In my years of collecting recruiting data Efobi might be the most controversial. On3 has him on the edge of their top-100. 247 doesn't think he's among the top 100 players in Georgia. The sites all list an offer from Georgia, which he visited plenty, as well as Penn State (also visited). But then they report he was probably headed to Georgia Tech until Michigan and Miami duked it out over the fall. We're not talking about a guy who immigrated from Africa to Montreal then hid in a New England boarding school for the pandemic—Efobi's dad immigrated from Nigeria, but Nathan himself grew up in the northeast Atlanta suburbs. They have football there. I've seen it.

Michigan jumped in last summer, and got Efobi's measurements in-person when he came up for the barbecue, at which point Sherrone Moore identified the lineman as one of his top targets. Moore's interest was shared by his former co-coordinator, as Josh Gattis made a run at Efobi around the same time. Michigan got their guy on campus for the Maryland game, and he committed a week later. Harbaugh and Moore were in-home (and sampling the Nigerian food) last week.

GURU RATINGS 

247: 6'3.5/282	On3: 6'4/282	Rivals: 6'4/288	ESPN: 6'4/280	247 Comp
3*, 85, NR Ovr #98 IOL, #118 GA	3*, 93, #123 Ovr #10 IOL, #10 GA	3*, 5.6, NR Ovr #35 OG, #81 GA	3*, 78, #259 SE, NR Ovr #32 OG, #56 GA	3*, 0.8879, #458 Ovr #32 IOL, #44 GA
3.36	4.41	3.56	3.67	3.88

Last row is my conversion to a five-star scale. Links are to profiles.

Huge disagreement here between On3, which sees a top-150 prospect, and 247, which if two-stars existed, 247 would be saying he's a two-star. This has only gotten more pronounced—247 kept him an 85 (low 3-star) when most of their 85s were bumped to 87s  while On3 doubled down, moving him from about 304 overall to the low 90s before a round of senior evals pushed that back down to 118th. ESPN had Efobi in their original top-250 for his class but promptly dropped him when Georgia did. Rivals had Efobi their #36 player in Georgia (about a 3.8-star) as of last May, then dropped him to a 5.5, then up again to a 5.6, but still 45 spots lower in the Georgia rankings than last spring.

[AFTER THE JUMP: I see why there's disagreement.]

SCOUTING

Big disagreement usually means wild card factors, and Efobi has his share. He started playing football in 7th grade, played defensive tackle through his sophomore year of high school, and apparently missed at least a chunk of his senior year with a hand injury (I can only find this discussed early in the season). He attended one camp—for Rivals—back in February 2021.

That means just one junior season at OT, when Efobi was playing both ways, to evaluate a projected guard at his college position. Georgia offered (or "offered") him after his sophomore year, but as a DT. Schools that jumped in after Efobi's junior year were looking at him for offense, and trended academic, like Vandy, Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami, and BC, though NC State and Louisville were in it as well.

This all paints the picture of a raw but intelligent prospect. 247's not Efobi's biggest fan but their profile page includes a quote from Efobi's line coach, who is:

“He honestly is just a very humble kid,. When you meet him, he’s a very easy young man to
like. As big as he is, goes out every day and practices the way he does, he doesn’t have that ego …
great teammate. The kids on this team love him. They love being out there with
him.

Though once we get past the Olu vibes there was a lot of body shifting:

One thing we talked about is he needed to get quicker going into his junior year. From sophomore year to junior year, we told him to get bigger, put on some size, so he ended up gaining close to 30 to 40 pounds. He had a lot of weight gain, so he wasn’t as quick as he was used to so one of the big things this past off-season was to gain a step as far as quickness and speed. He focused on that a lot and he’s a step ahead now of where he was last year in his quickness.”

That quote's from before the senior season that wasn't, which could mean those who evaluated Efobi as a junior are looking at a different prospect. EJ Holland mentioned the wrist injury when he got out there this fall, and was doing some mental filling in of a frame:

…it wasn’t hard to see why Moore fell in love with him on the hoof. Efobi has an athletic frame with the ability to carry plenty of weight. He’s extremely athletic with great feet. But what stands out the most about Efobi is his length, especially for an interior offensive lineman.

Holland called Efobi "still raw" both in terms of technique and physical development: "the ceiling is super high, but the floor is also very low." 247's Steve Lorenz also tacked "from a projection standpoint" onto his praise of Efobi.

That's it for the folks who've seen Efobi in person. Maize & Blue Review's Lucas Reimink did what he could with the junior tape, praising Efobi as a pass-protector and even more as a run-blocker, but in both cases only until it got to foot speed:

…great fit in any OL scheme that emphasizes a high percentage of run blocking due to his good physical strength and good pad level, which allow him to move defenders off the LOS with relative ease. This would also mitigate his weaknesses which are his marginal foot quickness/agility and marginal pass protection footwork. If he can improve upon his pass protection footwork and foot quickness/agility, he could become a Day 2 or Day 3 NFL Draft Pick.

Touch the Banner emphatically did not agree with the pad level thing nor the foot speed thing.

…decent build with an athletic lower body and a thick upper body. He handles down blocks well, latching onto defensive linemen and washing them down. Once he gets his momentum going in one direction, he can be a powerful blocker. He flashes quick feet at times, and he likes to finish blocks.

However, Efobi plays a bit bowlegged and maintains too narrow of a base at most times. He crosses up his feet and gets off balance, playing with too much of a forward body lean. This problem also exists in pass protection, where quick lateral movements will catch him off guard. He needs to do a better job of sitting down and anchoring in his stance.

