Patrick Destefano from Dorman HS in Spartanburg announced his commitment to Clemson publicly today, though we knew this had occurred in a private phone call to Dabo Swinney a week ago (if you saw this), if not secretly beforehand as first reported by TMB. Destefano is a 6’5 275lb Tackle/TE/H at Dorman and I’ve seen him play many times over the years, before his back injury last season (disc - KEEP HIM AWAY FROM BATSON), and his future at Clemson is probably at Guard. He chose CU over verbal offers from Duke, SC, Penn State, Tennessee, Notre Dame, and UNC among others. He was invited to the US Marines Corp All-American squad.
He will be rated as a 3-star player by Rivals, and some have questioned why he isn’t rated higher. He is rated higher by Tom Lemming, but I feel that this will come down. In my opinion the 5.7 3-star rating is correct, he is not yet a 4-star caliber player. His foot quickness is good and he moves well for a big guy, so his pass blocking has been good against some good DEs in the area. The reason why he isn’t rated higher is his run blocking. At his size, he should dominate more than he does, and since Dorman uses a heavy package out of the Wildcat, I would’ve expected him to show up more on run film than pass, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t get beat, but he’s more of a Landon Walker type of player in that he just doesn’t move people out of the way. He doesn’t appear to play angry to me, and that is what I want considering what we have starting for us right now.
Destefano’s father Frank played in the NFL and is a graduate of Duke, and the rumor to us was that Dad pushed hard for Patrick to look around at some of his offers and he has visited several schools that offered, as he should’ve. Notre Dame was one, and when Brian Kelly tried to bullshit his dad, that knocked them out of contention. Apparently they were making jokes about Southerners on his visit. Many of their fans now say he has no offer from ND. After that, it appeared it was all Clemson, who Patrick wanted to play for in the first place.
So, in short, a good player but not yet a great player, and he definitely fills a need for Clemson. At the Shrine Bowl Combine last month he bench-pressed 185 pounds for 19 repetitions, He recorded a broad jump of 8 feet, 5 inches at Spartanburg High; he said he has jumped 9 feet in previous tests. He ran a 5.32-second 40-yard dash; he said he should be able to run the 40 in 5-flat "any day of the week." And he ran the pro agility shuttle in 4.75 seconds; he said he ran it 4.44 seconds previously.
He becomes the 4th official commitment, giving us two interior OL when we need about 10 more tackles. He was recruited by Jeff Scott.
Film after the jump.