Raul Aguirre has ‘Miami blood’ and is eager to help lead the Hurricanes’ turnaround
Raul Aguirre Jr. has spent most of his last seven years in Georgia, but he also, in many ways, individually embodies about as much of the wide-ranging Miami experience as one teenager can.
His father is Cuban-American, a one-time youth baseball star from Opa-locka, who played at Columbus and later at Southwest, played football for Alex Mirabal when he was on the Columbus coaching staff; his son even jokes he has a brother named after Mirabal’s. His mother is Black and went Carol City. One of eight children, Aguirre spent his first 10 years moving around different Miami-Dade County neighborhoods and towns — Overtown, Carol City, Opa-locka — and got his nickname “Popo” from the staff at the daycare he attended in Hialeah. He loved the Miami Hurricanes and dreamed of one day playing for them.
He can admit it now, then: There really wasn’t a whole lot of drama to his recruitment, especially after Mario Cristobal and Mirabal got to Coral Gables late last year.
“Off the rip, I’ve always told myself Miami was the school for me,” said the four-star linebacker from Fayetteville’s Whitewater. “Cristobal was recruiting me at Oregon and when I found out he went to Miami, of course that was a done deal right there, so as soon as he came I knew I wanted to be part of the Cane family.”
On Tuesday, the 6-foot-2, 220-pound athlete officially made his feelings known when he orally committed to the Hurricanes, opting to return home rather than take advantage of scholarship offers from the Alabama Crimson Tide and Ohio State Buckeyes. Although he won’t officially be able to sign his national letter of intent with Miami until December, Aguirre is already as enthusiastic about his plan as just about anyone in the Hurricanes’ Class of 2023.
His commitment was the culmination of a lifelong dream. His cousins and grandparents mostly still live in South Florida. Above all else, he still thinks of himself as a Miamian and is ecstatic to be in the middle of a potentially transformative moment at his future school.
“The Miami blood has always been there,” Aguirre said. “We’re definitely going to get something cranking.”
Aguirre first landed his offer from the Hurricanes last year, when Manny Diaz — now the Penn State Nittany Lions’ defensive coordinator — was still the coach. He visited Miami once during the old regime, but Cristobal’s arrival really helped vault the Hurricanes into contention, both because of the family ties to the new staff and the way he could see the program starting to change.
In the last month, some of Cristobal’s promise has started to come to fruition. In the last four weeks, Miami has added seven blue-chip recruits to their 2023 recruiting class and Aguirre, the No. 121 overall prospect in 247Sports’ composite rankings for the 2023 class, is the latest. He said he made his announcement last week because he finally felt comfortable with the rest of the coaching staff beyond Cristobal and Mirabal—he had no relationship with Charlie Strong, for example, before this year—even though he still hasn’t taken an official visit with the Hurricanes.
Although the outlook at his position could change by the time he finally gets on the field, Aguirre said he believes he can be “part of a Miami-changing team” and he fits perfectly into Cristobal’s puzzle. The Hurricanes have only signed two blue-chip linebackers since the Class of 2017 and, so far, neither has started a game at Miami. There’s an opening for Aguirre to potentially step in and help immediately stabilize a mostly underwhelming position group.
Strong, he said, mentioned the Hurricanes’ need at the position, but Aguirre insists the roster construction didn’t play much of a role in his decision.
This is also part of what makes him quintessentially old-school Miami: In their glory days, the Hurricanes emphasized competition on Greentree Practice Fields — at this point, it’s almost a cliche spouted by program legends — and Aguirre brings the same attitude.
“Wherever I go I’m going to compete for that position,” Aguirre said. “That’s why I think they liked me so much because I didn’t come in there asking, What linebackers do you have? I don’t care about that. I’m going to go in and do what I’ve got to do.”
This story was originally published July 18, 2022 at 12:38 PM.
