Name: Ikechukwu Iwunnah
Height: 6’3″
Weight: 313 lbs.
High school: Garland (TX) Lakeview Centennial
Position: Defensive tackle
Class: Redshirt junior
Jersey number: #92
Last year: I ranked Iwunnah #79 and said he would be a backup nose tackle (LINK). He did not play in any games.
TTB Rating: 75
Michigan has been blessed the past few years by having some very good defensive tackles. The Wolverines have a couple potential first round picks in Mason Graham and Kenneth Grant, so it makes sense that a backup defensive tackle would have a hard time cracking the rotation. Graham and Grant are guaranteed snaps, and then everyone else is just going to fill in the gaps.
But this type of thing with Iwunnah doesn't happen very often: he's a fourth-year 300-pounder who has never played in a game for Michigan. When he arrived from Texas, he was going to be a bit of a project, so not playing in year one was somewhat expected. Then you think that type of guy will get a few snaps in year two, but not in his case. But surely in year three? Not so surely.
So now we're entering year four, and I don't know what to make of Iwunnah. Kris Jenkins and Cam Goode are gone, and Rayshaun Benny is the only heavy-rotation player still left behind the aforementioned Graham and Grant. Roderick Pierce will certainly play a role at nose tackle, but Michigan went after some defensive tackles in the portal and they were unsuccessful. The Wolverines were even messing around with walk-on Joey Klunder and defensive end-turned-defensive tackle Enow Etta in the spring game. Iwunnah got some snaps this spring, too, but it looks like he might be one of those guys who doesn't really play at Michigan and then transfers to a MAC school as a grad transfer, like Keith Heitzman or Wyatt Shallman or Tom Strobel. This season I wouldn't be surprised if a player like freshman Deyvid Palepale immediately steps in and passes Iwunnah on the depth chart, because something obviously isn't clicking.
Prediction: Backup defensive tackle
Interesting indeed. Big & strong DT from a football have like Texas should be a safe take ...
ReplyDeleteNot that's the importance of stocking up the trenches. You're gonna miss, so it's frustrating when RR & Don Brown eras "ignore" lineman as a recruiting priority
Remember when he was supposed to represent a sea change in recruiting approach post Don Brown? LOL.
ReplyDeleteI think this is a pretty fair assessment of the situation with Iwunnah. Unlike the pack of guys ahead of him in the countdown I think he'll have a real opportunity ahead of him to earn a rotation role in the early season. The freshman maybe coming for him but that can take time. Meanwhile he'll get a window to be a 5th DT type. When games are decided and Graham/Grant/Benny are better served on the bench than on the field, Iwunnah could be out there.
You mean when we went from recruiting tweeners to projected DTs? Yeah, that turned our defense around, and got us draft-worthy talent to go along with the occasional bust
DeleteMuch better than Bench Mason & Jordan Glasgow playing DT!
Recruiting tweeners never stopped after Brown. Nor did recruiting projected DTs during Brown.
ReplyDelete@JE
DeleteHere's some facts for you to ignore.
https://247sports.com/player/rayshaun-benny-46058238/high-school-223996/
https://247sports.com/player/george-rooks-46054746/high-school-216196/
Lighter recruits who became DTs <--- continued to be recruited, after Don Brown.
Pure DTs <--- Brown never stopped recruiting them.
https://mgoblog.com/content/hello-mazi-smith
https://247sports.com/player/christopher-hinton-89558/high-school-171713/
https://247sports.com/recruitment/taron-vincent-84437/recruitinterests/
https://247sports.com/recruitment/pj-mustipher-83921/recruitinterests/
https://247sports.com/recruitment/tommy-togiai-94058/recruitinterests/
https://247sports.com/recruitment/alim-mcneill-95143/recruitinterests/
All pursued and offered by Brown (and Mattison, who knows a little something about DL recruiting eh). Didn't land any in 2018, but certainly tried. Did in 2017 and 2019.
What you're actually mad about is that the 2017 recruiting class (including Aubrey Solomon and multiple others projected to DT) didn't pan out. Brown didn't take a bunch of big bodies just to have them (like, uh, Ike Iwunnah) in either 2018 because his defense didn't require them, and...he already had them on the roster. Adding 2 star freshman NT to replace Bryan Mone on the 2019 roster wasn't going to help - even with two future NFL DTs in Hinton and Smith.
