[jwplayer ijCrlIvI-XNcErKyb]
WEST BLOOMFIELD, Mich. — If you follow Michigan football recruiting, then you already know all about 2021 West Bloomfield (MI) four-star running back Donovan Edwards.
The local product has emerged as a national target, with not only the Wolverines, but also Ohio State, Alabama, Georgia and Oklahoma all in hot pursuit of his services.
But why? What makes him so special?
The Lakers head coach Ron Bellamy, the former Michigan wideout, sees Edwards every day, and first told WolverinesWire back in June 2019 that he was going to be a pursuit of all of the big national programs. That ended up being quite prescient.
So what makes Bellamy believe so strongly in Edwards and his potential?
“His work ethic – he has a tremendous work ethic on top of being very talented,” Bellamy said. “I’ll tell you, I’ve been around a lot of kids — not only my kids but other kids – I’ve been around some talented kids that sometimes you have to give them that motivation, get them going. He’s a self-driven kid. On top of being one of the more talented kids in our state. The kid, you talk about what his goals are, he’ll tell you, ‘Win a state championship.’ Because he knows all the individual goals come with that. He knows that a lot of coaches want to garner him as a football player because one: he has an unbelievable work ethic and he comes from a winning program, and coaches want to associate themselves with that.”
[lawrence-related id=20848,20817,20809,20800]
Bellamy has been at West Bloomfield for just a few years now, but he’s already put multiple high-level players into high-level programs.
Observing the football programs strength and conditioning on Friday, we saw a bit of Edwards’ work ethic ourselves. He treated every drill as a competition, was a vocal leader, seemed far beyond just a junior embarking upon his senior season of high school.
Bellamy notes that Edwards has something of an ‘it factor,’ just like many of those players who have come before him — not just at West Bloomfield, but at Michigan also.
“A lot of our guys are like that,” Bellamy said. “Lance Dixon, Trishton Jackson – we have a bunch of Power 5 guys. And the one common thing they have with each other is they’re super competitive. They hate losing. Whatever it is: classroom, weight room, conditioning – that’s what makes great players. People that don’t want to finish second. They always want to finish first and be the best.”
WAtch Edwards’ junior season film below:
[protected-iframe id=”0d5d182fee4f63708d539b963cc5ac26-146813584-139854940″ info=”//www.hudl.com/embed/video/3/9787122/5da90fe8b018da0d40397db1″ width=”640″ height=”360″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen=””]