Previously: Last year's profiles. S J'Marick Woods, S Jaylen Kelly-Powell, S Brad Hawkins, CB Ambry Thomas, CB Benjamin St-Juste, LB Drew Singleton, LB Jordan Anthony, LB Josh Ross, DE Kwity Paye, DE Luiji Vilain, DE Corey Malone-Hatcher, DE Deron Irving-Bey, DT Donovan Jeter, DT Phil Paea, DT James Hudson, DT Aubrey Solomon, C Cesar Ruiz, OT JaRaymond Hall, OT Joel Honigford, OT Andrew Stueber, OT Chuck Filiaga, WR Oliver Martin, WR Nico Collins, WR Tarik Black, WR Donovan Peoples-Jones, FB Ben Mason.
| Los Lunas, NM – 5'10", 190 | |||
| Scout | 4*, #319 overall #20 RB | |
| Rivals | 4*, NR overall #21 RB, #1 NM | ||
| ESPN | 4*, #240 overall #22 RB, #1 NM | ||
| 24/7 | 3*, #386 overall #22 RB, #1 NM | ||
| Other Suitors | OU, Arizona, Texas Tech, TCU | ||
| YMRMFSPA | Denard Robinson | ||
| Previously On MGoBlog | Hello post from Ace. | ||
| Notes | Twitter. | ||
Film | |||
Junior: I give this three-game senior reel a Kind of Good: | |||
O'Maury Samuels was a guy from New Mexico hoping for UT-San Antonio offer when he showed up at a couple of camps and did this:
Samuels posted the top Nike+ Football Rating score of the year during a testing day Saturday at AT&T Stadium with a mark of 142.41. … He then went out Sunday at The Opening Regional in the Dallas area and hit 138, which included 4.4 in the 40 and a 44 inch vertical.
He left with an invitation to the Final in July in Oregon.
UT-San Antonio offered. So did some others. I like to imagine the amount of mail that came in afterwards, and wonder if they put a ski lift on it.
Probably not, since Samuels committed to Michigan mere days after the world learned his name. This short-circuited some fevered pursuit and possibly further rises up the rankings; once committed and back in New Mexico, Samuels didn't have much opportunity to continue climbing without an All Star appearance. For whatever reason, he did not make one.
I bring it up because the scouting doesn't really match the rankings here. Once sites were alerted to Samuels's existence and took in his high school film they came back with reports that are really, really encouraging. ESPN starts off by mentioning his merely "adequate" size before describing a demigod:
Quick, sudden but also fast with very good top-end speed and acceleration to separate. Excellent vision. Runs with his eyes, very instinctive with a natural feel for the cutback. Will run with patience and let blocks develop, capable of getting through tight closing seams. … 0-60 in just a few steps …great in-line burst to get through seams of traffic. … not a pile pusher but he is a tough scrappy runner who doesn't go down easily. Twists and churns on contact and will pop out of arm wraps and make quality yards after contact. Runs with a lower base and possesses excellent balance. … Very natural runner with a ton of speed and quickness.
Hot damn!
Most of this shows up on film to this layman's eye. There are moments where Samuels is obscured by a churning mass of bodies before erupting at top speed from the middle of the pack. He will gear down in the backfield until he finds a lane and then explode into it. He'll reverse field when in trouble and then find a nonexistent crease to jet through instead of bouncing. The bits where he outruns New Mexico safeties are whatever, par for the course. The frequency with which he pauses, surveys, and then does something electrifying is where it's at. Samuels's film kind of feels like this:
I mean… I'm just sayin'.
Other evaluations aren't far off. Clint Brewster:
huge upside… great strength and quickness. … quick-twitch explosiveness pops out at you on film. He can start and stop with subtleness and get skinny through the hole to get to the second level. … combinationof speed, quickness, and explosive power that Samuels has is very exciting. … lower-body strength allows him to run through arm tackles and behind his pads. …sudden, 1-cut ability on stretch plays. …toughness to run inside the tackles and can get to the perimeter on the outside zone plays.
Scout's Greg Biggins:
size and speed combo is obvious … plays with a suddenness to him, is a decisiverunner who can hit full stride in just a few steps and he's gone. … fluid athlete with no wasted motion, can make you miss in the open field and isn't stiff or robotic like you see with some players that are as muscle bound as Samuels. …vision, patience and balance and projects at the next level as a player who can run between the tackles, bounce it outside and be used in the passing game. … easy to project, no matter what state he was playing in.
They continue in this vein, with literally no criticisms. Even his less-than-Najee-Harris stature isn't really cited as a problem because he is a squat brick of muscle—see that picture above—and being low to the ground is an asset for tailbacks:
Samuels isn't necessarily a 'big back' in the typical sense of the term. He's 5-foot-10, 188 pounds but he is extremely impressive from a physical standpoint. The dude is jacked. Even at 190 pounds, he's going to pack a punch and be able to play powerfully behind his pads. …one of the most athletic athletes at any position in this entire class. … homerun threat.
