RB Rakeem Boyd Offered
With the plethora of offers going out I hesitated to single this one out for a post, but the kid's highlights are really impressive and we are by far his best offer to date.
According to Sam Webb this morning Rakeem already has a great relationship with coach Wheatley.
He seems to run standing straight up when going through the line. If he does that in college he will get killed. Especially in a manball offense.
you're saying his Pad Level needs work? /s
Seriously though - he's got some quicks and some serious agility...do want!
Also seems like he ran through giant holes and was 20 pounds heavier than the kids in the d-backfield that were the defacto first line of defense against him. Damn it would be hard to evaluate these kids.
He plays in Houston Texas - most likely a much tougher league than anything in Michigan.
He has very good feet at this stage. Gets them up and down very quickly and that really helps him pick through traffic and make some nice cuts (and avoid arm tackles). A bit in the same mold as Higdon. Doesn't have very good top level speed, and takes time to get up to it. He's going to struggle breaking long runs and getting to the outside at the next level, and that mitigates some of the footwork he brings to the table because his threat of breaking it outside is decreased.
He also has the body to add weight and be a powerful runner, but he currently runs really high (not just high, but straight up and down essentially), similar to Darren McFadden, but he isn't a freak of nature athlete, so he'll have to learn to run behind his shoulder pads better.
No speed=no want
Time to get some running backs that can take it to the house every once in a while
And he wasn't a big burner.
Yeah, but Carlos Brown worked out much better for us.
If Harbaugh wants him, I want him. End of story.
Kid looks like a stud, but the competition level looks pretty bad too.
He is great in the open field in that film. Good vision, good feet. Strong, fast.
I'd wanna see him do it against some real competition though. As jmdblue said above, its gotta be hard to evaluate these kids.
He plays in Houston = Real Competition
Per Rivals, it looks like he's currently got offers from Boston College, Colorado, Colorado State, Duke, Houston, Iowa State, New Mexico, Oregon State, SMU and West Virginia. When you match that with the Hudl footage, you have to wonder why some of the schools on his "interest" list haven't offered (LSU, Nebraska, Auburn, among others), because the film is very impressive.
I think Jaxpo and space coyote covered the reasons behind the lack of top-end offers pretty well, actually.
Don't see it.
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Little Brother
Don't want to sound like Fred Jackson, but this kid is much faster than Mike was.
I just like the shuffle steps he takes when faking the direction of the play. Looks like he's crushing grapes...
Also great vision in setting up his angles and getting defenders turned around.
IMO I like his film more than Falcons. Falcon reminds me too much of Justice Hayes.
But is a long strider and doesn't have top end speed. He's a notch below Michigans other running back offerees
Looks faster than Falcon and would beat Derrick Green by 10 meters in the 100.