Monday Musings: Canes recruiting and MLB Draft nuggets

What’s up, ya’ll?

I hope your week has gotten off to a good start. We are now in the armpit of the sports world, with no sports on until baseball gets back after the All-Star Break. Gah. At least NFL training camp and college football fall camp is about to get underway for teams across the country.

Oh, yeah, and the MLB Draft is in progress and recruiting never stops. So, let’s get to that.

1) Jackson Cantwell got his proper due from Rivals on Monday.

The recruiting outlet dubbed Cantwell their #1 player in their Rivals300 list.

A nice recognition to be sure. And it’s something that we’re not really used to seeing with Miami. While some might deny it, I do not see as many Ohio State, Georgia, Texas commits get dropped at or not very long after they commit like I have far too often with Miami. I feel like there’s a view that when an elite player commits to an elite program, they’re going to have a great career, so the systems want to justify that with a high ranking to say, ‘see, we told you he’d be great.’ And that’s not how thing should work.

2) I will say I cannot get over this about Cantwell. I’ve seen some freaks in the gym. This is on a whole different level.

The level of strength of this is beyond words. Yeah, he’s big and he clearly has great genetics with his father, but close grip benching 475 for ANYONE in football, regardless of age or level, is stupid-strong. Much less a 17-year-old. And that was a smooth rep, so he had more in the tank. I can’t imagine what his touch-and-go regular grip one rep max bench press will be when he gets fully developed at Miami.

What I do know is that records are going to fly off the wall inside the Canes’ weight room after he gets there. You can pretty much count on that.

3) Derrek Cooper is set to pull the trigger on his commitment Sunday night, so that’ll be before the next version of this post.

The Longhorns have been making some moves lately, it seems, and On3/Rivals experts are starting to believe the Chaminade-Madonna Prep star is heading out of state, with Texas and Georgia being close at the top at this point.

I obviously hope Mario Cristobal can close the deal, but I’m not sweating the RB position like others might be. I think it’s a position where you can find an impact transfer or another local product that can succeed behind a well-built offensive line.

So, while I hope the Canes pull it off, I’m not going to lose sleep if they don’t.

4) By the way, Miami had a name called last night in the first three rounds of the 2025 MLB Draft.

Pitcher Griffin Hugus was selected in the third round with the 91st overall pick by the Seattle Mariners.

For anyone wondering if Hugus might come back, that draft slot has a value of $851,800 per MLB.com, so westward he surely goes. He’s now heading to an organization that’s absolutely flush with quality pitching, particularly after selecting LSU ace Kade Anderson with the third overall pick. Best of luck to Hugus in (eventually, hopefully) the Pacific Northwest.