Posts by: Thunder

Xavier Worthy, Wolverine

Fresno (CA) Central East wide receiver Xavier Worthy committed to Michigan on Friday afternoon. He picked the Wolverines over offers from Alabama and Oregon, among others.

Worthy is listed at 6’1″ and 170 lbs. As a junior in 2019, he caught 54 passes for 992 yards and 16 touchdowns. He ran a 10.55 in the 100 meters as a high school sophomore, and he ran a 21.41 in the 200 meters.

RATINGS
ESPN: 4-star, 84 grade, #22 WR, #126 overall
Rivals: 3-star WR, 5.6 grade
247 Sports: 4-star, 93 grade, #11 WR, #95 overall

Hit the jump for more on Worthy’s commitment.

2020 Season Countdown: #65 Cade McNamara

Name: Cade McNamara
Height: 6’1″
Weight: 205 lbs.
High school: Reno (NV) Damonte Ranch
Position: Quarterback
Class: Redshirt freshman
Jersey number: #12
Last year: I ranked McNamara #84 and said he would redshirt (LINK). He redshirted.
TTB Rating: 65

McNamara took the expected route in 2019 of redshirting. That’s what the vast majority of freshman quarterbacks should do, and Michigan was able to accommodate that by having a senior quarterback in Shea Patterson, a redshirt sophomore in Dylan McCaffrey, and a redshirt freshman in Joe Milton. For the first time in a while, it seemed like Michigan had a pretty decent succession of quarterbacks lined up.

Now Patterson is off to the NFL, while the other guys remain and true freshman Dan Villari joins the QB room. Presumably, McNamara will take over the #3 role that was held by Joe Milton. On the plus side, I have heard some people throw out that McNamara is a dark horse candidate to win the starting job, and one point in his favor is that he fits the mold of a Penn State-style QB (shorter, quick release, somewhat mobile) a little better than McCaffrey, Milton, or Villari. I don’t think that will end up mattering much, so I expect McNamara to be the third guy in, with minimal opportunities to make his mark this season.

Prediction: Backup quarterback

Site News: AdSense is trying to kill me

So this was already a wild week (if you only knew…), and then AdSense tried to put another nail in my coffin.

AdSense, which is Google’s ad program that puts most of the non-Amazon ads on the site, sent me an e-mail saying they were disabling ads on my site. Why? They said I posted pictures that broke their policies. This sort of happened previously, except then they told me it was okay if I posted those pictures, so I started posting them again last fall (after going through and deleting thousands of pictures off the server).

Then out of the blue, they canceled my ads again earlier this week.

At one time this site was making upward of $1,000 per month in AdSense revenue.

Recently it had trickled down to less than $2 a day.

Yesterday it was $0.06.

Today it is $0.00.

I submitted the site for AdSense review, but they rejected my appeal by saying the site was still breaking their policy. They sent me a link as an example of a violation, and the link said “Page Not Found.” So I have no idea.

I am now exploring other ad server programs.

2020 Season Countdown: #66 Tyler Cochran

Name: Tyler Cochran
Height: 6’1″
Weight: 206 lbs.
High school: Orchard Lake (MI) St. Mary’s
Position: Safety
Class: Fifth year senior
Jersey number: #30
Last year: I ranked Cochran #58 and said he would be a backup safety and special teamer (LINK). He played in twelve games and made 2 tackles and 1 fumble recovery.
TTB Rating: N/A

Cochran has turned into a steady special teams contributor over the past couple seasons. He has played in 15 games during that span with 3 tackles and 1 fumble recovery, which came last year against Rutgers.

So far Cochran has not played safety in a game, and it’s unlikely that he will this season, either. Michigan brought in a few 2020 scholarship safeties with the new signing class, and there are some talented players already in the program.

Prediction: Backup safety, special teamer

2020 Season Countdown: #67 Julius Welschof

Name: Julius Welschof
Height: 6’6″
Weight: 278 lbs.
High school: Germany somewhere
Position: Defensive tackle
Class: Redshirt sophomore
Jersey number: #96
Last year: I ranked Welschof #49 and said he would be a backup defensive end (LINK). He played in one game.
TTB Rating: 78

Michigan was very inexperienced on the defensive line last year once the team got past the top five guys (the starters plus Mike Danna), so that artificially elevated Welschof into the top 50. Now without losing much along the defensive line except tackle Mike Dwumfour, Welschof settles back down to where he should have been in 2019, right here in the 60s.

Welschof is supposedly bigger and stronger this year and looking like an interior defensive lineman. Word is that he could be bound for nose tackle. He does not appear to be in the running to start, but he could work in with the second unit. We have seen very little of him to make much of a judgment, but the buzz around him makes me think we might start to see some flashes of his athleticism and strength this year.

Prediction: Backup defensive tackle