Myles Sims, Wolverine

Myles Sims, Wolverine


April 7, 2017
Myles Sims

Myles Sims (image via Hudl)

Atlanta (GA) Westlake cornerback Myles “Spider” Sims publicly committed to Michigan on Friday. He picked the Wolverines over offers from Clemson, Florida, Florida State, Georgia, Georgia Tech, LSU, Notre Dame, Ohio State, and USC, among others.

Sims is 6’2″, 173 lbs. He claims a 4.73 forty.

RATINGS
ESPN: 4-star, 80 grade, #17 CB, #211 overall
Rivals: 4-star, #8 CB, #51 overall
Scout: 4-star, #11 CB, #80 overall
247 Sports: 3-star, 88 grade, #38 CB, #389 overall

Hit the jump for more on his commitment.

Sims was offered by Michigan in May of 2016. Things really heated up after he visited campus in March of 2017, and he came away from that visit rumored to be a silent commitment. Though he fielded offers from numerous big-time programs, it was the Wolverines who stuck out to him.

Sims is the tall, lanky cornerback that Michigan has come to favor since Jim Harbaugh arrived in Ann Arbor. He uses that length to disengage from blockers well, and it also allows him to stay attached to receivers and break up passes that shorter corners may not. One of his biggest strengths is his ability to locate the ball in the air when in man coverage. He does a good job of reading the receivers’ routes and eyes, and then he reacts appropriately, getting his head around to make a play. Sims is willing to be physical in the passing game and against the run, though his slight frame needs to be reinforced through strength training. You can see in his highlights some plays he makes against Cartersville High School and quarterback Trevor Lawrence (Clemson), whom I ranked as the #1 QB Michigan has offered in 2018 (LINK); look for the plays in which there’s a giant “C” at midfield.

On the negative side, Sims plays a little high at times and can have trouble changing direction. He needs to improve his backpedal. He needs to add strength in order to tackle Big Ten running backs and receivers, and he will need to learn better man coverage technique in order to prevent receivers from getting clean releases. He also lacks top-end speed, though he does have good leaping ability to make up for some slight athletic shortcomings.

Overall, I probably agree with ESPN most closely, with Sims looking like a top 200-ish prospect. Channing Stribling appears to be a good approximation, as Stribling was also athletically limited in some ways, but he was still able to play at a high level despite that fact. Good size combined with a decent modicum of athleticism makes for a solid cornerback with this coaching staff.

Michigan now has four commitments in the 2018 class, as Sims joins Indiana OG Emil Ekiyor, Georgia LB/S Otis Reese, and Michigan DE Aidan Hutchinson. The Wolverines have been making inroads in the Peach State over the past couple recruiting cycles, landing Reese, Aubrey Solomon, and Kurt Taylor.

TTB Rating: 81 (ratings explanation)

21 comments

  1. Comments: 9
    Joined: 4/5/2017
    MgoDude
    Apr 07, 2017 at 2:38 PM

    How would you compare Sims to St. Jesuit? Both tall corners that the staff love.

    Obviously the TTB rating will be a way of comparison. But I was curious on your thoughts till you update the 2017 ratings.

    • Comments: 3844
      Joined: 7/13/2015
      Apr 07, 2017 at 4:00 PM

      Sims isn’t quite as physically mature as St-Juste, who’s also taller. I think Sims has the superior ball skills, though.

  2. Comments: 6285
    Joined: 8/11/2015
    Lanknows
    Apr 07, 2017 at 3:46 PM

    That offer list is more along the lines of a blue-chipper than a top 200 guy.

    Exciting to see Michigan get a Plan A guy in this class, particularly so at a position where elite recruits haven’t been plentiful.

    The Stribling comp is encouraging.

    Keep the DBs coming! We need more.

  3. Comments: 1356
    Joined: 8/13/2015
    Roanman
    Apr 07, 2017 at 3:54 PM

    Funny to see the Lions logo on a high school football field.

    While it looks like Sims can play press at the HS level, I think I’d rather have him in center field against the bigger and significantly more explosive competition he’s going to see here. Besides, while I don’t think we have enough young corners around here yet, the numbers at safety are borderline desperate.

    • Comments: 3844
      Joined: 7/13/2015
      Apr 07, 2017 at 4:02 PM

      As much as we talk about moving bigger corners to safety, it rarely seems to happen. Reon Dawson, Channing Stribling, etc. all have ended up playing corner. With this staff in particular, it seems they like a certain body type at safety and a different body type at corner. It almost seems like they’re more likely to move a safety to corner than vice versa.

