commitment posts
2018 recruiting
aidan hutchinson

Hello: Aidan Hutchinson Comment Count

Ace


The word "lanky" comes to mind. [Isaiah Hole/247]

Michigan added a legacy to the 2018 class this evening when four-star Dearborn (MI) Divine Child DE Aidan Hutchinson, son of All-American defensive lineman Chris Hutchinson, committed to the Wolverines over the likes of Louisville, LSU, and Michigan State.

Hutchinson is Michigan's third commit in the class, joining IN OG Emil Ekiyor and GA S/OLB Otis Reese.

GURU RATINGS

Scout Rivals ESPN 247 247 Comp
4*, #16 DE,
#202 Ovr		 3* WDE 4*, 83, #11 DE,
#94 Ovr		 4*, 93, #5 SDE,
#97 Ovr		 4*, #9 SDE,
#205 Ovr

It's still early in the 2018 evaluation process and Hutchinson is a prospect who requires quite a bit of projecting from a physical standpoint, so it's not a big surprise to see a significant split in his rankings. ESPN and 247 both consider him a fringe top-100 prospect; Scout has him as an early four-star; Rivals considers him the #14 prospect in the state—in a down year compared to 2017, at that. Rivals' Josh Helmholdt had a positive evaluation of Hutchinson after yesterday's Best of the Midwest Combine, so we could see these rankings tighten up before long.

Hutchinson is listed anywhere between 6'4", 227 (Rivals) and 6'6", 245 (Scout). He told The Wolverine's Brandon Brown this week that he's at the high end of that range and may still be growing. When he fills out, he should land at strongside defensive end, though if he gets much taller he may merit a look at offensive tackle.

[Hit THE JUMP for scouting, video, and more.]

SCOUTING

A nice thing about legacy recruits with early offers (LSU was Hutchinson's first): people actually scout their junior year. Scout's Allen Trieu liked Hutchinson's ability on both sides of the ball in Divine Child's game against Robichaud last August:

For Divine Child, the top ranked prospect on the team is defensive end Aidan Hutchinson. He played offensive line and moved inside on defense some too. He was impressive on the offensive line. He was physical and aggressive. On defense, he showed a good motor, hustled down a couple plays and had a few tackles at or behind the line of scrimmage. He has a good frame and is going to be able to add a lot of weight still. He looks like a strongside end to me at the next level, but it will depend on how his body continues to develop. Good athlete, good, tough, football player as well.

The Wolverine's Brandon Brown caught him in action a couple weeks later and focused on the physical development Hutchinson needs to make:

Physically, Hutchinson is still maturing especially in his upper body. Hutchinson just turned 16 a few weeks ago and is still filling out in his shoulders and chest. He's got long arms and, even though he is still bulking up, he has a lot of natural strength in those arms. During the game he didn't play much on defense because of the score but on offense he was able to show his strength and really used the leverage in his long frame to put a lot of defenders on the ground. He has a good motor and really runs well for a young defensive end prospect.

In terms of areas to improve it really comes down to physical maturation for Hutchinson. His lower body is starting to look thicker and stronger but his core and upper body still needs to catch up a bit. Once it does, he will really be a force with his natural athleticism and work ethic.

ESPN has an undated underclassman evaluation on his profile:

STRENGTHS: Tall kid with an excellent frame and a muscular build. Uses his long arms well to keep blockers at bay and has the strength to hold at the point of attack. Demonstrates a high football IQ and knows where the play is going. High motor kid who fights through the whistle and looks to punish opponents. ... AREAS OF IMPROVEMENT: Not overly explosive and lacks the speed to consistently get around the edge. Will need to hit the weights in order to fill out his ample frame with functional strength. ... BOTTOM LINE: Hutchinson is a big, strong kid who plays with a relentless motor. He's not going to win any track meets, but this is prospect who should develop into an effective strong-side defensive end at the next level.

Some variation of "high motor" is appearing with great frequency.

We got more information on Hutchinson yesterday, when he was one of the standouts at the Best of the Midwest Combine. Josh Helmholdt had been a relative skeptic; he started coming around on Hutchinson's potential:

Considering his extensive offer list, I had been underwhelmed with Hutchinson in previous evaluations. Monday, though, was easily the best I had seen from the three-star defensive lineman. One of the key improvements for Hutchinson over last season is that he has reshaped his frame and is now filled out and strong to go along with great height and length. That has noticeably helped him at the point of attack, and he also looks more explosive. Put that combination together and you start to see why his offer list has expanded rapidly this winter.

Trieu had a brief but encouraging note:

Aidan Hutchinson shows good athleticism and bend for a kid that's 6-foot-5. He has gotten bigger and stronger as well. 

"Bend"/flexibility can be a major issue for players of Hutchinson's size, but he looks like a relatively fluid athlete on film. He's even got a naturally low stance, which could be the product of growing up as the son of an All-American defensive lineman. 247's Steve Wiltfong noted that Hutchinson "looked dominant at times" while lining up at both tackle and end.

OFFERS

Hutchinson holds offers from Louisville, LSU, Michigan State, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Boston College, Minnesota, Syracuse, Toledo, Vanderbilt, and Wyoming. He visited Notre Dame yesterday but hadn't added an offer before he decided to end his recruitment.

HIGH SCHOOL

Divine Child made the state semifinals in Michigan's Division 3, losing to eventual champion Orchard Lake St. Mary's. According to the Rivals database, which goes back to 2002, lists only one FBS commit from the program: two-star 2017 OT Liam Soraghan, who signed with Northern Illinois. According to the Bentley database, Michigan has had five football lettermen from Divine Child, most recently OT Tom Dohring, who was on the team from 1986-90.

