Aurora (CO) Eaglecrest offensive lineman Reece Atteberry committed to Michigan on Sunday evening. He picked the Wolverines over offers from Colorado, Colorado State, Miami, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Oklahoma, Penn State, and USC, among others.
Atteberry is listed at 6’5″ and 280 lbs. He claims a 5.24 forty, a 5.84 shuttle, and a 22″ vertical.
RATINGS
ESPN: 3-star, 79 grade, #47 OT
Rivals: 3-star, 5.7 grade, #51 OT
247 Sports: 4-star, 90 grade, #4 C, #266 overall
Hit the jump for more.
Michigan offered Atteberry in May of 2018 and he seemed to be off the radar a little bit; Ed Warinner was still recruiting him, but not much action seemed to be taking place. This spring Atteberry took an official visit to Duke and then to Michigan, during which he pulled the trigger on his commitment.
I have seen different sites and prognosticators projecting Atteberry anywhere from center to guard to tackle, but I think he’s an interior player. First of all, it’s rare for a player to move from the interior to the edge, and he’s already a high school center. Second, he has limited length and wingspan. He does have good athleticism, and his high school team pulls him to the edge, which is rare for a center; he looks pretty good doing it, too. I like his quickness off the ball, and he does a good job of sinking his hips when engaging defensive linemen in pass protection.
On the negative side is Atteberry’s lack of ideal size to be an elite offensive tackle, but that’s not a big negative; it’s like lamenting that a wide receiver is too thin to play tight end. There are occasional times when Atteberry’s feet get too narrow, and he ends up trying to overpower defenders with only his upper body.
Overall, I think Atteberry is a very good interior line prospect, perhaps limited only by his size. If he’s 280 lbs. now, I think his success will depend on how quickly and how efficiently he can add 20-30 pounds of muscle. If he can maintain his quickness, I really think he could be Michigan’s next version of David Molk; in case you don’t remember, Molk won the Rimington Award and was an All-American in 2011.
Atteberry is the first player from Colorado to commit to Michigan since 2017 when quarterback Dylan McCaffrey signed with the Wolverines.
TTB Rating: 85 (ratings explanation)
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Wow, so to summarize Thunder’s take on the activity over the weekend:
– Atteberry: 85
– Morant: 87
– Lewis: 86
– Mohan: 88
That’s 4 very good Big Ten starters with varying degrees of All-Conference potential, according to the TTB ratings system. Interesting that Michigan’s scouting seems to have aligned perfectly wtih Thunder’s opinion – bodes well given your track record! (Not implying any kind of pro-Michigan bias on your part either – just interesting because, with the exception of Morant, none of these guys are consensus top ~100 guys to the recruiting sites).
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Yes, I do really like the recruits Michigan is prioritizing and landing. I hope that’s a good thing, both for Michigan on the field and for my accuracy purposes. There are always things that could change these numbers (injuries, poor senior seasons, other commits, etc.), but that’s how I see them right now. Atteberry was a difficult one to rank, because he might be blocked at center for the first four years of his career by Nolan Rumler. Would Atteberry play guard? Would Rumler play guard? Would one of them transfer? But I think both are very good prospects.
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I can’t imagine this would be a real problem. Michigan has been playing NFL OCs at OG and OT in just the last few years. I have to guess that even a player like Molk would have been at least serviceable at OG. Even if not, it’s unlikely that both Rumler or Atteberry would be limited to OC and only OC.
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Yes, but Michigan is also recruiting very good prospects at those positions. Center/guard swing prospects can fill three positions; guard/tackle swing prospects can fill four. Trevor Keegan, for example, could be LT, LG, RG, or RT (but probably not C); if Nolan Rumler turns into a good college player, he can only play LG, C, or RG (but not LT/RT).
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I take your point and agree that not everyone can play every position. But if you have 2 good OCs, you slide 1 to OG. If that means you have 3 OGs you slide 1 to OT. If you already have 2 excellent OTs well that means your 2nd OC isn’t one of your 5 best linemen and doesn’t deserve to start anyway. (e.g., Pat Kugler).
Most good college OL can play multiple positions. (Ruiz, Bredeson, Runyan, Stueber have all shuffled around already and Mason Cole was an extreme example of flexibility – jumping back and forth from LT to OC.) For the minority of good college players who are limited to one spot (e.g., Onwenu) — you work around those guys with the position-flexible majority (e.g., Runyan). It may not be optimal for the individual but it’s what you do to help the team.
In the end, you put your best 5 out there. Very rare that you wouldn’t. That usually goes even in basketball, even though the difference between a point guard and a center if FAR greater than the difference between a left tackle and a center.
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That’s a very encouraging scouting report. I always get excited when the only question is size (e.g., Mike Hart, Jeremy Gallon, Devin Bush). Sometimes that’s a problem, but often it just means dude is seriously underrated. Ditto for positional uncertainty which can also depress the ‘starz’.
Speaking of ratings – I’m noticing a trend with these commits having pretty good to great offer lists but inconsistent/mixed rating across the scouting services. I know the fan inclination is to toss aside the low ones and focus on the good, but usually there’s some reasonable doubt being cast with mixed reviews.
Count me on the optimistic side given these scouting reports and the offer lists. Also, I’d rather see a guy ranked as a 4 star by one service and a 2 star by another than consistent 3-star across the board.
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A great offer list carries more weight with me than inconsistent ratings.
Lot’s of competition between raters and values get incorporated into the system that doesn’t reflect the player or how they will be used. Also the post commitment bump guys get after hooking up with a top program can be fishy, can be legit.
I agree a mix of 4’s and 2’s probably indicates the rater never saw the kid or the kid did’t camp with them.
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The only thing with offer lists is, everyone is throwing them around nowadays – early & in great numbers
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I agree GK. Have to take it all with a grain of salt but the offers are generally more telling IMO.
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Was hopeful when I read elsewhere that he could play Tackle. I’ll keep my fingers crossed
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I’ve read in a couple places that Atteberry started his high school career at tackle and moved inside. That would be a somewhat unusual path.
I like his feet too. You can easily see that he gets on linebackers a lot quicker than they are accustomed to, but I have the same concern here that I did about Mayfield which in that case turned out to be unfounded. Atteberry is real tough on little guys, but there is pretty much nothing on his film showing him beating up on guys his own size.
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Once again, OL are difficult to grade unless they are ELITE and play Tackle. Therefore, I’ll use this as a spillover from what I said about Persi. He seems smart, athletic and light on his feet. Unlike Persi, Atteberry seems more aggressive and can fill anywhere inside. Another 2-3 year wait for this kid but right now I’d grade him 80. I think 85 is probably too high because his competition doesn’t seem that great and I’d expect more domination in his film against them. But, I really like his size and definitely excited about him as a commit.
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The nature of the center position is that the film is often more underwhelming than that of guards and tackles. With having to snap the ball and often having a guy lined up inches from your face, you simply don’t get the angles and the get-off that guards and tackles do to really have dominant film. Guards and tackles are lined up farther off the ball, and they typically have guys lined up on either the inside or the outside shoulder, not head up.
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