Questions about DT: Mazi Smith and Chris Hinton
I know we are all down on the most recent DT recruiting and on field production, but Hinton and Smith were both highly rated (elite - OSU, Bama, LSU offer types) at this position of need.
I am no expert, but I understand from many football junkies that the biggest leap in production for many college football players, specifically those in the trenches, occurs from freshman to sophomore years. I thought we saw some good things out of Hinton last year. I understand we need more depth going forward, and it may just be blind hope, but is it possible that DT actually ends up being a position of strength over the next 2 years anchored by these 2?
Magnus or any other coaches / knowledgeable folk - would be interested to hear your thoughts on Hinton and Smith based on potential, practice buzz, and if indeed we can achieve the elite D-line that the playoff teams all seem to have.
Yes, it is possible.
I don’t remember hearing much about Hinton, but I do recall lots of buzz around Smith being crazy strong in the weight room. I might be mistaken, but I believe as a true Freshman he was one of the strongest guys on the team...or as much was inferred.
Well, yes we heard Mazi was strong, but Hinton played over Mazi.
Hinton played quite a bit and in some really meaningful minutes and they really liked what they saw out of him. I heard someone say in an interview after the season (maybe Nua) that Hinton is on the path to being great.
Most word on Smith was that he was super strong but had to get his technique and stamina improved. I expect big things out of both this year.
Hinton played quite a bit so he would be likely to be in the 2 deep this year. Smith did not see much time at all last year so hard to predict where he stands in the rotation.
A play comes to mind in the 2nd half of the OSU game. I remember Hinton shooting a gap and flattening the RB on a stretch play. Don't have the constitution to go back and look for it.
You remember correctly. He was one of the few guys who stood out in that game. Just like Hill and the young LB I cannot for the life of me remember the name of, he stood out against elite competition as belonging. Gives me great hope for the future, despite the outcome of the last 2 games.
I believe you’re referring to Cam McGrone. For being so young the kid looked like a vet from the get go. Excited to watch his game continue to excel
I think both Hinton and Smith will be great players. Problem is more that Michigan has no depth behind them. Your starters are likely 5th year senior Carlo Kemp and Sophomore Chris Hinton. And then only 3 players are backing up the two spots in RS Junior Donovan Jeter, RS Freshman Mazi Smith, and walkon RS Junior Jess Speight. That’s a very unproven room at this point.
Michigan’s recruited a ton of SDEs in the last couple years and it’s TBD who can legitimately help out at DT and who is sticking at SDE. I think Welschof, Mike Morris, and Kris Jenkins should be DTs. Welschof has been developing for 3 years and may be ready to get on the field. Morris probably needs another year. Jenkins is a long way to go in terms of putting on weight. So yeah, you’re really hoping our DTs remain largely healthy and some of these SDE projects pan out.
Dwumfour is still on the team. 4 DTs is better than the one we were playing with for the majority of last year
Dwumfour is a Scarlet Knight
I hate to break the news to you, but Dwumfour opted for the transfer portal and will be shooting cannons at Rutgers.
Dwumfour is at Rutgers.
Dwumfour leaving Michigan, where he was going to start and get a ton of playing time, for Rutgers has got to be one of the most hard to understand transfers yet.
I have a feeling that he was either feeling the heat from the younger guys or the coaches told him his opportunities were going to be limited.
He knew he was Dwumfour.
Yeah... His specialty (well, the thing he was pretty good at) was pass rushing with that quick first step. Nonetheless, he wasn't on the field very often in pass situations, let alone for run sets... I suspect he saw some wall writing that may have been pointed out to him.
Also, he went to HS about 30 minutes from Rutgers. Maybe he just wanted to go home.
Yeah "the"... other team.
I’d say one of those guys is a starter. Both will be on the 2 deep. Hinton is essentially a 5 star prospect
Hinton was a DE in high school so he's still adjusting to DT. He was making good strides towards the end of the season
Your problem is assuming that both players will be good to great based off their recruiting rankings. Maybe: both of them will, both of them won't, one of them will, both will be just rotational players etc....
The schools you mentioned (OSU, Bama, LSU) have 4-6 Hintons/Smiths on their roster just in case they don't pan out.
You may have missed the diary, but besides Bama the other schools have 3 to our 2.
I've never seen any of them giving a fullback meaningful snaps at DT out of desperation.
