Scouting Cal freshman tight end Gavin Reinwald

The return of the TE. Gavin Reinwald is one of our two tight end commits from the 2017 recruiting class. But who is he and what does he bring to the California Golden Bears?

For starters, he hails from Northern California out of Elk Grove High School in the Sacramento area. And based off his highlight reel, he will most likely play more of a pass-catching role at Cal.

I say that because a large chunk of Reinwald’s highlight reel is him lining up as a wideout where he runs a variety of short crossing routes and deep routes. While he does show enough pace to outrun defenders on a consistent basis, he shows fairly quick feet on the routes that we do see him run. Moreover, he shows great concentration, body control and hands as he is able to consistently win jump balls. Reinwald also shows some ability to pick up yards after the catch as he makes defenders miss with a stutter step move and some shiftiness. And important for us to see as Reinwald will play as a TE is that he is not afraid to take a hit. One thing of note is that we don’t see much of the actual route running as the play develops, but as long as he is able to outcompete more athletic defenders at the next level he should be just fine.

As far as blocking goes, we don’t see much of it on Reinwald’s highlight reel at all. In fact, I don’t believe we see him pass block at all. On the plays where he plays with his hand in the dirt he either is run blocking or goes out to catch a pass. Based on what we can see from his run blocking though, he can lay down a solid hit, but he often fails to latch on to opposing defenders. Reinwald contains his man but he fails to move the line of scrimmage. But provided he is willing to learn and improve his strength, blocking is something that he can pick up as we go.

Reinwald also lines up occasionally on the defensive side. While he won’t do so for Cal, there are some things that we can take away like his willingness to lay down a big hit and that he does not shy from contact. Moreover, we see good lateral movement and he is flexible and athletic enough to flip his hips somewhat fluidly. Those are all skills that can translate to the offensive side of the ball, so that is welcome to see.

While Reinwald will certainly take some time to work on his strength and blocking, he provides a diverse skill set to our TE corp that is good to see. Down the road his pass-catching abilities will be a welcome weapon for Cal to utilize.