Michigan's poor 2007 in-state recruiting haul
Old news I guess, but looking for some sort of explanation...
Looking through the Rivals' old state and I was struck first by what a great year 2007 was for talent in the state of Michigan and then by how unsuccessful UM was at locking it down. Rivals awarded twelve four stars and one five star in the state that year, of which Michigan landed two (ranked 10th and 12th respectively).
Another surprising aspect was the number of out of state non Big Ten schools who got in on the pillaging. Of course I know Rojo shocked everyone and was assumed to be in the bad, but what about everyone else? What happened?
Edit: By bad I meant bag, although I guess bad works too...(?)
Mark Dantonio owns the state of Michigan.
Just going through the 5 star/4 stars...
1. RoJo - We all know the fia$co.
2. Dionte Allen - Unfortunate situation where the instate recruit grew up dreaming of playing for a really random school. FSU was his dream school, and although he gave Michigan the time of day, it came down to FSU and OSU.
3. Joseph Barksdale - Michigan told him his future in college would be at OT, and he wanted to play DT, so he never gave Michigan a serious look after the summer and eventually committed to LSU........where he would start late in the season at right tackle.
4. Keith Nichol - More of a spread-type QB, never seriously recruited. New Michigan would've snatched him up.
5. Darris Sawtelle - Tennessee legacy.
6. Chris Colasanti - Just a flat out loss here. PSU's LB tradition won him over.
7. Mark Dell - No Michigan offer, and upon closer inspection, not a single article from The Wolverine spotlighting him. Don't think Michigan was very interested in him, for whatever reason.
8. Cedric Everson - No Michigan offer, we had bigger fish to fry. He was a thug anyway, didn't last long at Iowa.
9. Steven Threet - lol. Michign had its QB (Mallett), so they didn't really pursue him...
10. Ryan Van Bergen - Michigan commit.
11. Taurian Washington - Not sure what the exact deal was here. Maybe just liked OSU more?
12. Martell Webb - Michigan commit.
13. Quincy Landingham - No Michigan offer.
Overall just a string of bad luck with legacies, dream schools, USC shenanigans, and perhaps some sloth from LC and co. in their own borders. This was the year where OLSM sort of became the Bermuda Triangle for Michigan recruiting. Not sure what's going on there.
Michigan was recruiting him to play at WR. At camp, he got outplayed by an unknown instate player, James Rogers, at WR. James Rogers got more love and basically replaced Washington at WR for '07 class. It was Washington's fault that he got outplayed and didn't play well at camp. Michigan basically lost interest in him.
I know their careers are not over, but how many of those guys have become real impact players, anyway?
I personally have never heard of Darris Sawtelle, Cedric Everson, or Quincy Landingham.
RoJo enough said. Has Dionte even seen the field yet at FSU? If not, it says a lot seeing how poor they have become.
1. RoJo has done fine so far, but IME seems poised for a breakout year.
2. Barksdale is an entrenched starter already.
3. Dell might have made the biggest splash of all the players, but lack of competition at his WR spot surely was a factor.
4. Steven Threet but, like, in a bad way (see competition in #3).
Several other players are probably ready to contribute this year, Including RVB, Allen, Nichol and maybe Colasanti.
"other" brian chris colasanti only went to PSU because of the LB tradition. my cousin went to high school with him and they are good friends. when he told me that was reason why he decided to go to PSU i laughed. and the sad part about it is he doesn't even play that much there. i think if he would have stayed in state and gone to michigan he would have been a more vital part to our "D" last year.
I always thought that the point on ROJO everyone missed is that USC recruited him as a WR and if I remember correctly we had him in line as a CB. I swear it was never mentioned, but I had the feeling that may have been some part of his "defection." Or maybe USC just gobbles up every 5 star known to man, there is that.
This is true. Carr & English wanted him as a cornerback. RoJo's preference was to try out as a wide receiver first.
He has looked pretty damn good at wide out thus far - Pete Carroll probably got that one correct. However, who knows what kind of CB he could have been...
had ab$olutely nothing to do with it.
is that this year seems to be shaping up similarly to 2007, except most of that talent seems to be headed to MSU. I'm not complaining, because I'd rather have a pipeline in states like Ohio and Florida, but Michigan still got one of the top two players in-state, and don't seem interested in much after that.
it still shocks me how we lost RoJo (be it money, wanting to be a wr, usc beach girls, whatever it was still nasty) a supposed 5 star Michigan lock and then immediatly replaced him with d warren from under carrol's nose who was supposedly a lock for them