I'm still excited about both Hinton's and Smith's potential. I just wish we had more depth to allow them more time to marinate. We absolutely need production from them sooner rather than later. But I still think they can be a great interior DL combo.
We're forgetting that DT Jordan Glasgow got drafted this year. Going to miss him plugging gaps on the goal line against Wisconsin this year.
But there is another Glasgow in the pipeline right? There has to be... tell me there is :)
I'm pretty sure they make Glasgows in a lab on the medical campus. Not sure why we can't make more. Somebody write a grant.
DT - Jordan Glasgow? Huh? The only Glasgow on michigans team last year played linebacker..
Well you must’ve slept the,”WHOLE” Wisconsin game then!
The Fugitive was making a funny about lb Glasgow being asked to take on o-lineman in our goal line defenses.
He's being facetious, but early in the season they did experiment with lining up Glasgow on the line inside and it went as well as expected
Can we achieve an elite defensive line in 2020? No, I don't think so. We don't have an elite edge rusher.
Can our line be better than it was in 2019? Absolutely. And it should be, as long as everyone stays healthy.
Hinton showed flashes of playing well last year. He has the athleticism to do what he needs to do at 3-tech. He's just not consistent enough with his technique, and his strength wasn't where it needed to be. As for Mazi Smith, he's strong but from what I heard, he was just kind of a bull in a china shop. He could push people around, but sometimes he was ending up in the wrong gap and not reading the play correctly.
I think both will be better and able to play significant time in 2020 (or whenever they take the field again). Interior defensive line is notoriously hard to play as a true freshman.
I look at year 3 as the real make-or-break year, though. Freshman year most guys should be sitting on the sideline, sophomore year they get some experience and make some mistakes, and then junior year they have a chance to go nuts. After that I think most guys pretty much level off.
What do you think is needed to have an elite D-line in college football these days?
It seems Bama, LSU, OSU generally have 1-2 elite DT's with another 2 solid to good younger DT's rotating in to give starters a breather. It seem you need one or ideally 2 elite edge rushers, and they don't need as much of a breather as they tend to get taken out of a bunch of plays, or have plays run away from them quite often.
Do you think it's better to have 1 elite at every position backed up by serviceable young guys, or a line of many good players, like we had in 2016 that essentially went 7-8 deep that could rotate with minimal loss in production?
What does our recruiting look like at DT in 2021 and 2022? Are we in on any big recruits?
Well since they are DTs pretty much all of them are Big recruits ...(/rimshot)
To actually answer your question I think the answer in general is no in regard to "pure" DTs at least in '21.
We have a few 4* instate OL we are either pushing for specifically as a DT (Rayshaun Benny) or that could fit at OL or DT (Dellinger and Spindler).
In-state (Belleville) 5-star DT Damon Payne has never been high on Michigan - seems an OSU or SEC battle. -- Tywone Malone - the #56 overall player who was potentially a 2-sport get with Baseball's success seems to be trending OSU or at least not strongly to M - think we are still in the recent "top" list. Victory Vaka - top 200-ish DT just committed to Texas AM.
As with past years - with the except of Smith and Hinton - most other prospects seem to be big DE's that they must believe they can build-up to DT size and keep the agility. As you would guess this is a more uncertain proposition and not a quick fix.
This helps underscore the reason why quantity is just as important as quality with DTs and OL. Hinton seems like a smart, aggressive, talented player but he still needs time to gain size and strength. Smith has the size and strength but likely got by on that alone in high school (as most gigantic people do) and now we need to see if he can catch up with the smarts and technique. Much like OL, DT is really hard to project from HS for all of these reasons.
Frankly, it is entirely likely that Michigan has a good plan to turn athletic, intelligent SDEs into productive DTs just as effectively as finding a productive high school DT that they can teach to have the smarts/technique. The problem is that both approaches are risky enough that you can't put your eggs in one basket and that's the concern we see with recruiting.
We like those OL who start as tall/athletic TE types and become monster LTs when they put on weight. But you wouldn't recruit five of them in one class.
Good point about the lack of elite edge rusher. I do think the line will be better in 2020.
Despite losing Uche, the DEs are both strong in the run game and pushing the pocket. Development from the young DTs (and from McGrone + return of Ross) and Michigan should be very stout against the run. I'd expect they'll move from a top 25 run D to a top 10 unit.
As the run defense improves you put opposing offenses in more third and longs, and that's when Paye and Hutchinson will be able to get home by collapsing the pocket. No elite edge rusher, but two very strong guys who get there eventually.
