We'll jump right in. As always, The Chamber is information for PowerMizzou.com subscribers only, so please keep discussion on the Tigers' Lair.
- Want to talk about the quarterback spot in the 2016 class. We said in the Recruiting Q&A that Nashville (Tenn.) Christ Presbyterian Academy prospect Zack Weatherly appears to be the guy and that hasn’t changed in the last couple of days. What we are hearing is that Mizzou coaches really like his accuracy and the way he runs an offense.
As a junior he completed 125 of 180 (69.4%) for 1765 yards (9.8 YPA, 14.12 YPCo) with 29 touchdowns and three interceptions. He can also run a little bit gaining 557 yards on 41 carries (13.6 YPCa) with nine touchdowns. He put up those stats while leading CPA to a 14-0 season and the Tennessee Division 1 3A Championship.
It is really starting to sound like it will be Weatherly or nobody, but we will continue to follow the situation closely as changes happen all the time. Weatherly recently committed to Tennessee-Chattanooga, but if Mizzou offers that will obviously change things tremendously for him. As a sophomore he played with Paul Adams and Thomas Richard and if he gets the offer most likely he would again. Mizzou has been in contact with Weatherly weekly since September 1 and it sounds like a decision on the offer will be made by December. He talks with Andy Hill the most, but also talks with Pat Washington.
One angle to consider here is that Mizzou wants a kid that may be under-the-radar to go between Drew Lock and another bigger name quarterback in the 2017 class. Not saying Weatherly won’t want to compete for the starting job and will be perfectly content to sit on the bench for five years. He no doubt has some ambitions of his own. There is something, however, to the fact that right now he is committed to an FCS school and only getting any Power-5 interest from Syracuse and Wake Forrest in addition to Missouri.
- Missouri offered 2016 Dallas (Texas) Wilmer-Hutchins safety DeMarkus Acy recently and we are hearing that some of the Mizzou coaches are very high on him. Before the Mizzou offer it was sounding like Acy was Big 12 bound, with Oklahoma, Texas Tech, Texas, Kansas and Kansas State standing out to him.
With Zaire Jones, Meridian (Miss.) safety who has Mizzou in top three, and now Acy it looks like Ikenna Okeke has some competition for that one remaining safety spot. It continues to sound like Okeke is the top target at the position, but the Tigers needed to develop some good options considering they are going against in-state Tennessee as well as Notre Dame, Stanford and Penn State for the Smyrna (Tenn.) product.
Talking with our Tennessee site it sounds like there may be a few targets ahead of Okeke on the Volunteers’ board, which is a positive for Mizzou. He specifically mentioned comparing Tennessee and Missouri when we talked last week. One of the factors Okeke said he would pay attention to is how much of a priority the coaching staffs made him.
- A little more on Zaire Jones. He is being recruited by Pat Washington and likes that coach Washington is familiar with the Mississippi region having coached at Mississippi State and Southern Miss. Jones told PowerMizzou that he felt like he made his decision to originally commit to Mississippi State for immature reasons and that is why he decided to open things up in August. The Bulldogs are still heavily in the mix along with Vanderbilt and Missouri.
Jones plans to officially visit all three before he makes a decision, but he has not scheduled any of the visits yet. They will most likely start happening fairly soon as he doesn’t want to wait to go on them all after the season. He is a December graduate and wants to commit to a school by the end of November.
- Another player to watch at safety is Devon Clarke. The Kissimmee (Fla.) Osceola prospect was committed to Oregon State at one point, but has since opened his recruitment back up. No offer from Mizzou yet, but it sounds like he is a player Mizzou is evaluating.
- We have laid out what’s going on at quarterback and safety for you so that leaves defensive line as the last position that we know Mizzou will take more commitments at. At this point it still sounds like Missouri will take two defensive lineman.
There is always the possibility they could add an offensive lineman as well. Numerous people have told us that is the one position the Tigers are always willing to go over the numbers at. There is also a chance they add a wide receiver or linebacker. We also can’t forget about sign and place guys. For now, though, we will mostly focus on quarterback, safety and defensive line until we get some more substantive information on the other positions.
- PowerMizzou talked with Jovan Swann briefly earlier in the week. Things are kind of on hold for him right now as he tries to figure out which schools he wants to officially visit. We still feel like Missouri is likely to get an official visit, but Swann isn’t tipping his hand at all. Right now he is talking everything over with his parents. Together they are trying to decide on schools and dates for visits. Indiana, Stanford and Northwestern are schools that also seem likely to get an official.
