Class Impact: Deshawn Troutman to Miami

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Stefan Adams

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2021 Edgewater (FL) LB Deshawn Troutman committed to the Miami Hurricanes late last night.



The 6-1, 205-pounder is currently a consensus 3-star prospect according to major recruiting services. According to the 247Sports Composite Ranking, Troutman is the #938 player nationally in 2021, the #38 ILB in the country, and the #126 player in Florida. Troutman's commitment moves Miami up to the #13 overall class in the team rankings on 247Sports and #14 overall on Rivals.


The Player

Troutman has had a mostly quiet recruitment and hasn’t taken many visits, not even to Coral Gables where he’ll spend the next four years. Troutman is familiar with the South Florida area, however, having grown up there through middle school. Troutman also works on his uncle’s potato farm in his free time. Miami was his first major Power 5 offer back in late January, and even though he was an under-the-radar type prospect, the Hurricanes have always been high on his abilities. Still, UM wanted to wait and see what would happen with their top target in 4-star LB Jaydon Hood from St. Thomas Aquinas (FL). Once Hood committed to Michigan earlier this week, Troutman was given the green light by the Miami staff, and the Edgewater star took full advantage. He chose Miami over other offers from FSU, West Virginia, Louisville, and Minnesota among others.

Taking a look at the tape, you can see Troutman flashes qualities of a modern-day inside linebacker. Quick-twitch athlete that meets ballcarriers in the hole swiftly and with authority. Shows great sideline-to-sideline speed and can cover a lot of ground in patrolling the middle of the field, which also allows him to have elite potential as a coverage linebacker. Impressive read and reaction instincts to blow up plays before they get going, and he is a beast at shutting down the screen game. Understands angles well to knife into the opponent’s backfield. Goes for the highlight hit often, and his tackling form can break down at times. Improved play strength will help prevent him from getting washed out of too many plays at the next level. Would like to see more of him taking on blocks at the point of attack and stacking and shedding them to make plays.

As a junior in 2019 for an Edgewater team that won a district title before losing to St. Thomas in the state finals, Troutman recorded 89 tackles, 11 TFL, a sack, 3 PBU, and a FR in 9 games.


The Class

Troutman was the 14th overall commit in the class and he is the third linebacker along with Killian (FL) 3-star Tyler Johnson and Miami Northwestern (FL) 3-star Ja’Corey Hammett. With Troutman’s pledge, that would seem to wrap up UM’s linebacker recruiting for the cycle, but with the unpredictability of recruiting, it wouldn’t be surprising to see UM keep tabs on a name or two just in case.


The Team

With this class, UM is clearly looking to upgrade the speed and athleticism in their linebacking corps as the game moves more spread-based and pass-heavy than ever. Going into 2020, there were a ton of injuries at LB this spring and there aren’t really established roles for most of the linebacker position group aside from Zach McCloud being expected to start at one of the two spots. However, McCloud will be off the roster by the time Troutman arrives in 2021, leaving LB difficult to project into the future at this point, especially without a full spring to evaluate the healthy returnees. With an unsettled depth chart, Troutman have plenty of opportunity to come in and win a role as a freshman.

 
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Gotta admit I don't know much about this guy. Comes from a traditional power.
 
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How good is he and what is his potential? What is a good player comparison?
Wesley woodyard is good comparison in my opinion. I watched Wesley while in HS, played with a friend of mine, and then played at Kentucky and troutman reminds me a lot of him. Troutman has great tangibles such as quickness and instinct. As far as in state LB, he’s one of the good ones.
 
Wesley woodyard is good comparison in my opinion. I watched Wesley while in HS, played with a friend of mine, and then played at Kentucky and troutman reminds me a lot of him. Troutman has great tangibles such as quickness and instinct. As far as in state LB, he’s one of the good ones.
Thanks brother, Woodyard is a good player. I hope ur accurate.
 
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Troutman comes from Edgewafter, which has been good for the last couple of years under Coach Duke after struggling for a couple of years, including the failed Chris Leak winless experiment three years ago. Duke has had this team in the playoffs. I saw them play a couple of times, and Edgewater definitely has athletes and solid coaching. It would be great to establish a pipeline there.

Troutman definitely has the athletic ability to contribute, so it will be up to him. Happy to see the Canes were able to get a good linebacker after losing out on a local player.
 
Let’s hope he’s better than Pinckney
I think he will be. And don’t get me wrong guys, I’m not calling him the next coming of Vilma, but I am saying he’s a good prospect for UM. Although I do like Brendan Jennings over him and a couple of others, he will be good for the U. Especially when you talk about someone with leadership skills. I give him a 10/10 on that.
 
