cj stroud

Things discussed:

• Recruiting is #1: Should Ohio State fans be freaking out? Well yeah, because Michigan has Ohio State's class.
• Why are centers underrated? High schools can't waste beasts at center, and Wonderlic scores don't come out in college recruiting.
• Jerod Smith: How that all went down. How committable were his Georgia and Alabama and Tennessee offers? Pretty committable.
• I'Marion Stewart is their #1 WR since the July camp. Marquise Lightfoot is turning into an elite, good to have Stewart at his school in his ear but that one's an uphill battle.
• The three transfers: Those are all depth chart things after spring. NHG was still hurt. Henning is a loss but there were other guys doing that and he wasn't going to be getting many targets. Moten really fell off a cliff last year, and if he's behind Quinten Johnson and Zeke Berry, it wasn't happening.
• NFL Draft: Don't like the quarterbacks.
• Seth thinks teams are going to pass on QBs and take the personality gamble on Jalen Carter. Everyone agrees he's the best player in the draft, but even Georgia coaches are saying they won't miss him: Todd McShay has 7 sources.
• Brian: Ignore these quarterbacks, all of them are going to be failures.
• CJ Stroud: Every time he opens his mouth it's like stop talking. Michael Vick and Deshaun Watson are the guys you model yourself after? Losing to Michigan doesn't define me? You're a football player not a test taker? Dude!
• All I'm hearing there is Georgia coaches are going to bad mouth their own players at the draft; seems like something the recruits should know about.
• Can the Lions trade down and get Devon Witherspoon lower? Only if the QBs fall down to 6th and someone wants to trade up five spots to get one.
• Wolverines in the draft? Mazi Smith doesn't have the pass rush to be in the 1st round but solid 2nd rounder. DJ Turner on the other hand could make it. Seth: there's a pretty tight group of CBs and they're all in a pretty solid order so that run could happen in the 1st round or 2nd. He's got a really high floor and some team is going to see the ceiling too, because his one issue is he's too slight.
• Here's the Brett Kollman video I referenced.

[Hit the JUMP for the player, and video and stuff]

Baker back? Interesting roster development for basketball after last night's Toledo game:

We’ll see what happens,” said Baker on if he would apply for a sixth-year.“Potentially.”

“Absolutely,” he said on if he would come back to Michigan. “If I got it, I’m back here.”

Baker played a total of 18 minutes as a freshman; bizarrely these all came in late February or later. Usually this would not be grounds for a redshirt, but who knows these days. The NCAA is in its Security Guard Meme phase. It could happen.

Grimace dot emoji. Sam Vecenie's latest Big Board has Jett Howard 20th and Kobe Bufkin 24th. Hunter Dickinson is 83. No commentary on any of them, so nothing to quote. But maaan this thing where the NBA grabs Michigan players before they have their AA-type season is getting old.

The guy who did the thing, nope. DJ Turner ran a 4.27 40 at the NFL combine, which is sort of impressive:

Michigan CB DJ Turner (5-11 178)

38.5 vert
10-11 broad
4.27!!!!

Big time day.

— Nick Baumgardner (@nickbaumgardner) March 3, 2023

The Athletic had a piece on guys who rose and fell based on said combine and DJ Turner did not come up at all. I mean… I think… he's a corner? Right? One Michigan player did show up:

A lot of tight ends had big days, including Darnell Washington, who put on a show that will only help fans of his game build a case for his value and potential as a receiver. Sam LaPorta is an all-around football player that does a lot of things well and had a great day of testing. And even a prospect like Luke Schoonmaker continues to become more interesting because he’s a tight end who has shown he plays in-line and his testing numbers hinted there might be more to tap into as a receiver.

And fair enough:

Luke Schoonmaker is a TE prospect in the 2023 draft class. He scored a 9.75 RAS out of a possible 10.00. This ranked 26 out of 1020 TE from 1987 to 2023. https://t.co/Jd1VNkpNhF #RAS pic.twitter.com/chng7ofvKI

— Kent Lee Platte (@MathBomb) March 5, 2023

Ben Herbert hive grows ever stronger. Rivals has a piece on Turner and Mazi Smith moving up in draft evaluators' eyes. If Smith blows it out of the water at pro day—which is likely—he'll move up further.

[After THE JUMP: CJ Stroud and words: never again.]

It's rivalry week. The biggest game you've waited all year for is finally here and it is a clash of the titans, 11-0 vs. 11-0. Michigan and Ohio State. To get things going we're starting on the offensive side of the ball, where the Buckeyes have a great unit and a number of familiar faces from last season. 

The Film: Ohio State has played a couple really good defenses this year and I wanted to focus in on the latter half of the season, which brings to mind Penn State and Iowa. Of the two, Iowa is definitely the better defense but unfortunately that game was a bit unusual, with Iowa's already-bad offense turning in an all-time horrible performance and gifting OSU exceptional field position on the majority of their drives. It is difficult to extrapolate much from a game in which the offense you're charting is starting every drive at the opponent's 25 yard line. So, I felt that Penn State was the more useful one to use, although I watched the extended highlights of the Iowa game as well as the most recent contest against Maryland and drew clips from both. In addition, I charted the Rutgers/OSU game back during Rutgers week and have some clips leftover. In other words, a lot of film went into this evaluation. 

The personnel: Click for big or here for PDF. 

The Buckeyes again sport one of the top offenses in the country, but the diagram is far less intimidating than last year's DEATH MACHINE diagram and the SP+ numbers back that up- their rating at the time of The Game last year on offense was 47.2, while this year's is 44.0. Last year they were 1st by a wide margin; this year they're fourth behind Tennessee, USC, and UCLA. 

At QB we see the return of CJ Stroud for what is all but certain to be his final home game in the scarlet and gray. Stroud has completed another very good season and is among the foremost contenders to win the Heisman Trophy in a couple weeks. He has completed 66.4% of his passes for 9.7 Y/A, 35 TD to 4 INT. When the season concludes, Stroud will most definitely enter the NFL Draft and should be picked in the top ten slots, possibly as high as 1st overall. 

The RB position is littered with question marks and injuries, as it is for Michigan. Miyan Williams has been their best back this season, a hefty bowling ball that requires several men to be brought down. The problem has been the injuries, which have limited him throughout the year. He missed the Michigan State game, returned to get 10 carries against Iowa, then got hurt again against PSU (2 carries). Williams returned the following weekend to shoulder a sizable load against Northwestern and Indiana, but then was carted off against the Hoosiers and did not suit up against Maryland. There is optimism he can go against Michigan, but we will largely be in the dark about him until there is further clarification. 

Last year's primary starter TreVeyon Henderson is back at RB, but his stock has fallen some, with injuries contributing to him losing his star. Henderson's YPC is down a full 1.5 from last season and after sustaining an injury at the end of October, has played just one of the past three games. That was last week against Maryland, where he put up a dismal first half effort on the ground (more of an impact in the receiving game) before exiting and being seen on the sideline in a walking boot. When healthy, he's a lightning fast north-south runner, but he is likely not healthy whether or not he plays in The Game. Your author is higher on Williams because of his ability to break tackles but it's reasonable to assume that, like Michigan, neither RB will be 100% even if both play. 

The injuries to both Henderson and Williams have forced Dallan Hayden into the limelight, a true freshman who was just outside the top 250 of the composite. Hayden has filled in a fair bit this year with the injuries but got his chance to shine against the Terps and took advantage of it. If Williams and Henderson cannot go, Hayden will be next man up to get a lot of the carries. 

[AFTER THE JUMP: Ohio State's next receiving MUTANT]