Monday Recruitin' Utilizes Bye Week
[Googly Eyes Emoji]
STILL DON'T WATCH THIS
So.
“I’m going to take my five visits, but I just don’t know where,” Harris said. “Let’s say this: My mind isn’t set on Alabama. I’m not 100 percent set on Alabama. I’m trying to see what else is out there for me. I’m using my visits to see. As much attention as I’ve gotten, I feel like I have helped my teammates get some offers, too.”
That is the top-ranked player in the country, CA RB Najee Harris, going on the record about his recruitment for the first time in... months? It feels like months. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Chronicle dropped this pertinent bit of news in their ongoing series on Harris that mostly focuses on his life outside the lines:
Next week, when Antioch hosts Liberty, another wrinkle comes into play: Harbaugh, the Michigan head coach, is planning to attend the game, hoping he can persuade Harris to flip his verbal commitment to Alabama and play in Ann Arbor instead.
While 247's Steve Lorenz expects Harris to end up signing with Bama, he continues to believe Michigan is the school with the best chance to change that, and mentions that M's staff in fact thought they either led or were close following Harris's summer unofficial visit.
I'm still skeptical of M's ultimate chances to flip Harris, but going on the record to say his Alabama commitment isn't set in stone is especially noteworthy coming from a recruit who avoids the media and appears to be trying to keep his recruitment as drama-free as possible.
[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the roundup.]
Looking Good, Indeed
From Sam's gut to God's ears.
#Michigan looking REALLY good here... https://t.co/WfPZfNqgfV
— Sam Webb (@SamWebb77) October 6, 2016
That's regarding four-star IA WR Oliver Martin, who was one of the slew of blue-chip recruits in attendance for the Wisconsin game. While Martin has been very guarded in his praise for any school, it's clear he enjoyed his time in Ann Arbor:
"I really liked my Michigan visit," Martin said to Scout. "The big thing for me going in was being able to talk to the coaches more. I talked to Coach Fisch and Coach Harbaugh more, the wide receivers coach and head coach. I really enjoyed talking to them and liked what they had to say. I wanted to see what the game day environment was like and see how the players interact with each other. I thought it was a success. I really liked it and I connected with the staff well."
His dad, talking to Scout's Allen Trieu, was more effusive, in stark contrast to his quotes after their previous visit to Notre Dame:
"It also was another great opportunity to talk with coaches Harbaugh and Fisch. It really meant a lot to Oliver that Coach Harbaugh spent as much time as he did with him before such a huge game. The pregame was awesome. It was great to meet more 2017 commits and of course, the game was awesome."
Martin wants to take visits to Michigan State and Oregon "sometime soon" before coming to a decision.
At this point, it's tough to figure out which of M's top four WR targers is the least likely to end up in the class. I would've answered Martin a month ago; now it's probably Nico Collins, who's paid his way to visit Ann Arbor from Alabama several times.
More Wisconsin Fallout: The Wall & More
Building on what went up last week: Michigan couldn't have done much better with the OL recruits on campus for Wisconsin. 247's Ryan Bartow put in a Crystal Ball pick for four-star TX OT Chuck Filiaga right after interviewing him; it's easy to see why in the quotes:
"What really caught my eye was the game atmosphere," Filiaga told 247Sports National Analyst Ryan Bartow on Tuesday. "Being there with guys like Alex Leatherwood and Jedrick Wills too. I really liked my visit to Michigan a lot. It was amazing."
While for some reason this got posted in a different article, Filiaga also said Michigan "has an edge" after what he called his best trip so far.
Talking to The Wolverine's Brandon Brown, four-star KY OT Jedrick Wills implied the visit put Michigan right up there with Alabama and Kentucky on top of his list:
"Honestly, Michigan has jumped right into the mix with my other favorites," Wills said. "After having such a great weekend with some of my closest homeboys at U-M and spending more time with Coach [Tim] Drevno and Coach [Jim] Harbaugh, I can really see us going there and having the time of our lives while excelling on the field and while getting one of the most prestigious degrees in the country. Michigan is hard to beat."
Wills mentioned that bonding with fellow visitors Cesar Ruiz, Baron Browning, and Alex Leatherwood is what made his trip "the best." Based on the Twitter interactions between Leatherwood and Wills, that sure seems to be the case.
