Vanderbilt finds recruiting success in Georgia, sets sights on Florida and Alabama

With its verbal commitment from CB Karl Butler last week, Vanderbilt appears to be finished with 2010 recruiting in the state of Louisiana, at least for the time being.

Let's take a look, state by state, at how many players have given VU verbal commitments and how many are still considering offers:

COMMITMENTS
1. Georgia: 6
2. Louisiana: 2
3. Texas: 1
3. Alabama: 1
3. Florida: 1
3. South Carolina: 1

CONSIDERING OFFERS
1. Florida: 10
2. Georgia: 9
3. Alabama: 7
4. Mississippi: 4
4. South Carolina: 4
6. Texas: 3
6. Missouri: 3
6. Pennsylvania: 3
9. Michigan: 2
9. Tennessee: 2
9. Ohio: 2
9. New Jersey: 2
13. Nine with one each: North Carolina, Oregon, Arizona, Minnesota, California, Kentucky, Virginia, Washington D.C., Arkansas

Now let's take a look, position by position, at how many players have given VU verbal commitments and how many are still considering offers:

COMMITMENTS
Quarterbacks: 1 (Nash Nance)
Running backs: 0
Receivers: 2 (Jonathan Krause, Trent Pruitt)
Tight ends: 1 (Davis Dudchock)
Offensive linemen: 3 (Grant Ramsey, Chase White, Logan Stewart)
Defensive tackles: 1 (Kyle Woestmann)
Defensive ends: 1 (Thomas Ryan)
Linebackers: 0
Defensive backs: 3 (Kenneth Ladler, Andre Hal, Karl Butler)
Kickers: 0

CONSIDERING OFFERS
Quarterbacks: 2
Running backs: 8
Receivers: 6
Tight ends: 2
Offensive linemen: 11
Defensive tackles: 2
Defensive ends: 5
Linebackers: 4
Defensive backs: 20
Kickers: 0

Vanderbilt grabs another recruit flying under the radar

We've been away for a while celebrating our nation's independence, but now we're back to do some more celebrating of what's shaping up to be a stellar Vanderbilt recruiting class.

Over the weekend, the Commodores got a verbal commitment from Karl Butler, a defensive back from Louisiana. Sure, it's not the kind of commitment that'll send Vandy fans out dancing in the streets. That would be OT James Stone of Nashville or OT Max Garcia of Atlanta or RB Cory Grant of Opelika, Ala., or DE Carlos Thompson of some little town in Mississippi, all four-star guys still contemplating Vanderbilt offers.

Butler doesn't have any stars or ratings yet from the likes of rivals.com, scout.com and espn.com, but he did have offers from Virginia, Louisiana-Lafayette, SMU, Tulsa, Colorado and Tulane.

He's 6-2, 185 pounds, towering for a guy listed as a cornerback, and brings to mind Sean Richardson and Casey Hayward, two guys who played right away last season as true freshmen. Both are over 6 feet and were listed at 185 in high school. Neither was what you'd call a high-profile recruit. Richardson had offers from Troy, Duke and Miss State, but from neither Bama or Auburn in his home state of Alabama. Hayward had offers from Troy, MTSU and Southern Miss, but from nobody in his home state of Georgia.

But as soon as these guys got on campus and put on pads, the coaches took the redshirts off them. Richardson, a special teams demon, scored the Commodores' only touchdown in the Music City Bowl, on the punt coverage team. In that same game, Hayward stepped in for the injured D.J. Moore and was a key to victory. Now Richardson should step in for the departed Reshard Langford at strong safety and Hayward should replace D.J. at cornerback.

Bobby Johnson and company know how to pick DBs, and lately they've been landing rangy athletes like Richardson, Hayward and Eric Samuels. Like Butler, Samuels was flying way under the radar this time last summer and jumped at an offer from the Commodores, which was his first. Then everybody started noticing him and now he's widely regarded as Vanderbilt's top recruit of the ground-breaking 2009 class.