      • Comments: 6285
        Joined: 8/11/2015
        Lanknows
        Apr 07, 2017 at 6:02 PM

        Good point. The traditional big safety/small corner prototype is being reversed in recent years.

  4. Comments: 118
    Joined: 10/22/2015
    SinCityBlue
    Apr 07, 2017 at 4:38 PM

    I like this guy. If nothing else, Spider is a cool nickname to have on the team. Do you think this will detract us from still going after those twins from Texas being that the class won’t be as big this year?

    • Comments: 3844
      Joined: 7/13/2015
      Apr 07, 2017 at 7:12 PM

      Agreed on the “Spider” thing.

      I don’t really expect Michigan to land those twins. It’s going to be a small-ish class, and Michigan isn’t scheduled to lose any cornerbacks after 2017 (though Brandon Watson is a redshirt junior). I just don’t see them replacing 0 or 1 cornerback with 3 cornerbacks. If everyone returned, we would have 6 cornerbacks (Watson, Washington, Hill, Long, St-Juste, Thomas), and that becomes 7 with Sims. Even if one or two of those guys transferred, we would have anywhere from 7-9 corners with the two Greens in the fold.

    • Comments: 6285
      Joined: 8/11/2015
      Lanknows
      Apr 07, 2017 at 8:23 PM

      I have a different opinion on this. 6 or 7 Cornerbacks isn’t enough in a day and age where you are typically playing 3 at a time and you want some degree of specialization between between smaller guys who can stick in man-to-man and the long lanky guys who you want to jam people at the line.

      Michigan lost 3 CBs from last year and only replaced 2 of them (since there was hope Clark would be able to return.) So we’re light at CB in addition to being light at Safety.

      There is some overlap in DBs for sure, but Michigan is light right now and more attrition is likely. If Watson and Washington continue to fall behind younger players they may not last too much longer.

      A 3-person CB class shouldn’t be ruled out, though 2 is probably most likely for now. And while it’s true that Michigan hasn’t had too many CB to Safety switches lately (unless you want to generously count Peppers) this is a path historically that has worked often.

      • Comments: 3844
        Joined: 7/13/2015
        Apr 07, 2017 at 8:58 PM

        It depends on how many of them are playable. If you’re recruiting elite guys who can play, you don’t need 9 of them in order to play 6 while you groom 3. Alabama, for example, had 6 scholarship cornerbacks in 2016. You say we over-recruit the running back position because running backs can play early; cornerback is similar. They may not be physically ready to play in year one, but by year two, the good ones are generally ready to go. If you have 7 corners, you can probably count on redshirting one (due to inexperience or injury), and you generally don’t need the other 6 guys to actually play in crunch time. Even with Clark’s injury in 2016, Michigan only used Lewis, Stribling, Clark, Watson, and Hill at important moments.

        As for CB to S position switches, I don’t really remember the last time that move was made due to an inability to hack it at corner. The guys Michigan has played at both positions have generally been moved because that’s where the coaching staff saw them fitting best (Peppers, Marlin Jackson, etc.) with the rest of their personnel, since they were such good athletes that they could have played anywhere. Including me, we’ve said that a lot in the past – but it hasn’t come to fruition. I’m just not sure how viable that is. I think it’s less often said that a failed lineman could switch sides of the ball, but we have more examples of that – John Ferrara, Quinton Washington, Tom Strobel, etc.

        • Comments: 1356
          Joined: 8/13/2015
          Roanman
          Apr 08, 2017 at 7:59 AM

          I scrolled through all the DBs on 247’s target list last night. My first conclusion is that the days of runt CBs at Michigan has come and gone. Secondly, with very few exceptions, everybody we’re chasing right now for the defensive backfield is 6’1″ or better. The notable exception is Isheem Young who is 5’11”,weighs 200 lbs at 17 and seemingly really likes to hit people.

          I’ll put in my wish list now just in case somebody in authority schools through and wants me to be happy.

          Isaac Taylor-Stuart has just a God given body for playing defensive back, is an eager, accurate tackler and is pretty much your definition for the phrase “physical corner” .

          Shayne Simon is likely a LB at the next level, but he’s from New jersey and I’ve come to really enjoy plundering New Jersey. Most of his reel is making plays behind the line of scrimmage. If you like your SS to really be strong, this is your kid.

          Tyreke Johnson is a man among boys … physically speaking. He is a very confident and violent football player. Tyreke and Khaleke running around back there would be fun, and dangerous for anyone running a crossing pattern.