- With Missouri on the road at Kentucky this weekend they obviously won’t have any visitors. They will have one of their top defensive lineman targets watching them take on the Wildcats though. Brownsville (Tenn.) Haywood prospect Emmit Gooden will be in Lexington for an unofficial visit taking advantage of the opportunity to see two of the schools recruiting him hard. It’s the second time this season he has done that as he also went to the Mississippi State versus LSU game. His decision won’t be made off of watching teams play, but it is an opportunity for him to see how the Mizzou defensive line plays in person.
- PowerMizzou will start to turn more of our attention to the 2017 football class with there being so few spots remaining in the 2016 class. Unfortunately the 2017 class will be one of the smallest the Tigers have had so it could be a little bit slow as they wait to see how played develop in-state and in their primary recruiting regions.
Missouri has 12 seniors that will exhaust their eligibility after the 2016 season. Generally, the Tigers oversign by around four so expect a class of 16 or so. It could be 11 and 15 if Harold Brantley has to sit out another season, which isn’t completely out of the realm of possibility. Medical redshirts for Steward and Brantley seem unlikely since they appeared to redshirt by choice as freshman, but schools often file the paperwork anyways and the NCAA has been known to make some puzzling decisions.
All that being said a class of 15 or 16 is most likely in 2017. Jeff Thomas, A.J. Epenesa and Chester Graves are the big local targets that everyone should be familiar with already. DaRon Davis got the early offer, but if they’re taking only one wide receiver and no running backs (which is a possibility we’ve heard talked about) then the priority at wide receiver is going to be Thomas. The one consideration to that is if Davis decides to go ahead and commit early (like he almost did in July) we believe Missouri would take it. Thomas is a guy that they will oversign for. What sounds like is going to happen though is that Missouri will not use up a lot of resources on Davis moving forward.
Defensive line, cornerback and linebacker will be priority positions in the 2017 class. They will also take a quarterback, tight end and some offensive lineman. For now we are going to work off of this breakdown.
QB 1
TB 0
WR 1
TE 1
OL 3
DL 4
LB 2
CB 2
S 1
15
Now this will obviously evolve depending on attrition over the next year and some other variables, but this is what we have for now. If for some reason Missouri does decide to take a running back in this class SLUH (Mo.) prospect Andrew Clair is definitely one to watch. Has very good balance, change of direction and acceleration. Seemed to have pretty good vision and patience. Top end speed isn’t great, but looks to be plenty good enough. He is hearing from several schools, but Iowa is still his only offer.
- Will finish with the Top Tiger Targets. The list is getting short now with likely only four spots remaining.
1. Amani Bledsoe
2. Emmit Gooden
3. Ikenna Okeke
4. Zack Weatherly
- Want to talk about the quarterback spot in the 2016 class. We said in the Recruiting Q&A that Nashville (Tenn.) Christ Presbyterian Academy prospect Zack Weatherly appears to be the guy and that hasn’t changed in the last couple of days. What we are hearing is that Mizzou coaches really like his accuracy and the way he runs an offense.
As a junior he completed 125 of 180 (69.4%) for 1765 yards (9.8 YPA, 14.12 YPCo) with 29 touchdowns and three interceptions. He can also run a little bit gaining 557 yards on 41 carries (13.6 YPCa) with nine touchdowns. He put up those stats while leading CPA to a 14-0 season and the Tennessee Division 1 3A Championship.
It is really starting to sound like it will be Weatherly or nobody, but we will continue to follow the situation closely as changes happen all the time. Weatherly recently committed to Tennessee-Chattanooga, but if Mizzou offers that will obviously change things tremendously for him. As a sophomore he played with Paul Adams and Thomas Richard and if he gets the offer most likely he would again. Mizzou has been in contact with Weatherly weekly since September 1 and it sounds like a decision on the offer will be made by December. He talks with Andy Hill the most, but also talks with Pat Washington.
One angle to consider here is that Mizzou wants a kid that may be under-the-radar to go between Drew Lock and another bigger name quarterback in the 2017 class. Not saying Weatherly won’t want to compete for the starting job and will be perfectly content to sit on the bench for five years. He no doubt has some ambitions of his own. There is something, however, to the fact that right now he is committed to an FCS school and only getting any Power-5 interest from Syracuse and Wake Forrest in addition to Missouri.
- Missouri offered 2016 Dallas (Texas) Wilmer-Hutchins safety DeMarkus Acy recently and we are hearing that some of the Mizzou coaches are very high on him. Before the Mizzou offer it was sounding like Acy was Big 12 bound, with Oklahoma, Texas Tech, Texas, Kansas and Kansas State standing out to him.
With Zaire Jones, Meridian (Miss.) safety who has Mizzou in top three, and now Acy it looks like Ikenna Okeke has some competition for that one remaining safety spot. It continues to sound like Okeke is the top target at the position, but the Tigers needed to develop some good options considering they are going against in-state Tennessee as well as Notre Dame, Stanford and Penn State for the Smyrna (Tenn.) product.
