shown a tendency to only evaluate (or re-evaluate) players that come to THEIR camps. While ESPN is notorious for ranking a player and then never following up or re-evaluating.
All of that strikes me as laziness.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:11 AM ^
When did coaches go to games where there was nobody worth recruiting? You’re right that Jim Harbaugh isn’t going to randomly attend a game of 8-man football in the UP, but when did Bo Schembechler or Lloyd Carr or Gary Moeller do that?
I’ve been around high school ball for a long time with plenty of D1 recruits and...plenty of teams with barely a D3 recruit. I’ve never seen a coach show up to watch when there wasn’t a D1 recruit participating.
EDIT: Also, I don't know what you're really talking about. Michigan has offered over 240 players in the 2021 class and offered 347 in the 2020 class. Do you think all those kids have attended Michigan camps? If they've offered 240 in the class of 2021, how many others have they reviewed and put on the "maybe later" pile?
EDIT #2: I guess when you say "scouts" you're talking about the recruiting services, which...isn't really relevant to Michigan itself. To briefly follow you down that avenue, ESPN got rid of a huge chunk of its recruiting staff. So does that mean ESPN is lazier? I mean...sure, I guess, but to do the same stuff they used to do, it would require their reduced staff to do the same amount of work that their larger staff used to do.
In summary...your argument isn't very coherent, and I don't think you're operating with a great deal of knowledge on the subject.
January 25th, 2020 at 1:43 PM ^
Yeah I’m referring specifically to scouts. Meaning the guys from the scouting services. I’m referring to the process itself being lazier. More is placed on the recruit to GET noticed. Scouts aren’t going out and finding kids. Kids have to come to the scouts now.
You have to do more to present yourself to the scouts. You have to do more to present yourself to the schools. It isn’t “2020 so they’ll find you if you’re good.” You have to put in a lot of work to get noticed. Especially if you’re not in a recruiting hotbed or at a powerhouse school that pumps out top talent.
That’s why you see a lot of the guys that play multiple sports with low rankings. The guys that don’t attend the camps. That’s why we’ve had multiple players commit to Michigan in recent seasons that didn’t even have a recruiting profile at the time. Scouts had no idea who these guys were because the recruit didn’t present themselves to the scouts.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:00 AM ^
as a farmer, that analogy was particularly relevant.
January 25th, 2020 at 11:53 AM ^
Magnus, is Damon Payne really coming this weekend?
January 25th, 2020 at 9:57 AM ^
Ronnie Bell...
January 25th, 2020 at 9:22 AM ^
1. I think we'll end up signing J.J. McCarthy, Donovan Edwards, Jamari Buddin, Giovanni El-Hadi, Rocco Spindler, and Caleb Tiernan. I wouldn't necessarily put my crystal ball on all those guys, but that's what I think right now. (I did not include the 2022 kids because it's so early for them.)
2. This is a good question, and I hope you don't hold me responsible if your son doesn't get recruited.
a. I would make a small change to DrMantisToboggan's comment above: Have your SON create the Hudl cutup, and then see if his head coach will review/edit it. That's not a responsibility that should be put on the head coach, who has a lot of other things to worry about, to go back and review ~9 games of film for one kid.
b. The cutup should have his most outstanding plays first, in order to keep potential recruiters watching. Some coaches have a "five play" rule where they'll watch five plays, and if they're not impressed, they'll move on to the next kid's highlight reel.
c. Hit up some camps if possible, whether it's a satellite camp or whatever. Just make sure some larger schools are there. You probably don't want to go to a strictly DIII camp, because they can't offer much other than academic money. Your kid can always hook up with a DIII team down the road if he wants to play in college and has any talent whatsoever.
d. Make sure your son is AGGRESSIVE when it comes to getting reps at camp, and make sure he gets reps at different positions. He doesn't have to be a jerk about it, but some kids hang back at camp, and those kids get forgotten. Coaches like guys who can translate to multiple positions, because it often depends on what they need, how his body develops, etc.
e. Be persistent about reaching out to coaches. It only takes one. I've seen that numerous times with our high schoolers. If only 10% of schools are going to take interest, it's better to contact 50 schools and get 5 responses than to contact 10 and hear from 1.
f. It doesn't hurt to work with an outside trainer, as long as that trainer has some connections. This depends on your finances, goals, etc., but kids who put in extra work often get extra results. It's even better if your son plays an additional sport, which gives him some kind of cross-training without burning out his mind and burning out the same muscles he's using for football.
Good luck!
