2022 Miami Hurricanes player preview: Ryan Ragone

Ryan Ragone has gradually improved every season. He shook the Manny Diaz linebacker curse, and is a social media presence for The U.

Ryan Ragone is a five-foot-eleven, 220 pound linebacker from Houston, Texas. At this point, Ragone is listed as a fifth year redshirt junior with the COVID year included. Over four seasons, Ragone has played in 26 games making 31 tackles with seven for a loss.

Ragone transferred to Miami from Arkansas State, where he played in one game as a freshman. Since then, he’s been a Coral Gables guy all the way. The most impressive thing about Ragone is that while linebackers around him played worse at times, he has gradually improved his game every season.

I wrote a piece on the linebackers back in April and Ragone hasn’t just improved his game, but when he’s on the field the other inside linebackers improved, too. When Ragone was on the field with Keontra Smith, Smith played his best football. Ragone is getting the other guys lined up, and he plays team ball, meaning he understands fill and spill linebacker play.

Do I want Ragone playing man on crossing routes or having to drop 15 yards deep in Tampa 2 as the Mike? No. But can he work in a tight space against the run, and in a tight 45 degree zone drop? He’s proven he can.

Ragone and former quarterback D’Eriq King have their King & Ragone Show, as well as videos on the Catching Canes Network.

Strengths: Football IQ, team football, tackling (he basically never fell victim to the Diaz curse on linebackers- who all freelanced, were lost, and couldn’t finish)

Areas of improvement: SPEED. You can’t make someone into Usain Bolt, but you can make players fastER. Ragone, need some speed work? Just hit me up.

2022 Prediction: 12 tackles, 2 TFL’s, 1 sack.