Of course, the poster boy for flying under the radar is D.J. Moore, who was sitting in Steve Spurrier's backyard in South Carolina, also a place where guys like Mark Richt sneak in and steal recruits. He didn't have any offers to speak of, so he made a verbal commitment to the Commodores. And like Samuels last year, when the big boys took notice in his senior year and started suggesting he jump ship, he stuck to his word and signed with the Commodores.

That's another facet of Bobby Johnson's strategy: Get guys under the radar, but make sure they've got what it takes not only to play in the SEC but also to thrive academically and socially at Vanderbilt, and make sure they've got the character to stick to their word when they start ascending to new heights.

It'll be interesting to hear what people will be saying about Butler when he signs with VU in February. He's got a lot of high school football to play between now and then.

Justin Cabbagestalk wearing UT orange...and may never wear black and gold

Yes, that’s a picture of Justin Cabbagestalk, who’s scheduled to join the Commodores as a freshman in about a month.

And yes, he’s wearing the orange of the Tennessee Volunteers.

As in, prison orange.

Cabbagestalk was arrested Tuesday and charged with a felony count of burglary of an unoccupied dwelling and a misdemeanor charge of criminal mischief after he allegedly broke into a Tampa home.

In April, Angelo Hadley, one of Cabbagestalk’s teammates at Armwood High School, was charged with third-degree grand theft, grand theft of a firearm and armed burglary of a dwelling with firearm possession.

Hadley was headed to play football for North Carolina. Not anymore.

Bobby Johnson hasn’t yet commented on the situation, but don’t expect Cabbagestalk to make it to Nashville.

It does make for lots of interesting comments on Internet message boards. Click here for the usual thoughtful and not-so-thoughtful responses of people familiar with Tampa prep sports. Sample post: "Johnny Appleseed was not involved in this matter, but Charlie Lettucelimb remains a person of interest."

Somebody just commented on Chris Low's ESPN blog that "kids will be kids."

Sure, but screwing up less than a month before you're about to get a free ride to one of the top universities in the nation is kind of a form of natural selection. We'll see what happens, and maybe there's more to the story. Maybe he thought the building was on fire and somebody was trapped inside.

For what it's worth, Cabbagestalk was not one of Vandy's top recruits and he was projected to play offensive guard, a position where we're fully stocked with young talent and have more on the way. But that won't matter to Bobby Johnson. He'll treat this kid like a human being, which may mean teaching him that actions have consequences.

Larry Smith is not the SEC's worst quarterback... but it sure doesn't hurt if the rest of the SEC believes that

Seth Emerson of the State newspaper in Columbia, S.C., ranks the SEC quarterbacks and puts Larry Smith dead last.

I love it. No team has gotten in the heads of Gamecock fans – and Gamecock players – more than the Commodores. Last season before we dominated them in Nashville, the State’s readers were predicting online that they would beat Vandy by at least five touchdowns.

Imagine what they think they’re gonna do to us this year, especially since we have the SEC’s worst quarterback.

Of course, Larry Smith is not really the SEC’s worst quarterback, and I bet he scares the daylights out of the Gamecocks in Columbia this season. But in the meantime, let’s let the rest of the SEC think that.

Click here to see Emerson’s article, which is the sort of half-baked poop that sportswriters are serving up while they wait for SEC media days in a couple of weeks.

Tim Tebow and Jevan Snead are the top two, of course, followed by LSU’s Jordan Jefferson, Georgia’s Joe Cox, Arkansas’ Ryan Mallett, Bama’s Greg McElroy, SC’s Stephen Garcia, Tennessee’s Jonathan Crompton, Kentucky’s Mike Hartline, State’s Tyson Lee and Auburn’s Kodi Burns.

Kodi Burns? Are you kidding me?

What a stupid list.