January 25th, 2020 at 9:44 AM ^
I would make a small change to DrMantisToboggan's comment above: Have your SON create the Hudl cutup, and then see if his head coach will review/edit it. That's not a responsibility that should be put on the head coach, who has a lot of other things to worry about, to go back and review ~9 games of film for one kid.
The reason I say this is because that's what my HS coach did for me. He did it in the offseason with my position coach. I like having coach eyes be the play selectors because they know what stands out to coaches better than a 16 year old might.
That being said, I was doing this a few years before Hudl became big (I think my school started using Hudl to watch film a year or two after I graduated), and it was my coaches that had all the DVDs of our game film, so I had to go to them anyways LOL. They literally mailed DVDs for me. Sounds like much longer ago than a decade.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:03 AM ^
That’s what I figured. Times are changing quickly due to technology. At that time, though, your coaches probably weren’t doing as much with 7-on-7, they weren’t promoting their programs on social media, etc. It’s similar to what I said above to Johnny Hintz about laziness. Coaching is like sand on the beach. It might look like you cleared a space, but a wave comes in and you’re back to digging.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:16 AM ^
Yep, the social media presence of my HS is definitely new. We did have 7 on 7s but that's it. Almost scrapped with Kevin Koger and Chris Wormley when we played Whitmer, a little scrum broke out. Either would have been a bad career choice.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:59 AM ^
thank you mags, and let me try to respond to you in order, and hopefully this covers the other comments suggestions by doc and others. i appreciate you taking the time.
son has about a 6 minute hudl video he put together. i think its a good sample, playing a number of positions.
did go to a couple of camps last summer to get the lay of the land, and i remember your comments last summer about getting in reps - both older boys did that in appropriate fashion so thank you again for the tip. we are contemplating some camps this summer but of course far from decisions.
mrs. XM has taken on the roll of twitter press agent - she is all over it. now also doing it for the child behind this son, tagging coaches, keeping the volley going. he's got small colleges following him and even an ivy league school. we're just getting started on this twitter stuff.
this son has an exceptional work ethic, voted captain of team, yada yada. sat out b-ball this year because all he wants to do is lift and gain weight and prep for SAT. he will run track when that season comes.
all of this with his body changing so much, its hard to keep track of.
January 25th, 2020 at 8:56 AM ^
Thanks for posting. Great to see we’ve got some elite talent on campus. Hopefully they see a rocking basketball game with Livers return and get some good weather.
An elite 2021 class is needed.
January 25th, 2020 at 10:16 AM ^
It is a new year, Livers should be ready to go.
#YearOfTheRat
January 25th, 2020 at 8:58 AM ^
This is the most loaded in-state class I can recall, especially along the offensive line. Getting a great class this year is absolutely imperative.
January 25th, 2020 at 9:15 AM ^
Can Howard get to work on these guys too? A few assists wouldn't hurt.
January 25th, 2020 at 12:01 PM ^
Thanks Mags. Always appreciate your content.
January 25th, 2020 at 12:17 PM ^
Thunder, thank you for your contributions to mgoblog and TTB for us diehards wanting content throughout the year. I do a google search -magnus mgoblog- about every other day to read your posts. On that note, I used to do the same for umbig11.
January 25th, 2020 at 12:29 PM ^
Thanks Mangus!
January 25th, 2020 at 1:49 PM ^
Excited to see how many talk about academics, family vibe etc. Then we can proceed to finish 2nd in their recruiting, or at least that is what we will be told, as they proceed to commit at Bama, OSU, Clemson, UGA, SEC.
I used to believe the "we were a close second" in recruiting, but I think even that is a delusion. Football factory kids aren't coming here, but it seems many keep UM or Notre Dame on their list so they can pretend to have an interest in skoool.
January 25th, 2020 at 3:52 PM ^
This is a tired take. Guess what? When you offer 300+ players in a class, you're not going to successfully land all of them. I'm not sure why you're wrapped up in the 300 players that didn't commit to Michigan rather than the 25 or so each class who DO sign with Michigan.
Bottom line: Michigan is #11 in 2020 team recruiting rankings, and they're #23 in 2021 so far (the highest ranked team that has only 2 commitments at this point).
January 25th, 2020 at 4:08 PM ^
Still can't read your site on desktop, because the naked girls are in the way of the text. I do like naked girls, but they are in the way. I appreciate you want to make money. Maybe your site is designed for mobile. I don't know.
Thanks for the effort
January 26th, 2020 at 7:52 AM ^
It's not really designed for mobile, although it's mobile-optimized. I get very few reports of issues on desktop, so I think that might be unique to your browser/computer/settings for some reason.
Sorry.