And, yes, for what it's worth, Leatherwood removed any sign that he's an Alabama commit from his Twitter bio following the visit.
While four-star NY OT Isaiah Wilson wasn't at the Wisconsin game, he was one of the 200-odd visitors hosted by Rutgers last weekend. TMI's Josh Newkirk caught up with him the night prior to the game, and Wilson discussed the potential for a heck of a package deal:
“Basically the ‘Fab 5’ is if we were all to commit there, me, Alex Leatherwood, Cesar Ruiz, Jedrick Wills and (Chuck Filiaga),” Wilson said. “Basically if four or five of us commit a lot of people are predicting it to be one of the best O-lines in the class.”
So, do the five of them talk about coming to Michigan together on a regular basis?
“Yeah, we talk,” Wilson said with a smile, adding more on the possibility of the Fab 5. “It’s very cool knowing that if you were to go somewhere, that you were going somewhere with a bunch of cool recruits and enjoy your time there.
The likelihood of Michigan landing all five is low; even getting three of them would make for a great haul, though, and the Wolverines are still in great shape for the likes of TJ Slaton. It's unclear how the O-line class is going to finish out; it's hard not to see it being really dang good.
Oh, and five-star 2018 IMG DT Taron Vincent told 247's Steve Wiltfong his Wisconsin visit was the best he's ever been on.
Officials Set For Tufele, Others
Four-star UT DT Jay Tufele announced he'll take his official visit to Michigan for the Illinois game. Ohio State and Utah are the primary competition; Steve Lorenz, who's optimistic about M's chances, says Washington has also moved into contention. The presence of Tony Tuioti on staff and several Polynesian players on the roster could make a big difference for M in this one.
Three-star GA FB Tory Carter, an LSU commit, set an official for the Indiana game, and he'll be accompanied by high school teammate Otis Reese, one of M's two 2018 commits. Michigan will also get one last crack at their teammate and one-time commit Aubrey Solomon, who told 247's Ryan Bartow that M is one of four schools he plans to see on an official. Solomon also said Georgia "sticks out"; it'd be a very pleasant surprise if he ended up back in the fold.
Etc.
Donovan Peoples-Jones switch his official visit from Florida to Ohio State because of Hurricane Matthew, and while I'm sure this wasn't the intention, his tweet comes off as a "thanks for playing" type of visit reaction. Even Buckeye partisans don't seem to have much faith in their chances.
Three-star AL S J'Marick Woods, a Michigan commit, took his first official visit to Arkansas and tweeted it was his best visit so far. He told Brandon Brown that he's still committed to Michigan and plans to take an official to Ann Arbor after the season.
Four-star FL WR Daquon Green, a Florida commit, plans to take one of his officials to Michigan, per Scout's Corey Bender.
While NJ WR Brad Hawkins didn't make it in the first time around, Michigan is still in frequent contact with him, and he says he's still committed to the program.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:05 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 3:20 PM ^
me too.
2 hurdles in the first clip..and I knew it was a bad idea.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:49 PM ^
And again, my eyes hurt. :'(
October 10th, 2016 at 5:39 PM ^
are easy to evaluate and would take a Leatherwood flip way before a Harris flip. O line makes the RB anyway. It's the most commoditized position on the field (other than kicker), and our last two five star backs were total disasters, while our best outcomes were with borderline three stars like Hart, Evans, Toussaint, et al when we've had good blocking.
October 10th, 2016 at 9:52 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 9:52 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 10:10 PM ^
Guessing he's referring to Kevin Grady, though I don't agree with the sentiment.
October 11th, 2016 at 11:56 AM ^
You're probably right, although the answer is Ty Isaac. Isaac hasn't met his potential yet but he is far from a disaster.
October 10th, 2016 at 11:39 PM ^
October 11th, 2016 at 8:59 AM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 3:13 PM ^
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October 10th, 2016 at 3:17 PM ^
"Martin wants to take visits to Michigan State and Oregon "sometime soon" before coming to a decision."
Couple of real happy places for football these days. Why not check out Rutgers while he's at it.
