TJ Franklin

6'5, 276

5.04

23.0

30.5

The most criticized commit I have seen on this board proved many people wrong. You don't find players with his size that can move as well as he does, it is very impressive. To go along with his feet he has has great strength which shows up all over his film. He overpowers players consistently and it allows him to create tons of havoc in the backfield. His senior film is such a huge step up from his junior film which is natural for someone his size that is still getting used to his body. He looks so much more comfortable and so much less clumsy. This allowed him to make a bunch of plays and get lots of sacks this year. I went to his first game of the year against Cedar Ridge and his last game of the year against Midway. He was good in both but there was still a ton of improvement made from the beginning of the season to the end. He was much more aggressive, he attacked the ball, his motor didn't shut down, he played way better at DE than he did in the first game, the game slowed down, and he wasn't a liability in the run game. He improved all of that within the course of a season which just shows the kind of potential and ceiling this kid has which might be his number one strength.

He is around so many plays and then he somehow does not make some of them. This was really evident in his junior film but I still saw it some this season especially in the run game. It appears he has players in the backfield but he is just a step too late or his reaction is too slow. Currently he runs through defenders because he is simply bigger, he does not use many technical moves. I have seen him at camps and it is the same thing, he tries to run through or by people and it simply does not work. He could really use some work on his combination moves so that if his power fails he has technique to combat it. During games this year he got stood up multiple times by much smaller offensive lineman, he either got too high or he simply had no move to get away. That cannot happen often because when it did he was completely out of plays. The final thing I see with Franklin is his run defense is spotty. Too often he gets caught over running plays, missing tackles, not filling running lanes, and not flying to the ball in the run game.

I want him to for sure redshirt his first year on campus. I think his body could use it and it will also allow him to get the mental side of Phil Snow's defense which is clearly complex. After the redshirt year I suspect he will be thrown into the fire and be asked to play quite a few snaps in the defensive line rotation. He can play defensive tackle or defensive end in Baylor's defense and I think he will do well as long as he is given a little time to develop. He will be a major part of the rotation (in the two-deep) his RS-SO season.

87

There is so much to like from an improvement standpoint. He has awesome senior film that shows him making plays all over the backfield. All the negative plays he forced jumped his rating up. His rating also has potential weighed in it. At 6'5, 276 pounds with his mobility the sky is the limit for what he can become while at Baylor. His lack of offers, testing athleticism, and camp performances keep him out of the four-star category.