Despite the lack of history there, Hutchinson isn't the only Divine Child prospect on the radar in 2018. Three-star QB Theo Day already holds a couple Big Ten offers, including one from MSU.

STATS

None that were readily available.

FAKE 40 TIME

Hutchinson has a SPARQ-verified 5.11 40-yard dash, which gets zero FAKEs out of five.

VIDEO

Junior highlights:

Sophomore highlights and single-game reels can be found on his Hudl page.

PREDICTION BASED ON FLIMSY EVIDENCE

Since many 2018 prospects need scare quotes to describe the state of their commitment, it's worth mentioning that, as an in-state legacy recruit, Hutchinson is more likely to stick to an early pledge than most.

Hutchinson should slot in as a strongside end when he gets to campus in 2018. He'll almost certainly need a year or two to bulk up before he's ready to see significant time, by which point he'll compete for snaps with Carlo Kemp and the handful of SDE/DT types Michigan took in the 2017 class.

UPSHOT FOR THE REST OF THE CLASS

I feel comfortable putting two things about the 2018 class here: it'll be relatively small compared to 2017 and it'll have Aidan Hutchinson in it.

Here's the class as it currently stands:

Comments

Mercury Hayes

February 21st, 2017 at 9:33 PM ^

Interesting to see this new-fangled Divine Child pipeline. I can't ever remember them being good. I don't remember them being bad, but always overshadowed by other Catholic league teams like Brother Rice, Catholic Central, OLSM, and Warren DeLaSalle.

They haven't had a lot of college football players, but if memory serves, MSU had a kicker from Divine Child in the past few years. Of course, in that game Treau scouted - there is one notable Michigan alumn. Dearborn Heights Robichaud is home to Tyrone Wheatley Sr.

Joined: 08/18/2010

MGoPoints: 9215

JohnnyV123

February 22nd, 2017 at 9:41 AM ^

I went to Divine Child so yeah, fun facts time.

Gary Danielson went to school there. Funny enough, he was on the football team as a freshman when my dad was the senior starting running back, and back then they made the last string (which Danielson was) wear pink jerseys and move all the equipment and what not.

The 2004 class sent two players to Michigan State. Kicker Todd Boleski who ended up as a long FG and kickoff specialist and tight end walk on David Lesmeister who caught some passes but left the team when he didn't get a scholarship after his first or second year.

That is really all I know about the football talent, but my  2005 class was very good at baseball. Three pitchers from that class alone earned college scholarships and the fourth pitcher probably could have but he took a scholarship in golf and last I heard was sort of on the fringe of being a professional. The one pitcher, Chris Rusin, made it to the MLB with the Cubs and gave up Ichiro Suzuki's 3000th hit.

Joined: 04/08/2011

MGoPoints: 1007

CoverZero

February 22nd, 2017 at 3:05 PM ^

Back in my day (late 80s) .... DC was the best program in our Catholic league division.  We played them every year.  They sent 2 big Tight Ends to the B1G, neither of whom ended up doing much college.  I think one was named John Filliatrau or something like that.   I had the pleasure of having to cover both of them in my junior and senior seasons....and I shut both of them down.  Zero catches.

EDIT:  It appears that Filliatrau is their current HC...

Joined: 08/30/2014

MGoPoints: 14571

Every Roh Has …

February 21st, 2017 at 9:53 PM ^

Although they haven't sent (or produced) many football recruits to Michigan recently, as Ace noted, they are pretty traditionally a baseball power. Notable DC guys who went on to star at Michigan include Patrick Biondi and Alan Oaks (Oaks was the one who hit the walkoff bomb to beat David Price/Vanderbilt as a freshman about a decade ago, and then became a pretty good starting pitcher by his senior year). 

Joined: 11/29/2010

MGoPoints: 698

getsome

February 22nd, 2017 at 10:29 AM ^

you know the staff appreciates his motor, the kid appears to go all out on tape.  his size and how he develops obviously will play a huge part in where he ends up playing and the impact he makes - he should be an interesting player to follow, whether its one of the spectrum at 6'4" 250 lbs or the other at like 6'6" 300

Joined: 09/07/2013

MGoPoints: 7383

160 IQ

February 22nd, 2017 at 12:52 AM ^

Great pickup.  Welcome to Aidan!  Quick player, great motor.  Not long arms.  With some bulk should be a nice strong side.  Great to see a legacy player.  Dad has to be ecstatic.  Go Blue!

Joined: 06/26/2016

MGoPoints: 5992

Mongo

February 22nd, 2017 at 8:16 AM ^

Film is much more athletic than his forty time. Quick first step shows strong technique. Plays like his Dad but taller / longer. When he fills out and adds even more lower body explosiveness, has very high ceiling.

Joined: 06/25/2016

MGoPoints: 9585

OkemosBlue

February 22nd, 2017 at 8:42 AM ^

It would be great for him to follow in S. Hutchison's footsteps and become an all american guard or tackle! Obviously it would require him to gain a lot of weight and strength, but that's probably true whereever he plays.  

Joined: 01/15/2016

MGoPoints: 355

Kevin13

February 22nd, 2017 at 9:29 AM ^

and the kid appears versatile being able to play both sides of the ball. Definitely needs to bulk up, but has another year of high school an probably a RS year at UM to do that. Welcome to UM!

Joined: 01/26/2016

MGoPoints: 16040