October 10th, 2016 at 4:22 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 9:53 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 10:27 PM ^
If it backfires...we will have bigger sources of depression than Martin going elsewhere.
October 11th, 2016 at 12:03 PM ^
According to MLive the rest of his top 5 is ND and Iowa (the local school). Michigan looks especially good in comparison to those 4 schools in the middle of implosion.
I'm surprised we haven't heard anything about Darboh's relationship to Martin since they are both from West Des Moines.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:19 PM ^
That was a great recruiting roundup overall but I clicked on the osu article about peoples-jones to see what they had to say and all I saw was an article that said they don't know anything followed up by a discussion about 2019 devontae dobbs who is the country's top ranked lineman and there were some distressing quotes about him knowing the osu and msu staff very well but not knowing the michigan staff at all. We have like the second largest support staff in the country, how the fuck does a top player in the country from michigan not have more contact with michigan coaches than osu coaches?
October 10th, 2016 at 3:22 PM ^
i did the same but don't worry at all about Dobbs. Signing day for him is almost 2.5 years away. Young kid that you know will be a top priority.
October 10th, 2016 at 5:04 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 3:23 PM ^
It seems to me like we are recruiting a ton of receivers and running backs when those spots can be better used for interior lineman on offense and defense. I don't doubt anything Harbaugh does, just not sure if maybe I'm not seeing something or if anyone else has thought the same. Yes we have a lot of linemen still on our board, but that's a position group where you want a lot of solid bodies.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:32 PM ^
position changes? Harbaugh has played 4 RB's this year already, could be more if Walker and Johnson are healthy. Also we've seen 7(?) receivers so far?
It seems that instead of a redshirt year, he's having a more NFL approach which is, make your way on special teams.
plus this OL class is probably gonna be at 7. How many more do you want?
October 10th, 2016 at 3:36 PM ^
Thanks, I guess I'm thinking more about the dline where there is rotation. I'd feel better about the next couple years with some more beef in the middle.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:38 PM ^
Interior d line recruiting is definetely lagging but if we get the guy out of Utah, and Onwenu flips to dt permanently as a result of a big oline recruiting class and Gary eventually slides inside it probably works itself out.
October 11th, 2016 at 3:34 AM ^
October 11th, 2016 at 11:21 AM ^
But we don't want Gary at DT (because then we don't have an anchor) and Dwumfour has proven nothing so far. I wouldn't say we're "set."
October 11th, 2016 at 11:41 AM ^
October 11th, 2016 at 12:38 PM ^
Why are you sure Hurst will be back? PFF loves him. Several "experts" predict him as a first round draft choice. If he leaves it's guaranteed that a freshman would start before he does.
Also, I doubt Dawson will get a 5th year to switch to DT. There are indications we will take 4 WRs and 7+ OL. Harbaugh is going to be looking for scholarships for new guys, making it unlikely he would use one for an experiment with a guy for one year. There is no question in my mind that he would prefer to use it on Tufele and Solomon or similar players. If Dawson comes back it will be at OG.
Re: Onwenu, Harbaugh hasn't said he will be playing OL and DL full time. He said he's capable of playing both ways and it remains to be seen how much he will play at each position. It's possible he will start at OG and play DT only in short yardage situations. (While we are looking at a large OL class, the players are all OTs - except for center Ruiz. Harbaugh loves versatility and there is talk about players converting to OG but Hall, Herbert, Honigford and Stueben are all OTs as are Leatherwood, Wills, Filiaga, and Wilson. The only OG you hear a lot about is TJ Slaton, who I believe is playing OT in HS. Freshman plus position switch isn't promising.)
October 10th, 2016 at 8:03 PM ^
the large majority of his first couple of classes saw the field early, simply out of need. Inasmuch as he only spent four years with the Cardinal, it's difficult to determine if he will continue to play true freshmen or after a couple of years, begin the red shirting and focus on building serious depth. The difficulty I see there is the level of talent. AlthoughI have to think both Bama and OSU do this, given how easily they replace such a large amount of starters each year. I hope it gets to the point where the only freshmen he plays are of the Peppers, Denard, Hart abllity. He is though RSing his qbs an his OL for the two obvious reasons.
