The Wise Move for the (Possible) Last Spot

As Tennessee hits the home stretch of the 2019 class it has an incredibly limited number of spots to add more players, and despite what was a very successful Early Signing Period haul there are still needs at virtually every position.  The Thursday night addition of Georgia transfer Deangelo Gibbs – a former 5-star prospect who will boost the talent on the roster regardless of whether he’s eligible in 2019 or not until 2020 – reduces that number even further to likely only 3-4 spots.

OL Darnell Wright (1) and LBs Henry To’oto’to (2) and Chris Russell (3) probably have a spot available to each of them, respectively, and Wright appears to be a Vol lock while Tennessee is in good shape with instate Russell for whom they’re primarily battling Arkansas.  After an outstanding OV to Knoxville and the departure of Alabama DC Tosh Lupoi To’oto’to appears to be strongly trending to the Vols, but Saban (and likely new DC Pete Golding) and Alabama will fight for him until the end.  But with the Vols in good shape there too that seems like 3 of the max 4 spots are reserved and likely taken. 

Then there is WR George Pickens, the Auburn commit for whom the Vols are battling not just the Tigers but also UGA (where he’s OV’ing this weekend) and LSU.  Pickens has some grade concerns and of course is going to be a tough pull regardless.  He’s planning on going back to Auburn next weekend for an unofficial visit and you can bet that Malzahn and Co. are going to do everything – and I mean everything – they can to get him to shut down his recruitment.  Were Pickens to come out of that weekend wanting to take his last visit the Vols will still be in a battle with UF and Miami just to get that.  So there are quite a few obstacles to landing Pickens signature before you even get to qualifying and enrolling.  Regardless, Tennessee would make room for him if he decided he wanted to sign with the Vols.  He’s that good.

The Vols do have quite a few other prospects on the board, and in an ideal world would like to add another DL as well as another DB, but right now there won’t be room to add both and maybe not one of either.  Interestingly, Tennessee does in fact have a DL and a DB committed – DL Leddarius Cox and S Anthony Harris. 

Below we take a look at the options at both positions.

Defensive Line

Cox visited last weekend and came away saying he wants to sign with Tennessee.  However, both sides are clearly evaluating all of their other options, as Cox will OV to Auburn this weekend and Ole Miss the next, while the Vols are bringing in DL Wisdom Asaboro this weekend and are also recruiting DL Charles Moore and Kristian Williams (committed to Minnesota) as well.  Moore has yet to finalize an OV to Knoxville and lists Florida (OV’d last weekend) and Auburn (OV’d in December) as his Top 2 with the Vols in the third spot, while Mississippi State, where he was long committed, is also still trying.  The staff seems to be keeping Williams warm and might bring him on an OV the last weekend.

Defensive Back

At DB, Tennessee is bringing in CB/Nickel Jammie Robinson this weekend and also has Kenney Solomon (offered this past weekend on an UV) and Jamal Hill to go with Harris on the board.  Robinson is relatively undersized but is a dynamic playmaker and had an outstanding senior season.  He’s coming off a good OV to Auburn last weekend after visiting South Carolina and Kentucky before the Early Signing Period.  It seems like Kentucky would take him today, and likely South Carolina as well.  Auburn likes him a lot but, like Tennessee, would take him if numbers were not an issue but simply might not have room.  It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that another school swoops in between now and Signing Day because Robinson will have one more OV remaining. Solomon is a sleeper prospect who I don’t see Tennessee signing and Hill, while a really good prospect who looks to have a lot of potential, appears to be getting more love from among others Oregon, where he’s visiting this weekend.

Harris is an excellent prospect who shined during the NC/SC Shrine Game week after an outstanding senior season leading his team deep into the playoffs as a QB.  However, he’s got grade and other potential off the field issues (nothing scandalous, from my understanding) and at this point it seems unlikely that he signs with Tennessee in February.

So What Should Tennessee Do?

Let’s make one thing clear: No one other than Coach Jeremy Pruitt and his staff knows exactly how much room Tennessee has to sign players.  There are rules and then there are loopholes, and that’s why the Tennessee program employs administrative people who are experts at this sort of thing.  What we know is that the SEC says a school can only have 25 initial counters for each year, but that schools can both backcount and forward-count players.  We also know that Tennessee signed 19 in February and have enrolled the aforementioned Gibbs, who must count towards this year’s class.  Further, we know that Tennessee has to count 2019 grad transfers Keller Chryst and Madre London towards this class.  And finally, we know that Michigan transfer Aubrey Solomon could be counted towards the 2020 class as he did not take an official visit (unlike Gibbs).

Point being, if Pickens wants in and Tennessee has already landed the Wright/To’oto’to/Russell trio the Vols will make it work one way or the other. But what if they don’t land him?  Do they still have a spot, and would they want to use it on a DL or a DB?

This is where I think the Vols should, like they have with the additions of Solomon and Gibbs – both of whom could possibly have to wait until 2020 to play – think towards the future and perhaps a bit out of the box.  Which player on the board has the most size, positional flexibility, and upside?  Easy, that’s Wisdom Asaboro.

The brief background on Asaboro is that via the Access to Sucess program, which also brought fellow Nigerian Chris Akporoghene to the US, Asaboro accepted an academic scholarship from Christ School in North Carolina in September 2016 and then after a brief return to Nigeria enrolled at Covenant Day School this year as the school was fielding its first varsity football team.  He’s 6-foot-8 and 280 pounds and has a 7’4″ wingspan.  Please make sure you read that last part again as you watch these highlights of him not just dominating at the line of scrimmage – table stakes for a kid that big against the kind of competition he was facing – but also chase down plays well past the line of scrimmage and play running back.  Those highlights are why, even though it was unclear up until a few weeks ago whether he was going to be a 2019 or 2020 signee – it turns out he’d already graduated from high school in Nigeria so 2019 became a late option – he got offers from the likes of not just Tennessee but also UGA and other bigtime programs. That athleticism has also been shown as he has competed on both the basketball and track and field teams.

He’s raw for sure, and to the degree that either of Moore or Cox or Williams at DL or any of those DBs could help next year, most of them, particularly the DL, are more likely to do so than Asaboro.  However from here all of those prospects, while solid in their own right, project to be future rotational players at their respective positions.  On the other hand, Asaboro has the kind of rare size and athleticism combination that projects to a bigtime college career and even an NFL future on either side of the ball with the right development. 

Assuming Tennessee does in fact land Wright/To’oto’to/Russell they’ll have themselves an outstanding and borderline Top 10 class even if they don’t add anyone else.  And that ranking won’t take into account the additions of Solomon and Gibbs, two former 5-star talents who have both been in elite college programs and will each immediately take the roster to another level talent wise whenever they respectively become eligible.  But if Tennessee is looking to get back to being an elite program, which it certainly is, it needs more elite talent.  And from here it looks like of all the prospects left on the board that Asaboro far and away has the potential to be just that.  So the recommendation here would be for Tennessee to go full bore after Asaboro this weekend and given themselves a shot at having another blue chip player on its roster. Further, wait to see if Harris can get qualified after National Signing Day and have him enroll in the summer (ala Bryce Thomson last year) and count towards the 2020 class. He’s good enough to use that spot on him as he’d be another foundational piece for that class to go with QB Harrison Bailey and JUCO DL Jordan Davis.