After Tebow and Snead, nobody’s done anything. Jefferson and Garcia are raw and athletic, but so is Larry Smith. Cox has won the one game he’s started, but so has Larry Smith. McElroy’s never started a game, but Emerson’s impressed that he performed under pressure in front of all those fans during Bama’s spring game. Huh? Mallett is a stud prospect, but so was Jonathan Crompton. Oh, and Mike Hartline is so good that Kentucky benched him last season in favor of a true freshman wide receiver. And Tyson Lee? He can’t throw, though we all know he can run on third and long.

See what I mean? Numbers 3-12 are up in the air, and Larry Smith could very well have risen eight or nine notches by the end of the season.

In the meantime, let’s hope everybody keeps underestimating Larry – and the rest of the Commodores.

Further evidence that Bobby Johnson is building a great recruiting class, at least by Vanderbilt standards

As we sink into the dog days of summer, I wanted to give you further evidence of Bobby Johnson’s success on the recruiting trail. Everybody praised him for the 2009 class, but the 2010 class is shaping up to be much more impressive. (That's Thomas Ryan pictured above.)

Consider:

• This time last year, Vanderbilt had no commitments from three-star players. (Eric Samuels would eventually pick up a third star from rivals.com.) This year, Vandy already has commitments from six three-star players (DE Thomas Ryan, OL Grant Ramsay, QB Nash Nance, DT Kyle Woestmann, WR Jonathan Krause and TE Davis Dudchock).

• So far, Scouts.com ranks this year’s class No. 39 in the nation, and eighth in the SEC ahead of Ole Miss, Miss State, Arkansas and Kentucky. Last year’s class, widely considered the best in school history, was ranked No. 72 and the worst in the SEC.

• So far, Vanderbilt has verbal commitments from six players with three-star ratings from scouts.com (Ryan, Ramsay, Nance, Woestmann, Krause and Dudchock), compared to five three-star players in last year’s entire class (TE Mason Johnston, DE Walker May, WR Brady Brown, OL Wesley Johnson and DE Thad McHaney).

• So far, eleven players have accepted scholarship offers from Vanderbilt. This time last year, only three players had accepted offers.

• In all, Vanderbilt signed 13 players in the last recruiting class who received three stars from either rivals.com or scout.com (Johnston, Brown, Johnson and McHaney from both; LB Blake Southerland, RB Zac Stacy, RB Warren Norman, QB Charlie Goro, DB Eddie Foster, DB Trey Wilson, RB Wesley Tate and WR Collin Ashley from Rivals; and May from Scout. As mentioned earlier, Vanderbilt had no three-star verbal commitments this time last year and already has six. If Vandy has a successful season to rival 2009 then the current recruiting class should eclipse the last one.

Forget the SEC, Vanderbilt's football team would dominate the MAC and the Sun Belt

If there was any doubt that Vanderbilt’s in the toughest conference in America – at least, the last place it could hope to obtain a winning record – check out the preseason rankings for all 120 college football teams by The Quad Blog, the New York Times’ excellent college sports blog.

The Quad pegs Vandy at No. 65, way up from the No. 93 it gave the Dores this time last year. So let’s pretend for a moment that Vandy would beat all the teams ranked below it and lose to all the teams above it. So what will our record be in 2009? According to The Quad, Vandy should beat Miss State, Rice and Army. Assuming the Dores also beat Western Carolina, they should finish 4-8.

Of course, according to this same logic we should have finished 2-10 or maybe 3-9 last season. But it’s tough playing in such a touch conference.

Which has us wondering: In which conference would Vanderbilt have the most victories?

