Monday Michigan Football Recruiting Roundup Addresses the Rumors

Michigan Offers Defensive End

On Saturday, Michigan hosted 2015 4-star defensive end Dre'Mont Jones. Jones is a target the coaching staff have had their eyes on for awhile and have been preparing to offer him since their Junior Day festivities, but that never came to fruition. However, that all changed yesterday after his visit as the coaching staff extended an offer to Jones. Jones would be the fourth projected strong-side defensive end of the 2015 class. The only issue with that is it appears that Michigan doesn't really have all that great of a shot with these four offers.

That includes Jones. I don't think Michigan has that great of a shot here.

Jones is out of the solid St. Ignatius football program in Ohio. As some of you may know who are keen on Ohio football, it is rare Michigan ever pulls recruits from that program. The last recruit Michigan pulled out of there? Jake Ryan, he turned out alright for the Wolverines.

With that being said, Michigan always put themselves in excellent position for these recruits, but a Buckeye offer is difficult to compete with for the St. Ignatius recruits. This seems to be the case with Jones as well. The Buckeyes offered at least a month before the Wolverines did. Couple that with them being the in-state school of choice, this is going to be very difficult to pull Jones out of Ohio.

247's Steve Lorenz reflects ($) on the same thoughts that I have:

"At this point, however, it's difficult to see Michigan overtaking the Buckeyes here, who probably offered quickly after knowing the Wolverines were planning to pull the trigger once he visited Ann Arbor."

If anything changes between the Wolverines and Jones, we will have it covered in our recruiting roundups.

Below is a Jones highlight tape:

Penn State is Killing it

Just a little quick note on Penn State. The Nittany Lions under new coach James Franklin is absolutely destroying their 2015 recruiting class. Moving into the top five of the recruiting rankings, they had another solid weekend by picking up two more commits in this class. 4-star offensive guard Steven Gonzalez and, this might shock you a bit, 4-star linebacker Josh Barajas.

Both Gonzalez and Barajas were a bit of a surprise to me, considering both were heavy leans to different schools Ohio State and Notre Dame respectively. But, it goes to show you that anything can happen once these schools get the kids on campus.

How does this effect Michigan? Well, with Barajas gone, it takes away one of their top linebacker recruits on their list. However, this might make Michigan want to move on 4-star linebacker Darrin Kirkland Jr., who was a heavy Penn State lean at one point. Considering Penn State may not have the need for another inside linebacker, this could force him to look elsewhere. Does Michigan finally pull the trigger and send Kirkland an offer? I hope so, I am shocked it wasn't done during his overnight visit. They should do it before it's too little, too late.

If Michigan were to offer Kirkland, they would be in excellent position for him. With Penn State being the obvious looming threat and not knowing where they will go next, Michigan could be the next logical choice for him.

Michigan Drops Out of Harris' Top Group? Lies.

Rivals' National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell (Or RivalsMike as he is mostly known as) made some waves over the weekend with the following tweet regarding top Michigan target Damien Harris and his top group of schools:

Commence freakout? Not so fast, my friend.

Harris tweeted out a top ten of schools shortly after this tweet, which brings into question the strange timing of this entire situation. The schools are:

Of course, the easy way out is to say that his schools are in no order. But, is that really the case?

Lorenz quickly got in touch ($) with Harris' mother to see if there was any legitimacy to the top schools rumor. His mother says the following:

Did some quick digging and the top list being put out there was met with a lot of skepticism on both sides of the fence.

"Maybe it's his top four after Michigan!," Harris's mother told me. "Just because he's opened up his recruiting doesn't mean Michigan has gone down on his list."

Who do you trust more? Someone who is "familiar with the situation" or someone that the younger Harris talks to every single day? I still think Michigan is up fairly high on his list and there shouldn't be any worries until something official has been announced from the Harris camp.

As far as leaders right now? I still believe it's a two-horse race between Michigan and Ohio State. Of course, anything can change in a heartbeat in recruiting, so this is what the feelings are today. Who knows, it could change tomorrow. Like always, this is something to keep your eyes on as this progresses.

Link Roundup

2015 linebacker Josh McMillon discusses Michigan ($) and his desire to visit campus soon.

Rivals' Tim Sullivan discusses Michigan's growing recruiting presence ($) in Virginia.

Sullivan also came out with his recent ($) Recruiting Notebook.

247 also released a FREE recruiting snapshot for you to browse. Lots of good information inside.

Be sure to follow Maize n Brew's Joshua Henschke on Twitter, @JoshuaHenschke.