LEBANON, Tenn. — Zion Logue committed to the Georgia staff about a week ago. He went public with that choice from a gathering at his aunt’s home in Central Tennessee on Sunday night.
The 6-foot-5.5, 285-pound standout chose Georgia over a field of options that included serious interest from Kentucky, Ole Miss and Memphis.
He shared the news via a commitment video reveal on YouTube.
Alabama and Ohio State were a couple of his other higher-profile offers but they had not ratcheted up their pursuit of Logue the way that a few other schools had.
Logue becomes the 11th commitment for the Bulldogs in the class of 2019. His decision also bumps the Bulldogs up to No. 11 nationally. Georgia’s class now rates as the No. 4 collection in the SEC based off the 247Sports Team Composite rankings.
He will not enroll early and told DawgNation that the current plan is for him to not take any other official or unofficial visits besides the one he will take to Georgia.
“If Georgia will let me take any other visits then I will have to think about that,” Logue said. “But if they do not want me to do that, then I will make sure to honor what they want me to do with that.”
Why did he choose Georgia? Logue said that he couldn’t really articulate all the exact reasons. It was largely just a feeling, he said.
“It is just that family feel I get with Georgia,” Logue said. “I just feel like Georgia has something really special going on with that program right now and in the seasons to come.”
It is worth noting here that the DL target with the size-14 cleats is now the only 3-star commitment for the Bulldogs in the class.
About that 3-star rating here with Zion Logue
Did you just get a good look at that film? See what you need to know? Well, go ahead and flush all of that.
That film is essentially the recruiting equivalent of a weight loss “before” picture. With Logue, it will involve some serious weight gain.
Logue seemed to have re-booted his recruiting over the last 3-4 months. That junior year film from Lebanon High School was at least 50 pounds ago.
It now looks like he has transformed his body from a 245-pound defensive end as a junior into a serious SEC defensive line target for this cycle.
“I feel like I was able to show all those coaches that I was committed to working to become something really special one day,” Logue said.
The weight change, which was accomplished through some serious weight training, has reshaped his body. He was a different player when several major Power 5 programs saw him over the summer, including Georgia.
“My junior year I played around 240 or 245 pounds,” he said. “Then from January to March this year, I put on 35 pounds.”
That grind has included a lot of explosive lifts. Squats. Cleans. Weighted jumps from the middle of a power clean position. He’s kept on bulking up from there.
Logue has added another 15-20 pounds to his frame since then. His trainer Shavez Jobe told DawgNation that the future Bulldog DT has added that weight without losing any of his speed. He’s still right around the 5.0 or 5.1 mark in the 40-yard dash.
“Just weight room and more weight room,” Logue said. “Being in the weight room every day and just working.”
His athletic ability allowed him to play three spots in high school. He just recently gave up baseball and used to be a middle school quarterback. Jobe and Logue both believe he can still throw a football about 60 yards.
The prevailing opinion here is that Logue might not be the 5-star defensive tackle prototype that the Bulldogs need for this class, but the way he’d developed his body over the last six months indicates that he now has more college upside than his current standing as the nation’s No. 650 overall prospect, too.
The college position projection for Zion Logue
Logue rates on the 247Sports composite scale as the nation’s No. 42 strong-side DE prospect, but that projection was at his previous weight and that position.
He traveled to the U.S. Army All-American camp back in January and established himself as a prospect with a bit higher ceiling than that. Especially as he kept reshaping his body into a frame which can withstand the rigors of the SEC.
Where does UGA plan to use him?
“I can play between the ‘3’ and the ‘5’ technique for Georgia,” Logue said. “The coaches saw what I could do when I camped there for them and that’s where they plan to use me.”
He told DawgNation that he also plans to be at the highly-anticipated west end zone expansion and locker room reveal at Sanford Stadium later this month.
Logue had originally planned to make his commitment known on Sept. 6 but chose to move it up in order to just settle the matter of his college future and end his recruiting process.