If you’ve followed recruiting for any length of time then you know how rare it is for Virginia Tech to steal a recruit away from the Florida schools, Alabama, or any SEC team for that matter. For this coaching staff to go down to Miami, Florida and grab a commitment from Donaldven Manning, in February, is impressive. That doesn’t happen too often around here.
Manning was a hot recruit this year, grabbing offers from Alabama, Auburn, LSU, Florida, Miami, Nebraska, Michigan State, South Carolina, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and plenty more. That is as impressive an offer sheet as they come. Manning deserves it though. In my mind, he’s one of the top cornerbacks in the country.
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Strengths
Perhaps the sole reason I’m so high on Manning and what he’ll bring to the table is his how advanced he is at this stage. By watching his film and his technique on film, you’d almost swear that he was a redshirt freshman at a college somewhere. He has incredible quickness, he knows how to position himself on the field as well, and he does a good job using his hands. He’s also one of the more physical corners that I’ve seen in this 2012 class.
It’s hard not to be excited about this kid. He just has “it.”
Weaknesses
Manning’s sole weakness will be his size or lackthereof. At 5’9” and 163 pounds, the Miami product will need to increase his bulk a little bit and add some more muscle mass onto his frame. That shouldn’t be much of a problem but hopefully he can managed about 175 to 180 pounds on his frame. That would be a good playing weight. Other than that, his technique, speed, awareness, vision… all of that is just top notch.
When Will He See The Field
I think the Hokies will have a good duo at cornerback this fall in Kyle Fuller and Detrick Bonner. However, if Fuller moves to safety, then Manning will have a great shot at being the starter on the field side this fall. The only player he’d have to beat out at that point is Kyshoen Jarrett. That may be a fun battle to watch this spring. Either way, I doubt a redshirt is in the cards for Manning. There’s no point to waste a year on him, especially since he probably isn’t going to stick around for five years. He might not have to stick around for four either.
Highlights
Closing Thoughts
If you purely want to rank this class on potential and upside, I don’t know how Manning isn’t our top commit right now. He’s probably the most ready to play athlete in this class and he plays a position where we routinely send players to the NFL every year. Plus, he plays down in Miami where you can practice football year round. As much as I love the Commonwealth of Virginia, you just don’t quite have that level of dedication here.
Plus, the Hokies last three Florida corners all went on to have success here in Blacksburg. Eric Green starter for a couple of years and went to the NFL, as did Brandon Flowers and Jayron Hosley. I fully expect Manning to continue that tradition.
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{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
I LOVE DONALDVEN MANNING SKILL SET I BELIEVE HE IS GOING TO BE A GREAT ONE FOR US.
Im thinking Joel Caleb and Korren Kirven shun us and picks WVU and Tennesse. I’m just getting a vibe that they’re aren’t into Va Tech that much.
Seriously…a vibe??? There is no way we lose both. I think Caleb is a Hokie all the way, especially after he sees what a massive dump Morgantown is. And from what I hear, Kirven’s UT trip was good, not great
i think we get caleb and kirven.
i heard that bud visted ken ekanem last night think we land him?
We’ll have a better feel after he visits us officially this weekend. I do wish we had the last visit though, that’s the only reason I’m nervous on this one. ND will get final say.
Who is the QB that VT just sent an offer out to and what type of QB is he?
Haven’t heard of any new offers out to QBs but I’ll check and see what I can find.
do you think we land stanford and deloatch?
I doubt Deloatch comes here unless he preps first and squares up everything on his end. He has a lot to get done in a short amount of time so we’ll see. We have not offered him to this point. Stanford really likes us and its going to come down to Ark St, TCU, and us. I like our chances.
By the way, you pronounce his first name as “Donovan” as in “Donovan McNabb” the “l” and “d” are silent.
i believe we land ekanem, caleb, kirven, stanford.
We have three of our LB verbals coming in this weekend with Ekanem, according to The Key Play. Clark, Vandyde, and Edmunds are taking there officials also this weekend. If they have any competitive evaluations while they are in the burg, I think we would all like to see that. All four are awesome recruits. Maybe a little competition with our other recruits is what Ekanem needs to size up the caliber of our current verbals and make a decision on whether or not he wants to join our team.