Unfortunately, sometimes shit happens, your DL coach fails to do his job and quits, and you're stuck trying to make lemonade out of Carlo Kemp, MIke Dwumfour, and Donovan Jeter. Not for lack of trying or poor strategy, despite your insistence.
You didn't like the results so you made up a dumb theory that is easily blown up by facts. But I know you don't ever let those stand in your way.
Also fun fact about Iwunnah is that he was 275 in his recruiting profile. Don Brown/Gregg Mattison took 5 DL prospects bigger than him in the 2017 class. The entire premise of this theory is a fantasy.
Delete2016: Brown joins team and inherits Mattison (top 5 DL coach nationally), an elite and deep DL, Bryan Mone with 3 years left of eligibility, and a class of Dumfour, Gary, Kemp.
2017: Recruit a giant DL class including a 5 star DT, that Mattison fails to develop before quitting after 2018.
2018: Mattison/Brown failed to recruit a big DL class or land any impactful DTs in part because of the returning roster and 2017 class. Tried hard to recruit big DTs but didn't succeed.
2019: Brown suffers though a horrible year at DT after Mattison, Mone, and Solomon split and Dwumfour and Jeter fail to develop or live up to hopes. Goes out and recruits two NFL DTs who start on the 2021 big ten champs but gets fired before coaching them.
Obviously any fool can see here that the issue with Don Browns defense was that he didnt try to recruit true DTs and Ike Iwunnah was a game changer for the program LOL. True only if you ignore all the DTs he recruited, ignore Ike Iwunnah being a 275 pound recruit without much talent who never made any impact at all -- in part because he was playing behind the guys Brown recruited ahead of him. LOL
Who's ignoring anything? We discussed Brown's DTs last summer, and I was right: his model for DL was a tweener. His guys (minus Hinton/Mazi) were mostly DE/DT types, where recruiting services did not agree on where they fit best, MGo gave them a "wait & see" and we got railroaded while still lacking a pass rush ... that you concede 2o18 only supports my point, and helps explain how Mason and Glasgow played DR against B1G competition with disastrous results
DeleteAs soon as Brown left, we started recruiting pure DTs who projected at DT, and in numbers sufficient to allow for depth and occasional miss (Ike)
That's it, the whole story
The guys he recruited with the exception of the guys he recruited ....
DeleteOK
Brown put a bunch of DTs into the NFL and he even played some of them at DE (e.g., Wormley). Some of them were tweeners and some of them were "pure". Just like with the next 2 DCs.
He tried to recruit a pack of big pure true DTs in 2018 which disproves your terrible theory JE. Plus Dwumfour, Solomon, Smith, Hinton and more.
You're lying to yourself but only you are fooled by you. Sorry about the facts.
DeleteNO
The gap year you acknowledge hurt. The focus on tweezers outside of 2019 hurt. Combined, we got stuck with Fullback & walk-on Safety playing Defensive Tackle
Pretending otherwise is a fool's errand
The Jordan Glasgow/DT thing is overblown. He lined up at "DT" a little bit in certain packages, which was more of a mistake by Don Brown than anything. Sean McKeon wasn't a running back but lined up there once.
DeleteMichigan had the following 300-pounders on the roster in 2019 when Glasgow lined up "at DT":
Chris Hinton (303)
Mazi Smith (305)
Phil Paea (302)
Zero of those guys were on the field as Michigan played Kemp, Paye, Hutchinson, and Jeter. Paea was a junior at that point, and the other two were freshmen, but highly recruited freshmen. Michigan could have put bigger bodies on the field if they wanted, but they didn't.
That's a play calling/defensive design thing that's on the coaching staff, not a recruiting failure.
three 3oolbers is a problem, and proved to be a costly one. Especially since one was an out of his league Guard (Paea), and two were TRFr who were not ready
DeleteThis is about Brown's preference. Paea couldn't move or provide the push for a DBrown pass rush. Neither could the two youngsters ... that left him with experiments like Mason & Glasgow - a problem
Let's look at context though. In 2o19 we had three 3ooLb DTs. Last year we had SEVEN, and two right on the line of 3oo ... but last year was special. This year we head into the season with FIVE, and two right at the line of 3oo, even that has us "concerned" with DL depth
Going back to other "better years" and we had three in 2o18 but three more right under 3oo ... in 2o11 we had four over 3oolb and another two hovering around there
In other words, size matters on the DL, and depth is needed to compensate for injuries and guys who aren't panning out or aren't ready. Two TrFR and a Guard is a travesty, and leads to Mason/Glasgow
The gap year in true DTs (2018) wasn't a strategic choice or a desired outcome. PERIOD! Exclamation point.
