Darryl Stonum, ex-Wolverine
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| Michigan’s class of 2008 participants in the Under Armour All-America Game: Darryl Stonum, Christian Wilson, Dann O’Neill, and Brandon Moore. |
Wide receiver Darryl Stonum was booted off the team today. I’m not going to go through his litany of legal issues, but he had some alcohol- and probation-related offenses in the past that caused him to be suspended for the entirety of the 2011 season. Head coach Brady Hoke hoped that the suspension would give Stonum a chance to get his life in order, but that obviously wasn’t the case.
Stonum’s final season of eligibility would have been 2012, so he leaves with one year remaining. He had 76 career receptions for 1,008 yards and 6 touchdowns in his three years of play, with a school single-season record of 1,001 kickoff return yards (94 of which came on a TD return against Notre Dame) in 2009. It’s unclear whether he will try to enter the NFL Draft or whether he will transfer to a lower division and play college ball next season. My guess is that he will end up at an FCS school and try to make it to the NFL in 2013.
Michigan is now even thinner at wide receiver, a position that couldn’t really afford further attrition. Junior Hemingway, Martavious Odoms, and Kelvin Grady have played their final year at Michigan, leaving rising senior Roy Roundtree, rising junior Jeremy Gallon, rising junior Jeremy Jackson, rising junior Drew Dileo, and a bunch of young’ns who haven’t seen the field at all; class of 2012 receivers Jehu Chesson and Amara Darboh will have an even better chance of play this fall than they previously had. Gallon is tiny, Jackson is slow, and Dileo is a little of both, so there’s no clear-cut successor at the outside receiver position.
There are some more potential options in the class of 2012, with Cincinnati (OH) Moeller’s Monty Madaris and Westlake Village (CA) Oaks Christian’s Jordan Payton both flirting with Michigan. Madaris had potentially eliminated Michigan from contention, but this opens the door to playing time a little quicker. Meanwhile, Payton is “committed” to the California Golden Bears, but their lead recruiter Tosh Lupoi just left for the Washington Huskies and Payton is rethinking his pledge. Of course, there’s also the potential for more receivers to grab offers from Michigan or for the coaches to bank the scholarship for 2013. However – and I questioned this at the time – Brady Hoke chose to bank a scholarship for 2012 instead of taking class of 2011 receiver Devin Lucien, who chose UCLA instead. Lucien redshirted this past season for the Bruins, but he would have been another option for Michigan in 2012.
(I just happened to find the above picture interesting for its irrelevance to Michigan now. Stonum was a huge disappointment and got booted, Wilson de-committed for North Carolina and now is a mediocre Tarheel H-back, O’Neill transferred to Western Michigan, and Brandon Moore has been an ineffective backup TE who has 2 career receptions.)