1. THE MAC
Vandy would have the upper hand over a whopping eleven teams: Temple (74), Buffalo (78), N Illinois (80), Ohio (82), Ball State (85), Bowling Green (86), Toledo (88), Akron (93), Miami-Oho (101), Kent State (109), Eastern Mich (113)

2. SUN BELT
Instead of LSU, what if Vanderbilt got to play L-Monroe? Or L-Lafayette? Or any of the teams in the Sun Belt, of which Vandy is better than at least eight: Fla Atlantic (77), Ark State (87), MTSU (91), Fla International (97), La-Monroe (108), La-Lafayette (110), N Texas (116), W Kentucky (120)

3. CONFERENCE USA
Vanderbilt looks better on paper than at least eight teams, and one of them is Rice, which we play in the fourth game of the season: Memphis (75), UTEP (83), Rice (92), UAB (95), Central Fla (98), Marshall (100), SMU (102), Tulane (107)

4. THE WAC
A smallish conference, with at least six teams Vanderbilt would likely handle: La Tech (67), Hawaii (71), San Jose St (90), Utah State (115), New Mexico St (118), Idaho (119)

5. MOUNTAIN WEST
OK, the Dores would struggle against the likes of BYU and Utah, but could probably overpower at least five teams: Colorado St (73), UNLV (84), San Diego St (104), New Mexico (106), Wyoming (111)

6. THE ACC
Sure, Wake Forest, a small private school that found success in a big-time conference, is a role model for Vandy. But the Demon Deacs can hang with at least a handful of conference teams year in and year out. This year, they’d be one the Commodores could beat (and Duke’s a team we should have beat last year): Maryland (66), Wake Forest (69), Virginia (81), Duke (96)

7. BIG 12
Sure, we’re not scheduling Texas or Oklahoma any time soon, but we could probably beat at least four teams in the Big 12: K-State (70), Texas A&M (72), Baylor (79), Iowa State (112)

8. BIG EAST
We could handle at least three Big East teams, and could compete against a whole lot more: UConn (68), Louisville (76), Syracuse (103)

9. BIG 10
The Quad has us way ahead of two Big 10 teams: Purdue (94), Indiana (105)

10. PAC-10
Thank God for the state of Washington. But I’d bet we could take at least two other teams in the Pac-10: Washington (99), Wash State (114)

11. SEC
Here’s a big surprise: The SEC is the toughest conference for us to play in. Supposedly, we could beat only Miss State (89). Of course, we lost to the Bulldogs last season. Of course, we beat four conference teams we weren’t supposed to beat.

Am I suggesting we should change conferences? No freaking way. I love the fact that on paper we’re not supposed to beat anybody. Because when we beat them, we feel great and those other teams – like, say, South Carolina and Auburn – feel awful.

Vanderbilt football lands "best" recruit yet

Is Bobby Johnson on a roll or what? Remember how he predicted that the Music City Bowl victory would give a greater boost to the recruiting class of 2010 than the class of 2009? And remember how we told you earlier this week that he's already gotten verbal commitments from 10 players, by far his most ever in June?

Well, it's still June and he just got another verbal, this time from Davis Dudchock, a 6-4, 225-pound tight end from Birmingham whose father played at Auburn for Pat Dye.

Dudchock is on ESPN's 150 Watch List, which makes him the highest rated player to commit to Vandy so far this season. He got three stars from scout.com and appears to still be unrated by rivals.com. He had offers from Florida State, Tennessee and Auburn.

Expect the players to keep rolling in over the next month or so. It's a battle all the way, but Johnson appears to be turning the ship around at Vanderbilt — and without the Commodores leaving the SEC.

I'll never forget sitting behind the Vandy bench in Columbia, S.C., in 2007 and noticing how big and athletic-looking the players were, even the players who weren't playing. It was a far cry from the Watson Brown years. And sure, Woody had some stallions on his defenses, but not as many as I saw on that day — they were everywhere.

Of course, Vanderbilt upset South Carolina and Steve Spurrier that day. Last season and the last week's recruiting news are further evidence that the Gamecock victory was only the start.

I'm not predicting SEC championships or BCS bids or anything like that. But I am saying we've got the athletes and coaches and support system and overall program — and especially the athletes — to compete.