Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Football Secures Three Commits for 2025 in Jackson Cook, Darrion Jones & Tate Nagy

Starting point is 00:00:00 On today's Locked on Jayhawks, three more commitments for KU football. A couple receivers in Jackson Cook and Tate Nagy and a safety in Darian Jones. We're talking about what it means. And KU with Lance Leipold continuing to excel on the recruiting trail. You are Locked on Jayhawks. Your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. I'm Derek Johnson.

Starting point is 00:00:31 You can give me a follow on Twitter at DJohnsonRadio, and you can find our show with Locked On Jayhawks anywhere you get your podcast, including on our YouTube page where you can like and subscribe to the show. And on today's edition of LOJ, we're talking KU football, adding three more commitments over this past weekend from Friday through Sunday. They got a couple of receivers. They added a safety in total 14 commits now in the class of 2025,

Starting point is 00:00:53 which will break down that class of 2025. We'll talk about the future at each positions. They added with receiver and safety and overall the, the job that Lance Leipold has done in the recruiting game, not just this year, but overall in his time at Kansas and how it's been very impressive, especially compared to some of his predecessors in Lawrence. First, before we get into any of that,

Starting point is 00:01:13 today's episode is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook. Make every moment more with FanDuel. As playoffs wind down, the sports stop sporting like we want them to. But this summer, FanDuel is hooking up all customers with a boost or a bonus daily. That's right. There's something for everyone every day all summer long. Visit FanDuel.com slash locked on to get started today. So we're going to start with who KU added, the commitments that they gathered for the

Starting point is 00:01:40 class of 2025, and a little bit of scouting reports on the three players. Let's start with Jackson Cook, because you have Jackson Cook, Tate Nagy, and Darian Jones, three players. So Cook is a 6'1", 180-pound wide receiver. He is from Snellville, Georgia, and all three of these commits are class of 2025. From South Gwinnett High School, he eventually, it sounds like it was between Kansas and UConn, ended up choosing Kansas over UConn a couple commits from KU or for KU I should say from the Peach State now you have Jackson

Starting point is 00:02:12 Cook here you added the linebacker last week look out Kirby smart Lance Leipold's a coming in your own backyard but no in uh in all reality Cook an 85 graded three star on 24-7 sports. He has a 5.5 rating at Rivals, which Rivals works on a scale of it's like 5.1 to 6.2. Their three star ranges are 5.5 through 5.7. So that means he's a lower end of the three star, but still three star there. 77 graded on ESPN. He's unranked with on three total at all up top 1500 nationally. He is a top 200 receiver.

Starting point is 00:02:47 When you look at the 24 seven sports composite for Jackson cook and somebody who I think probably has a lot of potential in terms of the athleticism that he kind of brings to the table, but you didn't see it maybe in the unrealized stats. So in 2023, he caught 13 passes, that's it, for 276 yards and two touchdowns. Obviously good yardage based on the receptions there. This is a potential play, and keep in mind,

Starting point is 00:03:16 that was as a junior, as a senior this next season, he could end up with 800 receiving yards. You don't totally know. He ran an 11.33 in the 100-yard dash, according to his player profile on 24-7 sports. receiving yards. You know, you don't totally know. He ran an 11.33 in the 100-yard dash, according to his player profile on 24-7 Sports. At a comparison, Savion Morrison, who's a fast player for KU, but probably not one of the five fastest, he was like 10.7 in high school, so faster there. But apparently there was a clocked 4.47 40-yard dash for Cook, which that would tell you he is pretty fast, especially if that was just as a junior in high school, which means, you know, you're growing, you're getting faster,

Starting point is 00:03:48 you're getting more muscular as you become a senior in high school, as you go through college for a few years, right? There's no reason that couldn't get down to like 4.4 and Morrison's like a 4.52, 40 yard dash guy. So maybe that means Cook is more of your fast guy in that first 40, 50 yards. Morrison has a little bit more acceleration there. And he's at 6'1", 6'2", that's a good size for a receiver. If you're a good size for a receiver and you're running around 4'5", in the 40-yard dash, that's going to be good enough to have kind of enough athleticism that you need to be a good power five player. Overall, not too much tape because of those lack of catches.