In addition, his balance and ability to stay up when hit is a frequent discussion point:
… great running back frame at 5-foot-10, 190 pounds, strong and compact. He runs with great balance and has the ability to take a hit, spin off a defender and keep going or just run right through a would be tackler. He has a very strong lower body, is a decisive runner with no wasted motion and can hit full speed after just a few strides.
This 5'10" guy with a crazy SPARQ score gets described as "downhill running back," "classic power back," a "rock-solid, hard-nosed running back" and a guy with a "powerful running style." And yeah, the Versailles of thighs looks hard to tackle:
Touch The Banner praises him as "quick, speedy, strong, [and] instinctive"; Rivals's Adam Friedman says he's a "sturdy guy who can run the ball between the tackles as well as out on the perimeter." Both note his burst, because everyone does.
That about covers it as far as running back skills go. And yet.
It feels like there should be a catch. The rankings are middling. Samuels did open up his recruitment, and when he did the only school he visited was Arizona. (Oklahoma was also talked about.) There really isn't anything in the scouting, so… maybe Samuels's ability to go the distance? Nick Baumgardner was skeptical that he'd be a home run hitter:
He's not a breakaway back. He's a 4.6-ish back. … He's probably not going to be a home run hitter in college and that's not really something I'm sure he can improve. It just sort of is what it is. He's not slow, so don't get that confused. But his top gear comes out early and sort of remains.
This is a lonely opinion, but I mean… feels like there should be a catch, right?
Samuels's top end speed is tough to evaluate because of his competition and there's some confusion about what exactly he ran at camps. Some reports had him running a high 4.5 at the Opening finals—his breakout was at the regional—and others a 4.45 on a tweaked hamstring:
"I was nursing my hamstring, so I sat out track to get ready," said Samuels. "I wished I was healthier for The Opening and I think if I was, I could have ran a 4.3 (he clocked a 4.45). I would have ran it another time. But I was pretty happy with my results."
His hundred-meter times were good for a state championship; his personal record of 11.02 in high school was not in Denard Robinson's class (10.56) and is a bit behind Fitzgerald Toussaint (10.86) and Christian McCaffrey (10.89) but easily beat Dalvin Cook (11.24). McCaffrey and Cook just ran 40s a hair under 4.5 at the NFL combine. Given his explosion—his vert was five inches better than anyone at this year's NFL combine!—he's probably gaining on all non-Denards over shorter distances.
So he's not Denard fast, but he's in line with a couple of the biggest home-run hitters in college football last year. That'll do.
Attitude issues? Doesn't seem like it, via Steve Lorenz:
"He's a great kid," a source told Wolverine247 on Thursday. "He's well built and his mind has been like a sponge so far as he's caught onto everything really well. He really has an awareness about him that you can't teach either which is really interesting."
I do not have a catch for you. Samuels is a super athlete, a natural runner with an excellent, squat running back frame and he's a fringe four star because he's from New Mexico. There is no way there are 20 better running backs in his class.
Etc.: Man, "Los Lunas" is really bugging me. How is it not "Las Lunas"? Argh.
Why Denard Robinson? This is a good point to assert these are playing style comparisons, not assertions player X is going to be Denard Dang Robinson.
But: same frame, same electric start-stop, same field vision and patience. Robinson showed up at the NFL combine at 5'10", 200 and ran a 4.43; his vert was 36.5. He was also Denard Robinson, acceleration machine. Samuels is never going to be as effective a runner because he is not also the quarterback, but he looks like the kind of guy who can go from zero to 60 faster than anyone else on the field. That's Denard. Hopefully he won't have the same fumbling issues caused by long-term ulnar nerve damage. Now I'm depressed. Let's fix that:
Other comparables include Fitz Toussaint, he of the stunning jump cuts and sudden failure to pass block, and Oklahoma's Samaje Perine, per Scout. The judges will also accept "Mike Hart, but fast!" if only for nostalgia's sake.
Guru Reliability: Low. Running backs cannot be evaluated in un-padded situations. New Mexico. Quick emergence and commit caused some fire-and-forget. Rapture scouting reports do not match rankings.
Variance: Moderate. Samuels is already a jacked up 190 and close to physically ready for the show, and there's no doubt what position he'll play. Severe uptick in competition level is always a question.
Ceiling: Very high. SPARQ champion who looks like a savant in highlights.
General Excitement Level: Very high. I'm almost embarrassed about how high I am on this class. Samuels looks unbelievable, and the stuff he's doing in his highlights is stuff that translates. Maybe it'll all fall apart because every run not on the highlights is a ridiculous Mike Shaw bounce, but if so all the scouting reports are lying.
Projection: I'd guess a redshirt since Michigan has four guys ready to go in front of him, but I doubt Samuels is going to stick around for five years so whatever. Still, New Mexico transition and obvious target for garbage carries (Walker) should allow Michigan the luxury.
How Samuels's career develops depends not only on him but the rest of the crew as well, and there are too many moving parts for me to make a definitive declaration. The next two years will be platoon city with Evans, Higdon, Walker, and Samuels splitting carries. He'll get his chances, and he could be anything from Higdon 2 to Denard 2. Yes, both of those are good outcomes.