Notre Dame Football: Ranking the 2020 Irish players 1-25

With our friend Douglas Farmer still furloughed from NBC and his Inside the Irish gig, I decided to rank the Notre Dame Fighting Irish players a little earlier than normal. Then, I asked the OFD staff to throw their rankings into the mix — so what we have here is the beginning of a really good stew.

There were 10 ballots in total that were counted with the simplistic #1 is 25 points and #25 is one point system. All in all, there were 42 players that received a ranking by at least one staff member. The ranking was a mix of “best” and “impact”.

Let’s get into the nitty gritty:

TOP 25 IRISH PLAYERS

1. Kyle Hamilton (237)
2. Ian Book (236)
3. Jeremiah Owusu-Koramoah (234)

This was a ridiculously close race between what many of us believe to be Notre Dame’s 3 best players. Book was ranked #7 on one ballot, and it was the difference maker between him and Hamilton. Sweet baby Kyle was never ranked lower than 3rd on any ballot.

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4. Daelin Hayes (194)
5. Liam Eichenberg (189)
6. Robert Hainsey (179)

The next three players were also consistent vote getters, with Hayes having less fluctuation than the other two. Eichenberg, however, had a handful of #2 and #3 ratings while Hayes never did get a vote higher than #4.

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7. Kevin Austin (161)
8. Drew White (158)
9. Adetokunbo Ogundeji (145)
10. Tommy Kraemer (144)

What’s interesting here is Kevin Austin. The wide receiver was actually left off one ballot entirely, and had he been ranked along the average, he would be further up to contend with the 4-6 group — and he’s barely played.

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11. Braden Lenzy (132)
12. Shaun Crawford (127)
13. Myron Tagovailoa-Amosa (126)
14. Aaron Banks (121)

If these are Notre Dame’s 11-14 best players on the roster in 2020 — I’m feeling pretty good about Notre Dame’s chances. I personally had Crawford a lot higher, but injury concerns definitely were on the minds of the voters.

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15. Tommy Tremble (108)
16. TaRiq Bracy (82)
17. Jafar Armstrong (78)
18. Jarrett Patterson (76)

It’s strange to see Armstrong so far down this list just a year after we all thought he would be one of the biggest pieces of the Irish offense. Tremble is a guy here that has all of the tools to blow this ranking out of the water with the departure of Cole Kmet.

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19. Kurt Hinish (59)
20. Jordan Genmark Heath (40)
21. Lawrence Keys III (38)
21. Houston Griffith (38)
23. Nick McCloud (37)
24. Jonathan Doerer (34)
25. Jayson Ademilola (33)

Rounding out the top 25 is a collection of players that will help the Irish out quite a bit in 2020. JGH, Hinish, Keys, and Doerer are all projected starters at this point with McCloud having a really great chance of becoming a starter at the boundary corner. Houston Griffith will be battling with Pryor for the safety spot opposite Hamilton.

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OTHERS RECEIVING VOTES

Chris Tyree (30), Josh Lugg (6), Javon McKinley (23), Bo Bauer (8), Michael Mayer (5), Bennett Skowronek (13), Jay Bramblett (9), Justin Ademilola (8), Jacob Lacey (4), Jamion Franklin (3), C’Bo Flemister (15), Mick Assaf (10), Shayne Simon (7), George Takacs (12), Isaiah Pryor (14), Isaiah Foskey (24), Brock Wright (10)

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