Talking with our Tennessee site it sounds like there may be a few targets ahead of Okeke on the Volunteers’ board, which is a positive for Mizzou. He specifically mentioned comparing Tennessee and Missouri when we talked last week. One of the factors Okeke said he would pay attention to is how much of a priority the coaching staffs made him.
- A little more on Zaire Jones. He is being recruited by Pat Washington and likes that coach Washington is familiar with the Mississippi region having coached at Mississippi State and Southern Miss. Jones told PowerMizzou that he felt like he made his decision to originally commit to Mississippi State for immature reasons and that is why he decided to open things up in August. The Bulldogs are still heavily in the mix along with Vanderbilt and Missouri.
Jones plans to officially visit all three before he makes a decision, but he has not scheduled any of the visits yet. They will most likely start happening fairly soon as he doesn’t want to wait to go on them all after the season. He is a December graduate and wants to commit to a school by the end of November.
- Another player to watch at safety is Devon Clarke. The Kissimmee (Fla.) Osceola prospect was committed to Oregon State at one point, but has since opened his recruitment back up. No offer from Mizzou yet, but it sounds like he is a player Mizzou is evaluating.
- We have laid out what’s going on at quarterback and safety for you so that leaves defensive line as the last position that we know Mizzou will take more commitments at. At this point it still sounds like Missouri will take two defensive lineman.
There is always the possibility they could add an offensive lineman as well. Numerous people have told us that is the one position the Tigers are always willing to go over the numbers at. There is also a chance they add a wide receiver or linebacker. We also can’t forget about sign and place guys. For now, though, we will mostly focus on quarterback, safety and defensive line until we get some more substantive information on the other positions.
- PowerMizzou talked with Jovan Swann briefly earlier in the week. Things are kind of on hold for him right now as he tries to figure out which schools he wants to officially visit. We still feel like Missouri is likely to get an official visit, but Swann isn’t tipping his hand at all. Right now he is talking everything over with his parents. Together they are trying to decide on schools and dates for visits. Indiana, Stanford and Northwestern are schools that also seem likely to get an official.
- With Missouri on the road at Kentucky this weekend they obviously won’t have any visitors. They will have one of their top defensive lineman targets watching them take on the Wildcats though. Brownsville (Tenn.) Haywood prospect Emmit Gooden will be in Lexington for an unofficial visit taking advantage of the opportunity to see two of the schools recruiting him hard. It’s the second time this season he has done that as he also went to the Mississippi State versus LSU game. His decision won’t be made off of watching teams play, but it is an opportunity for him to see how the Mizzou defensive line plays in person.
- PowerMizzou will start to turn more of our attention to the 2017 football class with there being so few spots remaining in the 2016 class. Unfortunately the 2017 class will be one of the smallest the Tigers have had so it could be a little bit slow as they wait to see how played develop in-state and in their primary recruiting regions.
Missouri has 12 seniors that will exhaust their eligibility after the 2016 season. Generally, the Tigers oversign by around four so expect a class of 16 or so. It could be 11 and 15 if Harold Brantley has to sit out another season, which isn’t completely out of the realm of possibility. Medical redshirts for Steward and Brantley seem unlikely since they appeared to redshirt by choice as freshman, but schools often file the paperwork anyways and the NCAA has been known to make some puzzling decisions.
All that being said a class of 15 or 16 is most likely in 2017. Jeff Thomas, A.J. Epenesa and Chester Graves are the big local targets that everyone should be familiar with already. DaRon Davis got the early offer, but if they’re taking only one wide receiver and no running backs (which is a possibility we’ve heard talked about) then the priority at wide receiver is going to be Thomas. The one consideration to that is if Davis decides to go ahead and commit early (like he almost did in July) we believe Missouri would take it. Thomas is a guy that they will oversign for. What sounds like is going to happen though is that Missouri will not use up a lot of resources on Davis moving forward.
Defensive line, cornerback and linebacker will be priority positions in the 2017 class. They will also take a quarterback, tight end and some offensive lineman. For now we are going to work off of this breakdown.
QB 1
TB 0
WR 1
TE 1
OL 3
DL 4
LB 2
CB 2
S 1
15
Now this will obviously evolve depending on attrition over the next year and some other variables, but this is what we have for now. If for some reason Missouri does decide to take a running back in this class SLUH (Mo.) prospect Andrew Clair is definitely one to watch. Has very good balance, change of direction and acceleration. Seemed to have pretty good vision and patience. Top end speed isn’t great, but looks to be plenty good enough. He is hearing from several schools, but Iowa is still his only offer.
- Will finish with the Top Tiger Targets. The list is getting short now with likely only four spots remaining.
1. Amani Bledsoe
2. Emmit Gooden
3. Ikenna Okeke
4. Zack Weatherly
