Concerned about DT/NT recruiting
After reading the Rashan Gary post (which was great by the way), it made me realize we are going to be dangerously thin at DT next year and the year after that. Gary and Dwumfour were signed last year and Peaea is committed this year, but outside of those three we aren't really in on any inside DL other than Greg Rogers. Meanwhile we signed 6 WR's last year, which seems like overkill. Anyone else perplexed or concerned by this?
My problem with you is exactly that. You often aren't respectful.
and I don't like you. Weren't on my radar until your childish attack on Stephen King the other day. You seem to really enjoy the drama, but as they say, that's none of my business.
With the way he criticizes the basketball team and the softball team and now Harbaugh's recruiting, I wonder how he gets out of bed in the morning. Talk about being a "glass-is-half-empty" kind of guy.
With the way you take things out of context and twist my words, I could say the same thing about you.
I can't believe I'm on the same side of this as WD. Oh, the horror.
Uh, this thread for one. I'm not criticizing Harbaugh's recrutiting. I'm expressing a minor concern over one position on the team.
I love Coach harbaugh's recruiting efforts how could you not?
Which I'd say is very debateable btw.
I'd consider Hudson a DT and don't know why you think the only DT we're in on is Rogers. I highly doubt the coaches would agree with that.
Hudson is getting recruited as an end according to Lorenz.
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Yeah, we'll be dangerously thin next year. Our entire DT/NT list will be Pallante, Mone, Gary, Dwumfour, Paea and whoever else joins him. I expect Mone and Gary will start and will be good combo on the inside. But we really need Dwumfour and Pallante to take solid steps forward this year and perhaps an immediate impact type recruit. From what Magnus and others have said, Paea may actually better suited for the Oline than defense so it is a bit concerning.
You forgot about Hurst.
Mo Hurst Less Problems
.....
I'll see myself out
Whoops. He was listed as a Sr on the michigan football roster so I assumed he didn't redshirt. Okay then it will be Hurst, Mone, Gary, Pallante, Dwumfour, Paea + ?. I expect if Hurst and Mone are there then Gary will be playing as DE next year as Brian said on the scouting report.
What happens if Hurst and Mone play extremely well and get drafted? Both will be eligible and if have the top defense in the country like many hope two supremely talented interior linemen could be projected in the first three rounds. I think its a legitimate worry that if this year goes well at least one of them will have played well enough to get themselve a high draft grade. That puts us in some serious hot water very quickly
No one is concerned about this season, but we definitely have some roster holes and questions for 2017. Honestly, I'm excited for 2017, just for a completely different reason from why I'm excited for 2016. I see 2016 as our year to chase a title and 2017 as our year to meet the kids who will be chasing a title in 2018 and 2019.
I guess that means we'll have to settle for just this year's national championship, then.
Crap. I was hoping for back to back NCs.
Harbaugh is way overrated.
paea could be a solid DL but i agree he has greater potential at OL. im sure mattison would love to mold the kid, i just think he could be a really talented OG. hes one of many dudes thatll be interesting to watch but either way hes a nice addition thatll contribute up front.
future DT and OL depth look thin and obviously must be addressed (big time) this cycle. they signed 29 recruits last year (and it was a nice haul) but just 2 DT and 3 OL - and they only signed 30 players total over the previous 2 classes ('14 and '15), neither of which were overflowing with impact players in the trenches (its tough to overstate the importance of hitting on cole and mone). imbalanced #s like that can be tricky and typically leave teams short on depth (and certainly short on experience) in certain areas.
i trust this staff to field competent, competitive squads but adding 6-7 elite OL and 2-3 promising DT this class will go a long way to helping them find the necessary bodies in 2017 and beyond
"they signed 29 recruits last year (and it was a nice haul) but just 2 DT and 3 OL."
Indeed. The "3 OL" portion is telling to me. We know Harbaugh likes the trenches and isn't going to let them dry up without a fight. And we also know that we missed out on OLs late. That's not a mistake, that's recruiting. I believe we had similar challenges closing with some DLs as well.
This is part of why the WR haul is so big, because if I recall the last one or two guys in the class were WRs. They probably could have tried to get a lower-end DT, but just having a lower-end guy on the roster with little potential to see meaningful playing time doesn't do the team any favors. I think a lot of this has to do with the adventurous process of recruiting rather than serious errors.
The WR depth chart wasn't that sexy either. They need a ton of bodies there too. After Darboh and Chesson we have....um....?
Exactly. There were big needs there coming soon.
My best guess is that after the top targets, they fill the class using a "best player available" strategy to maximize value. If you have a "value grade" of a WR that is 20% better than the nearest DT you might be able to get, you take the WR. In this theory, anyway.