          As has been discussed around here ad nauseous, I think we took three and possibly four safeties last year, so any three of the above four would be just dandy by me.

          Lets just get busy recruiting 3, maybe four offensive linemen and another nose tackle please.

          • Comments: 3844
            Joined: 7/13/2015
            Apr 08, 2017 at 11:37 AM

            I would gladly take Taylor-Stuart at CB, Simon at S, and/or Johnson at S. Those are three of my favorite defensive backs in the 2018 class overall.

        • Comments: 6285
          Joined: 8/11/2015
          Lanknows
          Apr 09, 2017 at 4:27 PM

          You need to have 6 CBs ready to play every year. You mainly play 5 injuries make it likely you will put a 6th out in meaningful situations too. If you only have 7 on scholarship you are leaving yourself very little margin for error after accounting for busts and the many forms of attrition that can come.

          Last year was a bit of an anomaly in CB usage because Peppers was an extraordinarily versatile player. If you count his snaps as CB snaps you still have 6. The Michigan coaches counted CB as one of his many “positions”.

          LB is 2.5 positions. CB is 2.5 positions. The numbers should be pretty similar and everyone would scream bloody murder if we only had 7 LBs on scholarship.

          I do agree that CB require less development time (i.e., red-shirts) and therefore you don’t have to take as many per position numbers as you would otherwise. I also agree there is some overlap with safety. Still, the numbers at LB shouldn’t be too much more than at CB.

          Yet Michigan will have nearly twice as many LBs as CBs this year.

          I do agree that if recruit you get is a blue-chipper like Alabama you can probably afford to skimp. Obviously Michigan is not recruiting at Alabama’s level.

          • Comments: 6285
            Joined: 8/11/2015
            Lanknows
            Apr 09, 2017 at 4:31 PM

            IMO it’s been OL, CB, and S that have been most obviously underrecrutied at Michigan lately. I feel like safety hasn’t been too bad until this year but there’s been fluidity with Clark, Peppers, Kinnel, etc.

            Overrecruited have been RB, WR, TE, and LB. Could have a debate about DL but I think the numbers have been about right.

          • Comments: 3844
            Joined: 7/13/2015
            Apr 09, 2017 at 8:57 PM

            Peppers really didn’t line up at CB very much, unless you count “nickel corner” or “slot corner” as cornerback. That’s fine if you do, but then you have to consider whoever the Viper is (Khaleke Hudson, for example) as a corner, as well. Because that’s how Don Brown plays his defense.

            Michigan isn’t recruiting at Alabama’s level, but that’s the case at every position. So if Michigan needs more corners than Alabama, then they also need more linebackers, more offensive linemen, more tight ends, etc. But the scholarship limit is still 85.

          • Comments: 6285
            Joined: 8/11/2015
            Lanknows
            Apr 10, 2017 at 12:20 PM

            The coaching staff listed CB as one of Pepper’s supposed 15 position (or whatever it was). Remember he came in as a potential CB and maybe “the next Woodson”. It wasn’t uncommon to see him lineup at outside CB where Don Brown wanted to get creative. Sometimes he was on the field as a CB when we went to heavier sets.

            Not every every Viper is going to be able to cover like a CB (as Peppers did even if he wasn’t exactly going to lock-down elite WR man-to-man). People like Uche, Glasgow, and Metellus are not going to be able to do that. Willie Gay wasn’t either. Even expecting Hudson to do that might be unrealistic, and he’s supposed to be another athletic freak.

            In other words, one guy is not going to replace Jabril Peppers. Last year’s rotations were an anomaly because of his extraordinary versatility.

            Yes ‘slot CB’ or ‘nickel CB’ or whatever you want to call it is a CB spot. The Viper position doesn’t obviate the need for a 3rd CB, though it does make it less important. Same for OLB/SAM. It is a roster need that is distinct from the roster need for a Viper.

            Using a traditional OLB, a hybrid OLB like Viper, or a nickel corner is a defining characteristic of scheme and personnel. Peppers was brilliant because he could approximate both extremes (OLB/CB) in a way that you’re not likely to see again.

            ——————————–

            I don’t want to get too into parsing if LB is really 2.6 positions and CB is 2.4 positions or if Safety is 2.2. That’s going to change from year to year based on roster makeup and opponent scheme. Let’s just recognize that Michigan needs to have playable rotations for more than 2 LB positions and more than 2 CBs positions (unless they find themselves another Jabril Peppers.)