We should see the benefits of that in about two more seasons.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:36 PM ^
You can only have so many in a class because you want about an equal amount of linemen recruited in each class. This class will have a really large group (6-7) b/c of the failures of the 2013 class and basically the ineptness of Hoke to develop solid linemen. It makes no sense to load up the class with like 10 linemen and not focus on other groups.
As for defense, Harbaugh has been focusing on them already. He's recruited Gary, Johnson, Dwumfor, and Kemp last year, and Paea, Hudson, and Vilain this year. He's looking at Tufele and Irving-Bey also and whoever else that we don't know about. Not to mention that Onwenu could also move to NT if our OL class this year is as good as we hope.
October 11th, 2016 at 12:51 PM ^
You left out Corey Malone-Hatcher. Also, as noted in this column Solomon will be taking an official to the Indiana game.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:45 PM ^
already, but zero WRs, plus talk of 5 new OL committing together.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:23 PM ^
The guy seems to know the result of every play where Harris gets the ball. Get the guy some popcorn back there.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:30 PM ^
I'm just going to leave this here.
https://twitter.com/CoachKevinBurke/status/780792883884457986?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
October 10th, 2016 at 3:45 PM ^
My bad, that was a cornerback.
October 10th, 2016 at 4:56 PM ^
I love how he trucks his own blocker before bowling over the guy he was trying to block, and the high stepping... priceless.
October 10th, 2016 at 4:54 PM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 7:43 PM ^
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October 10th, 2016 at 3:31 PM ^
duplicate.
October 11th, 2016 at 4:34 AM ^
October 10th, 2016 at 3:37 PM ^
At this point, it's tough to figure out which of M's top four WR targers is the least likely to end up in the class. I would've answered Martin a month ago; now it's probably Nico Collins, who's paid his way to visit Ann Arbor from Alabama several times.
I'm surprised that's the takeaway on Nico. I'd say he and DPJ are the two MOST likely to end up in the clase. Nico has paid his way several times to come to AA and everything you read says the kid loves it up here. If I had to guess which WR doesn't end up in the group it'd be Black and even that is a stretch. Honestly think we take all 4.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:40 PM ^
I think that's just an indication to say that DPJ, Black, and Martin are all looking great, as well. Not that Nico isn't.
October 10th, 2016 at 4:10 PM ^
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October 10th, 2016 at 3:51 PM ^
Didn't Collins say Georgia was now tied with us in recent weeks?
October 11th, 2016 at 11:15 AM ^
His dad is bananas for us, so he might've been the one doing the refuting. I think the reason for the saying he's least likely to come is due to distance and his location. He's the furthest away and traditionally it's tough to get elite talent up to Michigan (state of). Let's see what happens when he takes his official.
October 10th, 2016 at 3:39 PM ^
Can Harbaugh make contact with Harris at this time of the year or is this a no contact period?
October 10th, 2016 at 3:40 PM ^
Are we entierly sure that Jabrill and Peoples-Jones aren't part of some sort of next stage in human evolution?
October 10th, 2016 at 4:06 PM ^
There's something in the water in New Jersey. I mean, besides the usual industrial waste.
October 10th, 2016 at 7:33 PM ^
and the names are Trenton and the Detroit of the east, Newark. Many of these young men tht enroll in the parochial schools come from these two crime ridden cities. Living there alone teaches you many things, among them the importance of sound decision making and, if necessary how to protect yourself. The natural, productive alternative to hanging on the streets is to entrench yourself in sports. There is roughly one million fewer in Jersey than in Michigan, yet they have four national powers that acquit themselves very well on the field.
The Catholic League, along with the two major public schools produce almost all D1 players in MI as well. If we didn't have to split the proceeds with MSU, and lately OSU we might take about 4 to 5 extra players per year. And as it is in the south, the coaching is far better simply because they are able to have larger paid staffs which allows for far more one on one training. I am certain the recruits they were hosting Saturday were very impressed with the level of play by one of the elite conference teams.
October 11th, 2016 at 12:56 PM ^
I always wondered why so many good decisions are made there:
"Living there alone teaches you many things, among them the importance of sound decision making . . . ."
October 10th, 2016 at 3:45 PM ^
Michigan Med School >> Ohio State Med School. 'Nuff said for DPJ.
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