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Sunday, August 15, 2021

2021 Season Countdown: #23 A.J. Henning

 

A.J. Henning (image via ClickOnDetroit)

Name: A.J. Henning
Height:
5'10"
Weight:
185 lbs.
High school:
Frankfort (IL) Lincoln-Way East
Position:
Wide receiver
Class:
Sophomore
Jersey number:
#3
Last year:
I ranked Henning #41 and said he would be a backup wide receiver with 7 catches for 90 yards and 1 touchdown (LINK). He caught 6 passes for 59 yards and ran 3 times for 15 yards.
TTB Rating:
86

Henning was a freshman speedster last season who would have really benefited from playing a full season. A jack-of-all-trades type of high school player, he never got a chance to spend much time honing his craft of playing wide receiver. The highlight of his freshman season was a leaping catch on a jump ball for 28 yards against Penn State, but otherwise, he had a pretty uneventful freshman year. That made sense because of the presence of then sophomore Giles Jackson, a similar slot-type player with a year of experience under his belt.

Jackson has since transferred to Washington, opening the door for Henning to be the resident gimmick player, a guy who can run the ball, catch the ball, and return kicks. If his high school film is to be believed, he has very good speed, some power, and some wiggle. It will be a matter of translating those athletic skills to the college game, and hopefully a full off-season has helped with that. Michigan will probably use him in a variety of ways, but I don't expect him to start. While the Wolverines don't have any true superstars at receiver, they do have some more experienced and proven players in the forms of Ronnie Bell, Cornelius Johnson, and Daylen Baldwin, among others.

Prediction: Backup wide receiver and starting kick returner; 14 catches for 170 yards and 2 touchdowns

3 comments:

  1. I'd put Roman Wilson ahead, but call Henning 'Gallon 2.0'

    🤞🏽

    ReplyDelete
  2. Great core: Johnson, Sainristil, Henning, Wilson, Baldwin, Bell, Anthony, Dixon. Very nice hands. And speed!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I like our WR group overall but I see Henning as a potential breakout player. Agree with Thunder's take putting a nominal backup ahead of a projected starter (Sainristil). I would agree even if Henning wasn't a likely contributor on special teams.

    I do hope our fanbase can move forward from seeing flexible skill position players as "gimmicks". If that mentality extends to the coaching staff, we probably will see more cases like this offseason where our two most dangerous offensive weapons transferred. Anyway, it's so common now to use WRs as runners and RBs as receivers that I don't think it even counts as creative. If an OC is not utilizing these tools he is missing an opportunity. More specific to Michigan - Harbaugh loves using pre-snap motion to mess with gap assignments, it would be a damn shame if Michigan wasn't integrating that mentality with more modern 3-wide personnel. For the same reason we want to see Chris Evans (and perhaps now Donovan Edwards) catching passes out of the backfield, we want to see Ronnie Bell and AJ Henning attacking the edges via handoffs, tosses, pitches, and screens.

    ReplyDelete