UM’s newest commit considers Jaquan Johnson a mentor. He explains why he’s coming home
Deshawn Troutman was working at his job on potato farm in Central Florida a few weeks ago when he had an epiphany.
The Miami Hurricanes had entered his recruitment a few months earlier and Troutman, who grew up in South Florida before he moved to Orlando about three years ago, had been thinking about home. He missed his friends he grew up with in southern Miami-Dade County and the family he had strewn all across the region.
“I was like, I want to go back home,” Troutman said. “Ever since then, I wanted to go to Miami.”
Last Wednesday, Troutman made his decision. The three-star linebacker from Orlando Edgewater orally committed to the Hurricanes despite never being able to make his way to Coral Gables for a formal visit because of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
Troutman is deeply familiar with the area, though. He has been to the campus plenty of times in the past for field trips. His sister is a cheerleader and used to compete in competitions at the Watsco Center. The 6-1, 205-pound linebacker grew up playing in the same parks as past, current and future Hurricanes.
Before he moved to Overtown and then eventually Orlando, Troutman played his earliest days at Richmond Heights Park, where he got to know Jaquan Johnson, the Buffalo Bills safety and beloved former Miami star. Johnson became a player for Troutman to look up to and lean on. Troutman would even go to Miami Killian games when he was younger to watch Johnson play in high school.
“A couple of dudes that went to Miami were like mentors to me when I was little,” Troutman said. “They were a little bit older than me playing for the same park and they would just like take me under their wing, rough me up a little bit, make me tougher, you know what I mean?”
Killian outside linebacker Tyler Johnson, the safety’s younger brother, is one of two other linebackers in the Hurricanes’ Class of 2021, which sits at No. 15 in the 247Sports.com composite rankings. Troutman, however, is the first true middle linebacker.
Last season, Troutman piled up 89 total tackles, 11 tackles for loss, a sack, three passes defended and a fumble recovery in just nine games.
The junior helped Edgewater reach the Class 7A championship, where they fell to Fort Lauderdale St. Thomas Aquinas, 28-23, on the final play of the game.
The Hurricanes offered Troutman about a month later when director of recruiting David Cooney, who was serving as an extra coach on the road while Miami had a vacancy on its staff, made the trip up to Orlando to meet with Troutman in person.
A little while later, defensive coordinator Blake Baker started reaching out to Troutman and the two bonded on voice chats while the coronavirus pandemic shut down in-person recruiting.
Although he grew up rooting for the Hurricanes, Troutman said he hadn’t given Miami much real thought early on as a few other teams, including the Louisville Cardinals, offered him last year. Once the Hurricanes joined the picture, his thought process flipped.
“Before they offered me, I wasn’t even thinking about going there,” Troutman said. “That’s when they changed the playing field.”
Troutman is the 14th member of the Hurricanes’ 2021 recruiting class and the 13th from Florida. Thirteen of the 14 players — including Troutman and Texas’ Elijah Arroyo — grew up in Miami-Dade before moving to their new homes and 11 of the 14 currently go to schools in Miami-Dade or Broward counties.
Troutman, who grew up with outside linebacker commit Ja’Corey Hammett and defensive tackle commit Allan Haye, is excited to come home.
“That’s just the way we like it!” he said of the Hurricanes’ local-heavy class.
This story was originally published June 3, 2020 at 1:42 PM.
