UofL Football Gets Commitment From 3 Star FL OL/DL Renato Brown

UofL Football just picked up a huge commitment from talented FL OL/DL Renato Brown who was visiting campus this weekend.

110% committed ⚫️🔴🐔 #UNCAGED19 pic.twitter.com/VWijoRAKI8

— Renato Brown (@Renato__59) January 13, 2019

Brown is a 6’3 310 lbs 3 Star lineman out of Palm Beach Central High School in West Palm Beach, FL. Brown had offers from Alabama, UK, Miami, Florida, and Georgia among others. In other words, this guy is über talented. Cort Dennison was UofL’s primary recruiter per 247sports.

I reviewed his Hudl Highlights for both his play on the offensive and defensive line. Let’s just say, wherever UofL coaches want him to play, he will likely be an impact player.

Offensive Line Play

As an OT primarily, Brown is an adept blocker in passing and rushing situations. He has a few characteristics that I think make him an impact OT.

Strength 

Brown is strong and demonstrates his strength numerous times in his highlight video. When run blocking, he is putting defenders on the turf a lot. He’s a juggernaut when he gets a head of steam. In pass blocking, when he gets his hands on defenders, they don’t move anywhere. The only place they may end up is the ground. Speaking of hands…

His Hands

Brown uses his hands wonderfully. Many times when a pass rusher can’t get to a QB, which happens a lot to pass rushers facing Brown, they will try to get their hands in passing lanes. Brown uses his hands to keep defenders from getting airborne to tip passes. His hands are obviously strong because defenders cannot shed him once he’s engaged them in a block no matter what they do.

Quick Feet and Good Footwork

As an OL, you must have good balance and agility to get out of your stance at the snap, beat often times quicker defenders to a spot, and then get leverage to stonewall or push them back. Brown is excellent at this. He gets out of his stance quickly on both passing and rushing plays.

On rushing plays, he can actually pull to the inside with graceful movement or he can dart to the outside with a quickness. Once he engages a defender on rushing plays, they often eat turf while his RB is gashing through the line.

On passing plays, he is quick enough to beat smaller, quicker edge rushers to the outside and he gets a strong push with his arms and hands, jabbing them backwards or to the ground violently. His good footwork makes it hard for pass rushers to use spin moves to beat him as he just moves right with them, often putting them on the ground.

Blocks Until the Whistle Blows

Brown’s motor is impressive. He will block until the whistle blows. A few times you see him not so politely escort defenders out-of-bounds. You will also see him pancake block one guy and instead of stopping, he will go find another guy and maul him as well. He seems to play with a nastiness and that will be welcome by UofL for sure.

Defensive Line Play

As a defensive lineman, it’s the same exact skills that make him a very good offensive lineman that make him a very good defensive lineman. Strength, hands, footwork, and playing until the whistle blows.

He uses his strength and hands to shed blocks with relative ease and make tackles. He uses his quick feet to get a good first step on slower offensive linemen and get past them practically unblocked and bring havoc in the backfield.

UofL needs quality depth on the offensive line. So, I could see Brown playing there under Coach Dwayne Ledford. However, his disruptive nature on the defensive line could make him a valuable asset at that position. Regardless, UofL got themselves an impact football player that will be a definite contributor; possibly from day 1. Excellent pickup by the new UofL staff.