Starting point is 00:04:28 He showed some breakaway speed and some of the stuff that was on there. Showed some good fight, I thought, in going for blocks in the run game. Looked like that was something he was very interested in doing. He had a few nice run routes, but it's hard to take too much from the limited opportunities or notable plays or feel like you had a huge route tree because a lot of the routes that you saw i think there was like one out route on the big uh uh highlight profile but the rest it was all like bubble screens or like a either a slant or a post which basically is you know sort of the same thing just different kind of depth and yardage there uh so what does that mean does that mean

Starting point is 00:05:02 that those are just his four days and he doesn't have a full route tree and that'll be something that he has to learn at KU? Does it just mean he hasn't got to show at all yet because maybe they had other players that were seniors on the team or something that they were going to more than him? And with his athleticism and speed and everything, there's more untapped potential here.

Starting point is 00:05:18 I'm sure more is going to come as a senior. And that's, I think, the idea here for KU. You get a bit of a diamond in the rough because when you're Kansas, you don't have the luxury all the time to wait. Sometimes you're going to swing and miss. Sometimes you're going to bring kids in who you're like, I think they're set up for a big year as a senior in high school. And that doesn't happen. And they end up, you know, not maybe being good enough for you once you get to college. Other times you swing on that and it ends up hitting in a real big way. And those players end up breaking

Starting point is 00:05:46 out to some degree and become even better than when you got them to commit back in the summer. And then you have the loyalty card of, oh, they were on me before I really blew up in my recruiting. So that's Cook. The next guy is Darian Jones. He's a six foot two, some places six foot three, 175 pound safety from Cape Corral, Florida. He chose Kansas over Georgia Tech, Illinois, and others. He even last year, it sounds like his recruiting kind of blew up last year when he was, I guess, going into his junior year. Got offers from Florida State, Miami, Ole Miss. Things seem to slow a bit there, so I don't know what that means from that kind of slowing down, but it does show that clearly there is some opportunity there in what you got with potential.

Starting point is 00:06:29 He's an 86 graded three star on 24-7 sports. So one spot ahead of Jackson Cook there, unrated on the other three sides. But according to 24-7 sports, he played linebacker, he played safety, and he played cornerback last year. A lot of the tape you watch actually has him lined up at corner. He loved to press people. He loved to jam people, which shows you that, I guess, he kind of likes to hit people. He had 34 tackles, four TFLs, three interceptions,

Starting point is 00:06:55 pass breakup and a sack in eight games played. I don't know if he was injured or they just played less games there. I don't know what the situation is there. But because he was playing all those positions, it does make you wonder, could he be a future, like, Hawk player? Could he be a future Cinco player for KU in those packages? I think the idea based on kind of the talk around him is for him to be a safety. But maybe you keep that in the back of your mind that, yeah, if he ends up being your third string safety one year, could you move him to Hawk to just get another good player on the field?

Starting point is 00:07:21 But from what I watched on the film there, showed good toughness. I was really impressed with the toughness he seemed to show on film. Showed pretty good speed. The biggest takeaway for the film for me was the guy is tough and loves to talk trash. And there was a lot of plays of him like knocking someone over

Starting point is 00:07:39 and then kind of walking over or talking trash or something like that. That can be a good thing on the defensive side of the ball. That can be a good thing at the safety position, right ball that can be a good thing at the safety position right you gotta have a little bit of an edge to you uh normally you'd see nearly like six foot three safeties and think okay that's like a big hitting safety like your cam chancellors of the world but i don't know how agile they're gonna be i don't know how great in coverage they're gonna be like tj ward um and obviously

Starting point is 00:08:04 i talked about some of the toughness but honestly he looked to be more of like a coverage guy and part of that you saw him playing corner seemed to have good ball skills out there so maybe if you can get him to fill out the body a little bit more fill out that six three frames got the coverage skills kind of have the best of both worlds last commit they got and this was on sunday night was tate who, yes, that is the son of Matt Nagy, the offense coordinator for the Kansas City Chiefs. He is a 5'10". He's listed at 150 pounds on his 24-7 profile. Some other places have mentioned like 160 pounds.