Efobi described his game to Brice Marich as "nasty with some celebrations." Celebrations are pancakes.

OFFERS

Georgia's offer was probably an "offer" but Efobi had legit interest from Miami (YTM), Penn State, Auburn, NC State, Louisville, and Boston College. I think Georgia Tech was the favorite to land him before Michigan and Miami moved in. Tennessee was poking around.

HIGH SCHOOL

South Forsyth, in the Atlanta suburb of Cumming, plays in Georgia's 7A (highest) division, and fares pretty well, though Efobi is the highest-ranked recruit they've produced in Rivals' database. Some of their other 3-stars were a PSU kicker and a bunch of guys who played at Georgia Tech. It's an upscale "We moved out here for the schools" sort of district which has had to build three more high schools since 2007.

Those expansions have resolved into an absolutely brutal league. Milton is a football factory that sent 5-star DE Lebbeus Overton to Texas A&M last year. Main rival Lambert was where Ohio State got 2022 WR KoJo Antwi, while Michigan was recruiting Oscar Delp out of West Forsyth. And Denmark only opened in 2018 but is already a regional power that's sent 4-stars to Bama, Clemson, Auburn, and Tennessee. North Gwinnett (DJ Turner II), Dacula (Jalen Perry), and Grayson (Trente Jones) are all from the same geographical region and play at the same level, but they're all in different leagues.

STATS 

The AJC reports 20 solo tackles, seven for losses, and three sacks on defense in 2021.

FAKE 40 TIME

Offensive lineman but he self-reported a 40 time of 5.08 from a Rivals camp in 2021. That gets thee FAKES out of five because if someone says they run a forty over five seconds you believe them, but if they're running that at 285 pounds you do an involuntary thing with your eyebrows then try to cover it by quenching your face into something that looks impressed. He also reported a bench of 340 and 500 squat.

VIDEO

Junior year from his Hudl page:

ETC 

Played soccer most of his life. Also throws shot put and discus. His mom and David Ojabo's mom were school friends. Plans to enroll next fall. Father a Nigerian immigrant.

PREDICTION BASED ON FLIMSY EVIDENCE

If we get to bring this out for any prospect this year: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Efobi seems to have all the mental, emotional, and physical tools to be a very good offensive lineman, and will need a lot of physical and technical growth to get there. Michigan is clearly aiming for the high ceiling here, which given their history at developing players sounds like a good idea. Less experience usually means the bad habits aren't as ingrained, but also a lot more to critique about his film. I put less stock in fears about his size, even if he does swing out to tackle, because Michigan's interest spiked after they took his measurements. Also, Jake Longs are nice, but Michigan's been doing just fine with their Runyans, Mayfields, Barnharts, and Joneses.

There's a lot more development from where he is now to pressing for playing time, but Michigan also has rows of shark teeth to work through before they need him, or anyone else from this class. Projecting him inside, Efobi should go in the Herbert machine for a few years while Moore works through the El-Hadi/Crippen/Anderson/Atteberry generation who've already begun to see the field. Behind them, RS Fr Dominick Giudice (who moved to OL this fall without me noticing--thank you commenters in the Rooks Exit), 2022s Alessandro Lorenzetti and Connor Jones, and the rest of Efobi's class should expect to see jobs open up in 2024 or 2025. I think our rooting interest there is for Efobi to break through, since that would be a good sign that he's making good on that ceiling, while classmate Amir Herring out of West Bloomfield is closer to what he's expected to become. Whether he does or not will play a big role in which service comes out looking smarter in a future Recruits in Retrospect article.

UPSHOT FOR THE REST OF THE CLASS

Michigan still would like to add another 2023 offensive lineman (Henderson is a transfer with 2 years left), but lost 2/3 battles with Utah and may have just pulled out of a third last week, so this might be it for now barring a late surprise.

OFFENSE
Pos	Player	State	Stars	In a nutshell
RB	Cole Cabana	MI	4.3	Speedy receiver back
RB	Benjamin Hall	GA	3.5	Battering ram with vision
SL	Semaj Morgan	MI	3.8	Homegrown Gattis-ian slot
WR	Fredrick Moore	MO	3.7	Crafty, Roundtree 2.0
WR	Kendrick Bell	MO	3.5	Ronnie's little brother
TE	Deakon Tonielli	IL	3.9	Catchy bouncy bballer
TE	Zack Marshall	CA	3.7	1,000-yard receiver in Cali league
OG	Amir Herring	MI	4.0	West Bloomfield's interior mauler
OG	Nathan Efobi	GA	3.8	Big teddy bear
OT	Evan Link	DC	4.1	Agile OT with a Wisconsin offer
OT	LaDarius Henderson	TX	3.7	Transfer G, length to play LT
DEFENSE
Pos	Player	State	Stars	In a nutshell
DT	Brooks Bahr	IL	3.7	Lengthy grow-a-3-tech
SDE	Enow Etta	TX	4.4	Poor man's Rashan Gary
WDE	Aymeric Koumba	FRA	3.7	Long/French athletic freak
OLB	Jason Hewlett	OH	3.8	Hybrid S/OLB/DE
MLB	Semaj Bridgeman	PA	4.1	Formerly elite, WLBish
MLB	Breeon Ishmail	OH	3.5	LB/Edge tweener
CB	Cameron Calhoun	OH	3.9	Gritty not-fast playmaker
PK	Adam Samaha	MI	3.2	Local #1 kicker