Should Michigan continue to recruit Taylor Groves after his decommitment?

On this week’s Future Brew podcast, we discuss the recent decommitment of 2022 four-star safety Taylor Groves, and if Michigan should continue to recruit him, given the amount of safeties the Wolverines are in on in this cycle.

Von: He had been committed to Michigan since February. Actually committed the same day as Kody Jones. Jon, I wanna ask you. When Groves decommitted, were you surprised at all, given how it kinda came out of nowhere, but his commitment came out of nowhere, too. So what was your initial reaction when this decommitment took Twitter by storm?

Jon: I think when I first saw it, I was bummed. I was like, “Michigan lost their second-highest rated commit.” But then after a minute I was like, “It kind of makes sense.” When Groves committed, it was out of nowhere. It seemed like he was caught up in the Mo Linguist hire. I think Linguist got him really excited about Michigan. He got him to commit without visiting any schools, and now that there’s a potential for him to take official visits coming up in a couple months if everything stays on track here, I think he wanted to look at his other opportunities. And maybe he decided he pulled the trigger a little bit too early and he wasn’t completely satisfied with his decision, which you can understand as a Michigan fan. We’ll see where it goes from now — I think his official visits will tell a lot if he’s still interested in Michigan or not. Maybe they can reconnect, but we’ll see.

Stephen: I’m not gonna say there are a ton of guys who run a 4.42 like Taylor Groves does, but I think there are a lot of safety types you can kick your tires on. His instincts coming downhill on outside runs was something that really popped out to me on film. He did not shy away from contact at all. I would still continue recruiting him. You have a strong enough connection with him to establish a relationship to a point where it resulted in an initial commitment, then there’s probably still hope to continue that. The thing that’s good about a decommitment, which is weird to say, but it does help the staff account for other prospects and put their effort maybe towards other safeties as well. So while the initial reaction is that this is terrible, it gives the staff ample time to take a look at other prospects, fill that gap and understand this is a position you need to give more attention to moving forward. You can find a fair number of guys who can fit into a safety position — they’re a little less dime a dozen. While I’d still probably try to pursue Groves here, but it’s not the end of the world and there are plenty of guys who could replace that commitment moving forward.

Listen to the entire podcast below.

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