With Harbaugh's swiss-army knife offense and QB-focus, I'm sure he's looking for a lot of different looks at WR at any given time. And WRs are a finnicky bunch to evaluate coming out of high-school, lots of diamonds in the dirt when it comes to WR performance at the college level, and, lots of development swings from year to year.
Also, there's at least somewhat of a chance for WRs that don't pan out to get a chance at DB.
My blind guess could be that Harbaugh's probably feeling more confident in bottom-half of the roster (particularly in the trenches) than we fans have grown accustom to feeling confident in.
I'm excited about our recruiting successes, and Harbaugh and Co. are very bright, so I'll lean on their expertise. For all we know, they are making a conscientious push to recruit extra DT/OT in this class.
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I don't think it's fair to attribute that to "Hoke's failures." Chesson and Darboh (2012) have been really good, and everyone expected Drake Harris (2014) to be a major contributor before the injuries set in. Hoke had one crappy WR class, in 2013, but that class probably would have looked completely different had Ole Miss not opened its wallet for Laquon Treadwell.
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Not to be contrarian, but given the time it takes for DLs to develop into contributors (Rashan Gary's incipient All-B1G season being the exception), it seems that it does made getting DTs earlier more of a priority. We won't be drafting Garys every year--guys have to be in the pipeline a couple of seasons ahead of time.
I negged the OP but from this standpoint there is some logic to this.
he made an impact at WR. 3 of that level out of 4 classes sounds OK to me, but it took Darboh and Chesson time to develop and Funchess left early. So you're right, that's not good. Fortunately, it looks like Harbaugh has solved the problem. As much as he loves TEs, FBs and big RBs, he's not taking Hoke's approach to recruiting WRs.
You could also say that Hoke should have had a better read on Treadwell and known that was never a legit option. That ship had sailed early in the season. If it wasn't Ole Miss, Treadwell was going someplace else.
Treadwell WAS going to play here!
But Brandon forgot that TCF Bank coincidentally closed early on signing day, and Laquon got stuck in traffic on I-94.
2017 will be an interesting year for sure considering how many players will be in their first year as a starter. Next year for us is actually kind of comparable to OSU this year, only that a lot of their best players were early entries to the draft and most of our best players are seniors.
What about OL
Nobody's above anything. "Because Harbaugh" doesn't suddenly mean that if our D-line gets injured, our defense won't suffer, in the same way that "because Belein" doesn't suddenly mean that injuries and whatever else won't stop our basketball team from going to the Final Four.
However, I think what they're saying is if we can see it from here, Harbaugh sure as hell can see it too and will be working very hard to fix it. And given his track record, he will probably manage to do so.
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| DT (4+0) | P. Paea | R. Gary | B. Pallante* | M. Hurst Jr.* | |
| NT (2+0) | M. Dwumfour | R. Glasgow*# | |||
| SDE (2-1) | S. Johnson* | C. Wormley* | |||
| WDE (6+0) |
We took 6 DL last year. We are taking at least 4 this year. Gary has positional flexibility. So do some OL. We probably need 1 recruit from the 2017 cycle to play as a Freshman. Plenty of the current 2016 class is College Sized. Other than that, we can get some sort of line together. Any worry should be disgarded due to HARBAUGH.
What happens to that chart if Mone goes pro? Or even more likely if Mo hurst goes pro. You are starting gary and he is backed up by true freshman paea? That sounds bad. You flip over onwenu who spent the previous year as a redshirt OL? That sounds bad.
If both go pro which is unlikely but certainly possible you DT, NT depth would be Gary and Dwumfour as starters with Paea and Onwenu coming off a year spent on the offensive side of the ball as your primary backups. That seems like a tenous position to be in. Though it would also likely mean our defense was as dominant as we hoped this year which would be one of those good problems to have.
Hurst probably won't go pro early, for the simple reason that he's a 282 lb DT. That's fine in college, but virtually every DT drafted into the NFL is bigger than that. Anthony Zettel was the only DT in last year's draft that was Hurst-sized, and he went in the 6th round despite being outrageously productive in college.
I do not possess the knowledge to determine your statements as accurate, or, the ramblings of a callous mad-man.
So I will just say this:
By God let your woven prophetics come to pass.
Why would you assume he's on offense next year and that he is going to be the only DT in this class?
If all our good players leave as soon as they're eligible for the draft we'll have frequent issues with depth. It's hard to prepare for every contigency. If need be, we may see more 3-4 looks or a DE or two bulk up and move inside.
We actually took 4. Shelton Johnson and Rueben Jones were redshirted from the year before. And it's unclear at this time if Jones is a LB or DE.