Uche had 7.5 sacks in 2019. The team had had 36 (21st nationally). I think it's reasonable to expect Paye (6.5) and Hutchinson (4.5) both to up their sack totals in 2020. I think they'll get more out of the linebackers on blitzes as well (which were some of Uche's sacks) and make up for the lost production. I don't think it's unreasonable to predict 40+ sacks in 2020. Clemson had 46 last year in 15 games.
Our best year under Harbaugh (2016) is when we had the most depth on the d-line. We may have two decent starters, but we need depth.
I am not a football coach, but have spent a good deal of time as a college S&C coach working with football. In my personal subjective opinion few interior d-lineman, other than the truly elite are anything more than serviceable in year one. I think we saw a bit of that form Hinton at the end of 2019. Then, generally the 4-5 star types become solid to serviceable in year two, then we see them break out in year three. But, you generally don't see someone go from not playing at all and/or being a liability to being good in one offseason. The stages seem to go from not good, to serviceable, to good/great. So, Hinton is probably in line to make the jump from serviceable to good (but still probably not great). Smith is probably in line to go from not playing at all to serviceable. That's my take. So Hinton will be good but not great and Smith will be serviceable. In 2021 Hinton will be great and Mazi will be good. If we get Hinton back for a 4th year that's when we'll have two dominant DTs at the same time.
I think best case for this year would be as follows:
Carlo Kemp continues to be basically playable/a small plus against most competition and a little bit less of a liability against elite OLs.
Hinton breaks out into a legitimately good tackle poised for a monster junior year and an NFL decision.
Smith is playable but inconsistent. Can’t expect much from someone who hasn’t seen the field yet but if he could be playable and trend upwards towards being legit his junior year that would be a positive.
One of Speight/Jeter becomes viable. I don’t expect either of these players to be draftable impact players at any point in their career based on their trajectory but if one of them could just become Carlo Kemp as a junior/senior that would be at least a depth piece.
You get a playable but inconsistent player out of the pile of SDEs. Basically one of the projects you took the past two years looks promising on track to be an impact player next year.
For 2020 this is kind of a low ceiling that is going to require really strong play out of our DEs, but hopefully you get enough out of Smith/Hinton/insert SDE here to expect multiple playmakers in 2021.
I think realistically, we can be cautiously optimistic that Hinton can become an impact player along the interior of the line based on his late season performance on the field, and another year in the weight and film room.
Mazi has all the tools to be a beast in the middle, but typically players in their first season seeing the field need a little time to get acclimated on game day. I think he can contribute, but will be prone to mental mistakes and getting lost by the speed of the game on Saturday. He should be able to flash some potential based on his raw tools sporadically.
Overall if the interior positions can just "hold-the-line" and not expose the defense, that would be a reasonable expectation from this unit. I don't know that they can be the "strength" of the defense with the talent and experience we have in linebacker and DE positions, but I think it's realistic to think they could hold serve this year.
"Don't get got, and do your job" should be the mantra for the interior line this year.
Hinton was very good for a true freshman, showed everything you want to see in a rising player. He's going to make a leap in 2020. He can be very good, and Kemp can be OK: so 3 man line with Paye and Hutchinson can be very good to good depending on who's in. 4 man line with those two I'd say the same. Should be better than last year. Mazi Smith is TBD, no one knows. He was out of shape is the primary gist I get from Sam Webb, and he's tried to address that in the off-season.
Per Magnus' comment above re. lack of pass rush, we have to hope Villain arrives this year.
I think your comment on Villain is a great point, and I'd throw David Ojabo in there as well. If one of those guys (or, god forbid both) can take their freaky athleticism and put it together on the edge(s) that would drastically change the things you could do with the D-line.
Agree about Villain. I think he's the X factor on D. Magnus is right that the D Line needs an edge rusher. That was Villain's recruiting profile. If he's healthy he's an impact player people won't be expecting. Brown has usually had 1 guy that flashes the year before blowing up and could be a good candidate this fall.
Hinton will be a star. Could see the signs late last season. Didn't see Smith play.
Hinton will be a star. Could see the signs late last season. Didn't see Smith play.
Smith projects to be very good and so does Hinton...getting more depth behind them (and ideally ahead of them) is a must though.
One thing to consider regarding a sophomore leap is that Hinton and Mazi didn't get to have spring practice this year.