            ————————

            I think the need for another CB was pretty apparent when you compare how the team reacted in bowl games when Peppers went out. In 2015 the reaction was to put another CB on the field (Stribling) and fold Lewis inside. The defense played great. In 2016 they had to throw a freshman safety on the field because they didn’t really trust any other CB to do the job.

            While it’s true that’s really a multi-position failure that could have maybe been addressed anywhere on the OLB-NCB-SS continuum, CB seemed to be where it was most notably an issue based on the contrast from one year to the next.

            If a safety could have filled that job you would have thought they would have tried Kinnell. Maybe with more time to prepare that would have been the answer.

          • Comments: 6285
            Joined: 8/11/2015
            Lanknows
            Apr 10, 2017 at 12:34 PM

            As for the recruiting comment – Alabama has the luxury of skimping wherever it wants to (except OL where starz are less predictive than other positions).

            Michigan doesn’t have that luxury so they have to be more careful. They probably can’t afford to recruit as many OL as Alabama (though they need to recruit a lot more than they have been).

            What Michigan CAN do is ease up on recruiting so heavily at positions where they are pretty comfortable bringing in a 4th option (like WR, RB, LB and TE) at the expense of positions where bringing in a backup is immediately exploitable (like OL, S, and CB).

            Michigan has had depth issues at pretty much every position at one point or another – that’s the nature college football and scholarship limitations. But there are certain position that over the last 20 years of Michigan football have been trouble spots more consistently than others. DB and OL are the two that we can point to and identify multiple points in time where a lack of depth at those positions really brought the team down.

            We can blame ‘development’ all we want but we’ve had good and bad coaches at every position yet the OL and DB issues keep recurring. That indicates that there’s more to it and that numbers need to go up.

            • Comments: 6285
              Joined: 8/11/2015
              Lanknows
              Apr 10, 2017 at 12:35 PM

              This really is just a hypothesis about incorrect scholarship/roster allocations but I bet there is a way with good data to back it up.

            • Comments: 182
              Joined: 9/15/2015
              ragingbull
              Apr 10, 2017 at 3:49 PM

              in addition to your argument, bama also has the luxury of junior college and that can make a big difference. not exactly in line with your comment but figured id mention it since it can be fairly big factor in the recruiting world yet many seem to never much discuss.

              even if they dont consistently land all conference starters or big impact guys from juco, theyre still adding experienced depth to roster – theres something to be said for signing 21-22 year old grown men to compete for spots and provide depth when necessary vs only having the option of signing 17-18 year old frosh to compete in those same situations (or the same limited transfers most programs fight over each year).

              the nature of college ball and scholarship limitations require all teams to overcome depth concerns at some point, no matter the recruiting wins, and some teams can get more creative than others.

              bama, osu, fsu, etc find themselves short on reliable QBs, OL, DL, etc they can simply bring in several jucos to compete with the frosh. and even if those dudes dont end up earning big minutes, its still beneficial to add 21-22 year old backups – theyre already more physically mature and possibly more football savvy than 17-18 year old frosh, not to mention they cycle thru the program quickly (as most jucos often only on the hook for 2 years, they either contribute and help the team or theyre gone in 1-2 years and the program moves on).

              some teams live and die with juco prospects (kansas state is good example) while others smartly supplement the roster when necessary / possible. other programs like utah, byu, etc field rosters with numerous 23 year old seniors, 20 year old frosh, etc due to missions and benefit from mature squads in that manner (and though its unrelated, its still something thats intrigued me at times).

              not saying teams need juco options to be able to compete at highest level but it certainly doesnt hurt.
              and its not just bama but almost every other major school has the option of pursuing juco ranks when faced with depth issues, etc.

              michigan for example prob couldve allowed themselves a couple spare scholarships to spend on a safety prospect like brian cole or an athletic OT to help fill out the roster for 1-2 years, if they were able to pursue juco kids. it can make a huge difference.

              my point being that bama has many advantages (as you stated) and michigan will obviously always have to play from behind, at least in some areas

            • Comments: 6285
              Joined: 8/11/2015
              Lanknows
              Apr 10, 2017 at 4:13 PM

              Valid point about JUCO being a nice option at other schools. Grad Transfers can accomplish the same thing at Michigan and are a growing trend. I’d like to see more of them.

              Certain positions are more likely to be filled by grad transfers than others. This is probably something that should be in the equation for scholarship/roster allocations.

You must belogged in to post a comment.