Starting point is 00:08:36 Either way, they'll be looking to add weight there. So he's a quarterback at Blue Valley West High School, in-state kid. Obviously good NFL ties for Cahill between Nagy and Ballard. He chose Cahill over Ball State, Kentucky, and some others. He's kind of somebody who's been blown up in the camp circle, because in high school he's playing quarterback, and maybe from a potential of he could play quarterback at the collegiate level, but maybe it would be at a lower level,

Starting point is 00:09:01 whether that be a group of five school or a division two or something like that. But he'd been playing receiver in some of these camps and did well enough that he got offers from Kentucky and KU. And I think he was at a TCU camp where he did really well. He's unrated on three of the four main sites, probably because they don't know what position he's listed as an athlete, but going to play wide receiver. Rivals, he's a 5.5 three-star. And the film doesn't really matter here because it's him playing quarterback. I guess you can watch the film and be like, okay, there's some of the speed, there's some of the athleticism, but it's a little bit different playing receiver where you're getting off the line of scrimmage and you're trying to be agile and run good routes and stuff like that. Honestly, we could probably talk cliches for days about being

Starting point is 00:09:44 the son of a coach and having good work ethic and having good smarts and stuff like that. Honestly, like we could probably talk cliches for days about being the son of a coach and having good work ethic and having good smarts and stuff like that. And I don't know if that's him. I don't know if those are just cliches, but, you know, typically a lot of times cliches are there because a lot of times they do end up being true. So, you know, if he's a smart kid and clearly I think there is something to that. The fact that he went from playing quarterback and then all of a sudden in these camps goes to receiver and get some power five offers probably shows you he's quick at picking things up. So if you're able to get him in your program, get some weight on him, you have some untapped potential. I know it's a word I keep using here, but or a phrase I keep using here. But at receiver, because he hasn't been training there specifically, so he could be end up being better.

Starting point is 00:10:22 Honestly, there's probably going to be a lot of like Lukeke grim comps for obvious reasons um between the two of them i don't know that that's the case like grim at high school that dude was like a killer as a route runner and a lot of production at receiver at high school the one that comes to mind for me and i don't know this kid's path in high school to be completely honest honest. So I don't know how well it resembles that. But Cade Warner, who was actually at Kansas State, who actually ended up being a very solid player, a very productive player for Kansas State. He was like 6'1".

Starting point is 00:10:58 He was a bit of a bigger receiver. But he was the son of Matt Nagy, offensive coordinator, and here he is, a quarterback. Kurt Warner is the father of Cade Warner. He was a quarterback, but Cade Warner was more of your, I guess, crafty white guy receiver, right? I think there could be something there with Nagy, but maybe a little less size and a little bit more quickness.

Starting point is 00:11:18 Also, other quick news I wanted to touch on. Kansas did make the final three for Muiz Tunkara with Arizona and Wisconsin. He's going to commit July 13th. Gabe Daniels is committing on June 29th. Sounds like KU versus Syracuse, so a couple other players to watch at the receiver position for KU. Let's continue on what this all means for the class of 2025 and plenty more on this episode of Locked on Jayhawks.

Starting point is 00:11:41 First, this episode is brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook. I love sports. I love them so much I never want them to stop but as playoffs wind down we have fewer games and sports aren't sporting like I want them to right now but FanDuel lets me keep going sporting doing good with with whatever you want everything going on right now all I have to do is open up the app and dream up bets anytime I'm in the mood I mean I there's still a lot going on for me. I'm a big baseball fan. I watch golf tournaments every weekend, you know, so I was just watching the Travelers this past weekend. So you can get on that. We still have to open coming up here in a few weeks and you still have futures. We're getting

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Starting point is 00:12:50 All right, continuing on here with thoughts on the class of 2025 and Lance Leipold overall, what he's done as a recruiter, and then we'll get to the future at the receiver and the safety positions with those being the positions KU added over the weekend here. So 2025 now KU has 14 commits and currently ranked 43rd on 24, seven sports. Again, that's tough to judge right now because there's so many moving parts. KU is going to add a handful, possibly more of, of commits. Could be two more, could be five more. I don't know.

Starting point is 00:13:15 They have a lot of scholarships to fill. Other schools are going to add a lot of players, a lot of commits, right? Like there's still so much to happen that it's, it's tough to take that rank as far as where these recruits rank, none of them cracked into the top five. Jones is kind of middle pack from the recruiting rankings. Nagy still has to wait to get his rating. At least these are by the 24-7 sports ratings. And then Cook is kind of toward that bottom tier right now. But again, some of this stuff can change too based on what they do as seniors in high school. But here's what's interesting here.

