Mailbag question: Recruiting question and the development of players

Eroc/Coach:

I know there have been a lot of questions concerning not getting elite talented high school recruits on defense. Although I’m in the camp of Michigan needing to go after elite defensive recruits, I’m encouraged that we have a developmental process in place unlike in the previous administration.

Take TCU defensive first-team all-american Jerry Hughes, a 2 star recruit out of high school, and South Florida’s George Selvie, also a 2 star recruit out of high school. These kids DEVELOPE and from my research WORKED HARD and LOVE TO PLAY FOOTBALL. Sounds familiar??? As much as we all want Michigan to recruit the 4 and 5 star kids, I believe you have to recruit kids who are athletic, fast, and just love to play football. I have seen 4 and 5 star recruits have terrible college careers.

With our strength and conditioning program and the emphasis on fundamentals, I believe if we continue to get athletes in the program, we will be just fine regardless of their star rating. Rich Rod has demonstrated in the past to get this type of player. We who love the maize and blue have to be patient and allow this baby to develop. I think one of the unique qualities about this staff is their ability to develop high school recruits in a college program. Just look at what they did at West Virginia. Please share your thoughts.

D. Phelps

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Thanks for the question.

We have great respect for Coach Barwis and his ability to get the most out of kids. We also have respect for what Coach Rod and his staff accomplished at West Virginia. We also are not stargazers, and realize such ratings are just one person’s, or organization’s opinion.

Here is where we disagree some. We completely agree that there are some two star and even lower rated kids who will be good football players. We just believe that there are twenty-five to thirty elite level players who have the highest ceiling and will eventually produce the best results. The term difference maker has been used over and over.

We 100% agree that a player like Wilkins could end up being a very good player, it is just that he does not have he same ceiling as say Jeff Luc.

Could Wilkins end up being a better player than Luc? Sure.

We believe it is worth the effort to get a commit like Jelani Jenkins over a Hawthorne. Hawthorne could end up being better than Jenkins, but in our opinion he does not have as high a ceiling.

One thing we would like to mention about Coach Barwis. He was the person telling us at the coaches’ clinics that in his opinion he would rather have the elite five star players because their ceilings are so much higher than say a three star player. The potential is there for those five star kids to be great, whereas three star types usually pan out to be good football players.

Also, many fans will point out certain three star kids that have succeeded over a five star kid. That is fine and maybe the three star kid never went to camps, combines, or went to a smaller school where he did not get noticed, or plainly the recruiting services just messed up. In the rankings there are probably twenty times the amount of players ranked as three stars compared to the less than fifty recruits that are five stars. So the argument is not always what it seems since there are far more three star players.

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Written by CoachBt and ErocWolverine

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