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Love his attitude. Seems a step faster than Pinckney who had to sell out to get to the ball carrier. Also seems to diagnose a little better than Pinck, doesn’t have to course correct and find himself 5 yards behind the runner. I like the fact he knows how to cover already, too.
 
I love this kid's athleticism and explosiveness. The quickness and agility just pop. He's going to make a lot of plays especially in open space. Really closes well after he diagnoses the play.

This is a really good pick-up IMO. A great addition to our future LB core. I really like the speed and athleticism for our future with Brooks, Huff, Austin-Cave, and now Troutman.

After watching the 2002 National Championship game against Nebraska on ESPN yesterday, I see the potential of these young LBs to play with the same speed, agility, and tenacity of that championship LB core. The announcers just kept raving over and over about the speed and athleticism of the LBs and the defense as a whole. I'm not saying they have the same pedigree as those LBs from that championship team, but the athleticism looks very similar.

I really like where Manny is going with the defense.

If we could get Steed, Jennings, and Joyner healthy, we'll have tremendous depth at LB albeit not a lot of experience which is why McCloud's leadership and experience in 2020 will be crucial in his final year.
 
Let’s hope he’s better than Pinckney
I understand where you are coming from and I think Troutman will have every opportunity to be better than Pinckney. Troutman certainly has the ability.

I'm certainly no @Liberty City El when it comes to evaluating prospects lol but I love this kind of thing so I will offer my opinion. If you go back and look at Pinckney's high school film what you will notice is a player with decent physical ability and speed who stood out because of his phenomenal instincts, football IQ and desire. I see the same qualities in Troutman but with much better physical skills. Troutman shows much better speed and overall athleticism with a nasty closing burst. Troutman possesses all of the qualities of an ideal Mike LB in this age of college football. Troutman has sideline to sideline range and shows the type of athleticism and awareness to be an asset in coverage. He shows a marked ability to diagnose plays quickly and uses his excellent speed to close on his target in a hurry. Troutman is a hard hitter who arrives quickly with violent intentions where Pinckney was more of a technician in terms of his tackling. Another thing that I saw was enormous potential as a Blitzer in our scheme. Put Troutman's exceptional speed together with his instincts, explosivness, the ability to diagnose and filthy closing burst and you have a kid who could be a devastating weapon as a Blitzer.

I did see the tendency to go for the knockout highlight reel type hit as another poster had mentioned but that is relatively easy to correct. To be fair, Troutman has the ability to make those type of hits consistently as he is not a sloppy tackler by any means. It is also worth noting that when Troutman arrives at the ball carrier, the ball carrier goes down as he is sure tackler for the most part. Troutman also shows a keen understanding of pursuit angles and has the rare ability to close quickly and strike a moving target in space with accuracy and authority. The key for Troutman will be increasing his core strength without sacrificing his speed and agility. Getting into Feeley's S&C program should produce tremendous results. I love this pickup!
 
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Do we know his speed? He seems fast enough but not a blazer. On the highlights, he looks faster than Flagg and Pinckney, slower than Perryman. He does have good lateral and downhill burst.
 
I love this kid's athleticism and explosiveness. The quickness and agility just pop. He's going to make a lot of plays especially in open space. Really closes well after he diagnoses the play.

This is a really good pick-up IMO. A great addition to our future LB core. I really like the speed and athleticism for our future with Brooks, Huff, Austin-Cave, and now Troutman.

After watching the 2002 National Championship game against Nebraska on ESPN yesterday, I see the potential of these young LBs to play with the same speed, agility, and tenacity of that championship LB core. The announcers just kept raving over and over about the speed and athleticism of the LBs and the defense as a whole. I'm not saying they have the same pedigree as those LBs from that championship team, but the athleticism looks very similar.

I really like where Manny is going with the defense.

If we could get Steed, Jennings, and Joyner healthy, we'll have tremendous depth at LB albeit not a lot of experience which is why McCloud's leadership and experience in 2020 will be crucial in his final year.
When players haven't seen the field in two years, typically they are more likely headed to the portal as opposed to providing depth.
 
i like that he's a linebacker from jump, where as a few of our guys we've had to transition to lb ... i think recruiting guys with those natural instincts is huge
 
Well it looks like 2021 LB Jaydon Hood didn't feel UM'S staff is stable and will be in Coral Gables longterm per his Michigan commitment article. So if Miami has a very good season, this could interesting with keeping Troutman vs a late flip attempt with Hood.


Go Canes
 
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