Starting point is 00:13:48 14 commits now for KU. Of the 14, five are graded 87 or higher on 24-7 sports. This is just the 24-7 sports, not the composite. But five of them are graded as an 87 or higher, right? They're different levels of two-star, three-star, four-star recruits and stuff, right? So 87 or higher, right? There are different levels of two-star, three-star, four-star recruits and stuff, right? So 87 or higher. 11 of the 14 are 86 or higher, and 13 of the 14 are 85 or higher. The only exception there is Nagy, who is unrated. He could come in as an 85 or an 86. I don't know. I would assume probably closer to being 85 being that you know he does play

Starting point is 00:14:25 quarterback and he's going to be asked to play receiver there's just some unknowns there right so maybe he's an 83 80 45 i don't know um regardless 13 or a 85 or higher so you might be wondering what does this all mean like okay i have no reference point for that well glad you asked by comparison 2024 last year's class had 17 in total, so three more than this one has. That one had 11 players of 87 or higher. They also had two of 90 or higher with Brinkley and Warner. And so I don't think it's going to live up to what last year's class was, but the point being, if you want to infuse the talent of 2025 and 2024, that's 16 players, 87 or higher.

Starting point is 00:15:02 That's very, very impressive. They had 15 in last year's class of 86 or higher, 17 of 85 or higher. So a lot of infused talent over these, these coming classes, but let's compare to past KU classes to be like, okay, how does this compare to some of those other teams? Which obviously we know, you know, KU's had a lot of shortcomings in football before Lance Leipold. So it's not going to be pretty, but I think it'll show you how big of a

Starting point is 00:15:24 difference it is. Let's go back 10 years, right? That's just an easy round number to go back. 10 years, we go back to the class of 2015, which would have been the first class for David Beatty, I believe. That was 26 commits in that class. So a lot more than this one's probably going to have. Only two of the 26 were 87s. One more was an 86 and one more was an 85. So in total of the 26 commits KU had 10 years ago in the class of 2015, four were 85 or higher. Right now they have 13. Right now they have more players who are 87 or higher than they had 85 or higher. And that's with half the commits almost as they had 10 years ago. Okay. What if we go back five years ago, go back to the class of 2020,

Starting point is 00:16:03 which that would have been one of the less miles recruiting class. In fact, I think that would have been his final. I don't know. I guess he was still part of the for the 2021 recruiting class. I don't know. Whatever. Five years ago, 2020, KU had 28 commits. That's a lot of commits.

Starting point is 00:16:18 Four players were 87 or higher. So they had double the commits that this class of 2025 has, and they have one less player, 87 or higher. Eight were 86 or higher, which is three less that this class of 2025 has and they have one less player 87 or higher eight or 86 or higher which is three less than this class and 11 were 85 or higher so again double the commits two less players total 85 or higher and that actually 2020 class ended up being a good class right you're getting guys like um what jaylen daniels and and I think Devin Neal's in that class. And so I don't know. But in total, Kansas brought in 37 players or will bring in assuming these players stay committed, which that's a story in itself, right?

Starting point is 00:16:55 You have to stay on these guys and make sure they stay committed. But as of right now, between the class of 2023, the class of 2024 and this current class of 2025, which still can be added to. Again, player can decommit, but you can still add more players to. So the last three classes, including this class to come. Under Lance Leipold's regime, 37 players have been graded at 86 or higher over these last three classes.

Starting point is 00:17:22 37, 86 or higher. During the David Beatty era, if we want to call it an era, I don't know, that might be a little strong. So 2015 through 2018, David Beatty is the coach, meaning that the classes, because he was fired before they signed the class of 2018, right? And then it's a whole new coach, whole new class. But that means David Beatty gets the class of 2015, 2016, 2017, right? Over those three classes, KU signed a total of 10 players who were rated an 86 or higher on 24-7 sports. 10 versus 37, when the 10 was also getting a lot more commits

Starting point is 00:17:56 in terms of the players with less players in the transfer portal. And the 37, basically four times that mark, and you still have more room to add even more in 2025. You can see the difference, right? It's not just the difference of, oh, Lance Leipold's added a few extra kids. He's added another handful of kids. Four times the amount.