DeleteAnyone asserting this is lying -- and the proof to the contrary is in the recruiting links above. Brown's PREFERENCE was to get Alim McNeil. McNeil, and a bunch of others like him were offered. You offer the players you want. Brown's PREFERENCE was to have guys like Mone and Hurst and Mazi and Hinton. But he and Mattison didn't land who they wanted to land in 2018.
It wouldn't have been a problem either (rarely do you get everyone you try to get), as long as the massive 2017 haul panned out. That class had 5 guys who projected inside and would go on to be 300 or over, as could have been expected.
1. Aubrey Solomon true DT who ended up at 325 at Tenn.
2. Donovan Jeter who played DT in the NFL at 325.
3. James Hudson who plays at 313 in the NFL (albeit on OL not DL)
4. Deron Irving Bay who played DT at 349 at Ferris State.
5. Phil Paea was the smallest of them at 303 while playing DT for Oklahoma.
The fact that NONE of those 5 got developed into contributors by 2019 was the far BIGGER problem than failing to land DTs in 2018 (again, not by choice). Jeter took years, Solomon and Hudson transferred dramatically, Mattison failed and bailed, none of the others were impact players, etc.. 2018 exacerbated this problem, but again that was a problem not with who you chose to recruit but inability to close on the guys you were TRYING to get.
If there's a lesson in this it's that grasping at straws like Paea and Iwunnah doesn't fix the issue. Size for size sake...doesn't work. You gotta get people who can play. Getting a TRUE DT doesn't help if dude can't play. Especially in the Portal era when there is more need for high ceiling guys with upside than filling out the lower ends of the depth chart.
The issue was never approach it was execution. Which is why recruiting Iwunnah was never a significant indicator of anything. Don Brown wanted 300+ pound DL. That's why he recruited them.
Anyone asserting against these demonstrated facts is lying to themselves, especially years after the fact when Iwunnah has been a non-factor while the guys on the roster previously are NFL DTs.
Asserting that Brown's preference was to use Mason and Glasgow is comical. Laughable at face. But on it persists, between spitting out sand.
It's true that Michigan could have played bigger freshman DT instead of Kemp and Mason. They didn't feel like that was a good option - which holds up since Smith and Hinton were still not very good players as sophomores in 2020.
DeleteThunder's words between 2020 and 2021 "Unfortunately, it’s been some slow going with Smith and Chris Hinton, Jr. Smith played in a couple games in 2019 but didn’t do much, and last season he made just 3 tackles in five games as a backup." Hinton was even less effective his first 2 years on campus, which is not unusual for interior linemen.
Size for size sake doesn't work.
So you're saying he failed ... weird flex, but okay
DeleteYou're lying to yourself on 2o17 Lank. Jeter, Hudson, Bay and Paea all had mixed projections from the Recruiting Services & your MGo guys ... they were tweeners. Listing their weight (as OL, playing other than for MICHIGAN) is ... misleading at best
Who said Mason & Glascow were preferences at DT? We got STUCK with them. Keep reaching
Stop with the strawman. 3oo is not THE qualifier. The guy at your local Planet Fitness isn't going to cut it. We need - and now receipt for - pure DTs (and depth). Recruiting only one true DT in 17 killed us in 2o19
They were projected to DT and they played DT. You called them tweeners because you want to believe a lazy dumb narrative. Even when it's comical in hindsight (Iwunnah is a strategic game changer! LOL) you stay the course.
DeleteNot the first time, won't be the last. dumb it down for yourself Jelly. Only you believe you.
But go off on how James Hudson moved to OT as if that somehow proves your point (nevermind how big that "tweener" ended up LOL).
projected by whom? We did this last year liar - I mean Lank - and it didn't work out for you ... ea recruiting site & MGo had different projections. Here's one example:
Deletepaea was somewhere between OL & DL (tweener)
hudson too (tweener)
irving- bey was just a lineman (tweener)
jeter too (tweener)
malone-hatcher (Edge, not Tackle)
only solomon (tackle) & Villain (edge) had definite positions. The rest had mixed projections, meaning a lot of development growth & time was needed. By 2o19, a Fullback & walk-on Safety were lining up in their stead
https://www.on3.com/teams/michigan-wolverines/news/michigan-football-recruiting-2017-class-recap/
the abuse continues