More On the Jeremy Graves Commitment

Like was stated earlier the commitment of Jeremy Graves to the Cincinnati Bearcats has been a long time coming. He received an offer from UC last June when he camped in Clifton with the Raw Talent bus tour. The offer that Graves just committed to has been there for a year. There was a ton of speculation that Graves would wind up being the first member of the class of 2012. That never quite came to pass, but for most people who watch UC Football recruiting thought it was a matter of time before Graves cast his lot with the Bearcats.

Turns out that assumption is correct. Perhaps the most interesting development with Graves is that he has transferred to Maple Heights after spending his first three years of High School two and a half miles down the road at Garfield Heights. Maple Heights is the Alma Mater of Shaq Washington, and Shaq and Graves are pretty tight. I don't think there is anything foul going with this situation. As far as I know it is all above board. Still recruiters and the NCAA certainly tend to raise an interested eye when kids transfer to a new school for their senior season.

Graves only offers at this point in the process are from UC and a couple of MAC schools. The transfer almost certainly played a part in the lack of offers. The odds of getting offers go way down when a coach sees film of a kid playing for one school and can't find him at the school they played at the year before. Coaches have very limited time in the evaluation period, about six weeks. As such they don't spend a ton of time looking for kids. If they can't find a player it's on to the next one. By all appearances Graves got lost in the shuffle a little bit because his talent certainly is worthy of BCS offers.

Sophomore film available here if you want it.

Graves marks the 11th commitment in the class of 2012 for the Bearcats and is the 5th prospect from the state, but the 1st outside of South West Ohio. I would imagine that Butch Jones and Co. will take a couple more receivers in the 2012 class. But between Graves and the guys in the 2011 class like Alex Chisum, Chris Moore and Rod Coleman UC is pretty well set for perimeter receivers. I would imagine that the other receivers taken in this class will be of the slot variety.