It's official: Less than half an hour ago, running back Wesley Tate of Pope John Paul II High School north of Nashville, signed with Vanderbilt.
That's great news. We desperately needed some powerful runners, and we got four with Tate, Eric Samuels, Warren Norman and Zac Stacy. All were three-star guys. Some of them, like Samuels, may shift over to defense, but expect Tate to stick at RB.
Tate's a big back — 6-foot-2, 210 pounds with room for some bulk, and he was the Tennessee 100-meter champion with a personal best of 10.8 seconds. He got three stars from rivals.com.
And of course he was a member of the school chorus and plays the piano. That explains why he narrowed his choices down to VU, Georgia Tech, Purdue and Stanford. It'd be cool if he majored in music instead of the popular football major Human & Organizational Management, but for some reason the recruiting Web sites don't list a player's academic interests.
His big brother, Golden Tate III, is a star wide receiver and centerfielder at Notre Dame and his dad — you got it, Golden Tate II, played at Tennessee State.
Anyway, here's what Tate's coach, Jeff Brothers, says about him:
"Wesley is a prototypical SEC tailback. He gives them a very powerful running back, an explosive, downhill runner. When teams played us, Wesley was our marquee player on offense.
"Wesley has tremendous strength in his lower body and is a durable running back. He's just as strong in the fourth quarter as he is in the first quarter. Physically, he'll be about ready to play when he gets to college.
"Wesley is also a young man of the highest character, very coachable, and willing to do anything and everything to help the team succeed."
"About ready to play when he gets to college." Ya hear that? That's what we want to hear.
And Brothers should know. He played safety for the Commodores and almost singlehandedly beat Ole Miss in 1992 when he had 146 total return yards on an interception, a blocked field goal and a punt return.
1 comment:
this is good news. wish mcmullin was smarter though.
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