Starting point is 00:18:13 So they are bringing in much more talent. And that doesn't even get before you get to the point where Lance Leipold and his staff are better at probably scouting, probably at finding diamonds in the rough, are better at development, are better at game management than those previous coaches that Kansas had. It is night and day, but the level of talent they are bringing in is just flabbergasting how much better and how much different it is. Because even though Kansas has had, obviously, a lot of bad years

Starting point is 00:18:40 during the 2010s and prior to Lance Leipold, they still had some dudes, right? You still had your Dorans Armstrongs and Ben Heaney's and I don't know, Mike Lee's and Daniel Wise's of the world, right? You still had your Steven Sims. There were still some good players. And this is just blowing out those years in terms of the amount of talent, which makes sense that Kansas is doing a lot better,

Starting point is 00:19:01 but it also shows you arrow still pointed up for the future. All right, let's finish up here. Future at the positions that KU added here with receiver and safety on Locked on Jayhawks. First, this episode is brought to you by eBay Motors. Passion, drive, and patience. The formula for winning championships is also what keeps your ride

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Starting point is 00:19:59 Guaranteed Fit, only available to U.S. customers. Finishing things up, what KU has added in the future at their positions now. So Cook and Nagy both going at receiver. Well, KU's receiver position this year, they're going to lose a lot. Lawrence Arnold, Quentin Skinner, Luke Grimm, ever heard of them? They're all seniors. Trevor Wilson's also a redshirt senior right he's a rotational player who does play so you look at next year's receiver core Doug Emelian would be a senior when I say next year I'm referring to 2025 uh 2025 you'll have Doug Emelian as a senior I'm confident he'll end up doing well Keaton Quebec at that point would be a third year player as a redshirt sophomore I'm confident he can at least give you something there uh not a lot of us left on the roster right you have Jared Sample right now as a redshirt freshman.

Starting point is 00:20:47 Bryce Cahoon, who you brought in as like a walk-on, as a transfer from Syracuse. Not a lot there. So even for the freshmen, there's going to be an opportunity for playing time early, even if it's a rotational spot. I'm assuming they'll probably add a guy or two, maybe even three in the transfer portal at receiver

Starting point is 00:21:01 to shore that position up a little bit more. But it's not just about, yeah, some of these guys are going to have an opportunity to come in right away and make an impact. But also, then you fast forward to 2026 when the receivers you're bringing in in the class of 2025 will probably be redshirt freshmen at that point. You know, then Doug Emelian's also gone. Then if you bring in any transfer portal players for 2025 who are seniors, they're gone as well.

Starting point is 00:21:24 So it is a very important receiver recruiting class for KU especially because they didn't take any in the class before and then the class before that you already lost Saraz Bunkum to transfer and you know I don't know the full uh I guess fruits of your labor that you're going to see from that class right so I think it becomes kind of interesting about how they handle this already two commits probably could add another one. Maybe could even add two more. As far as the high school class, I mentioned those two guys.

Starting point is 00:21:48 I don't know if both would end up coming to KU. I don't know that they'd want to do that. But with Daniels and Tunkara, probably end up with one of them. And then maybe you can see if you can bring in, like, you know, if there's another star receiver out there. Otherwise, it's in the portal from there. Now, as far as the safety position, so Jones comes in. Schmelzle, the athlete from the state of Kansas, he's probably going to be playing in safety. So you're probably done there at the safety position. Again, the exception,

Starting point is 00:22:13 just like receiver, unless you can, there's some superstars like I want to commit there. You're going to make room for him. But yeah, I mean, same kind of thing here, right? Like after this season, OJ Burrows, Marvin Grant, both those guys graduate. They're both seniors. And then you go to 2025 when all the safeties you bring in in the class of 2025 would be freshmen. Well, Devin Dye, Jalen Dye, they're going to both be seniors in 2025. So then they graduate.

Starting point is 00:22:36 Then you get to 2026. And then, you know, you have guys like Taylor Davis and Mason Ellis and Caleb Purdy, Damani Maxson, guys who you would hope have emerged by then, or it could be some players in this freshman class. You're kind of layering things and taking care of stuff. So at this point in time, maybe you just continue to look to the line of scrimmage. Maybe another receiver seemed to be set at like quarterback and running back

Starting point is 00:22:59 at this point. You can always, like I said, use more players on the line of scrimmage at this point in time. So that's the future at those positions. That'll do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. We're going to be back for a Wednesday episode of the show, and we're going to switch gears and talk a little KU basketball. It's the offseason done now for KU Hoops. We'll get to that on Wednesday's episode of the show.

Starting point is 00:23:19 We'll have a Football Friday episode on Friday. So make sure you subscribe anywhere you get your podcasts, including on our YouTube page. We also are going to have a cool trivia event coming down at Johnny's Tavern. You can join a team, enter, win some stuff. So check that out on my social media as well, at DJohnsonRadio. And we'll see you next time with LOJ.

Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Football Secures Three Commits for 2025 in Jackson Cook, Darrion Jones & Tate Nagy

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