Last but not least we'll look at Terry Richardson's fellow Technician, Royce Jenkins-Stone.
Royce Jenkins-Stone 6'2" 215 lbs.
Outside Linebacker
Detroit Cass Tech
According to Scout, Jenkins-Stone finished his junior year with 90 tackles, five sacks and three interceptions. He's a player who has seen his stock grow tremendously in the past year. Once seen as an unpolished player who relied solely upon his athleticism to make plays, Jenkins-Stone has turned himself into an intelligent and fundamentally strong linebacker. Let's look at Royce's junior film and breakdown his emergence from there (btw, watch out for a great hit from Terry Richardson around the 5:37 mark).
Jenkins-Stone looks to be a more consummate middle linebacker prospect than Ross, even though he's listed as an outside linebacker. For one, his frame is one that could easily carry another 20-30 pounds while still supporting Jenkins-Stone's current speed (which is likely exaggerated when it's listed at 4.56) and agility. I liked Royce's patience, mainly because it's one of those instinctual attributes that he was likely lacking before the 2010 season that led to him not being as highly touted as Ross. I don't think Royce's instincts are quite up to James Ross' and he doesn't have the same closing speed, but he doesn't just run through the first opening in the line when he's pursuing a running back. He predicts where the back is likely to go and he contains well when he has to, forcing the ball carrier into a cul-de-sac. Thomas Wilcher and his staff at Cass deserve props for this. The lack of consistently displaying this attribute plagued Jonas Mouton, who was an extremely athletic safety-converted-to-linebacker for Michigan. Mouton was invited to the 2010 combine, but he could have been a top NFL prospect if he had ever learned that tackling isn't just chasing down the ball carrier, but forcing him back toward the strong side of the play or toward the sidelines, using angles to your advantage. It wouldn't be true to say that Royce or Ross are perfect at this, but they both seem to have the patience and instincts to be able to quickly develop this skill.
There was a time when Michigan had a massive lead in Royce Jenkins-Stone's recruitment, however, that lead has seemingly shrunk. Royce made it clear through various media that he was frustrated with the lack of attention that the new staff was showing him when other prospects in the area were getting scholarship offers, and he has since backed off stating Michigan as his leader (We'll see this phenomenon again when we look at another in-state recruit, Matthew Godin, and I'll explain then why it should be interpreted as encouraging, not discouraging, to M fans). Jenkins-Stone has offers from Iowa, MSU, and Oklahoma along with Michigan, and he told Scout.com that Oklahoma was his most impressive offer so far (I wouldn't look too much into this. Frankly, it's the truth). Royce made a recent visit to the Michigan campus, where according to Royce's twitter feed, Greg Mattison saw Royce as the next Ray Lewis. Whatever gets them to commit, Greg. In all seriousness, Royce would be a very good pick up, and keeping the Cass Tech pipeline perpetually solid to Michigan is important. That constant touch-up along with the signing of two defensive prospects with loads of potential can be accomplished for another year with the signings of both Terry Richardson and Royce Jenkins-Stone.
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