Want to attack every day with the latest UGA football recruiting info? That’s what the Intel brings. This entry offers up the first DawgNation read on top 60 overall national recruit in California OL Earnest Greene.
Georgia is once again extending to California to recruit one of the nation’s top overall prospects in the 2022 cycle. This time it is 4-star OG Earnest Greene III from national powerhouse St. John Bosco.
There’s an evolving flow chart when it comes to Georgia’s recruiting odds of landing a player of Greene’s caliber from California. Let’s run through it.
- Does Georgia have an OL tradition now of getting guys to the league? Yes
- Do the Bulldogs have success stories from the state of California on the roster? Yes, yes and yes. (That’s Brock Bowers, JT Daniels and Kendall Milton of late.)
- Did the Bulldogs make the final top 10 for Greene? Yes
- Can Greene see himself as a Bulldog? Yes and likely feels that way about several schools in that top 10.
- Have the Bulldogs been recruiting him hard? Yes
- Does Greene have a history of college and NFL players in his family? Yes, his father played in the NFL and at Savannah State in Georgia. He even has a couple of cousins that also played Divison I football, too.
- Does Greene have any ties to the state of Georgia? That Savannah State stuff is the tip of it. Greene has a lot of family on his father’s side still residing in the area.
That local connection to his father and the state of Georgia seems like it deserves a little more detail here.
“My Dad played at Savannah State and then went on to the NFL to play at the professional level with the San Diego Chargers and the Pittsburgh Steelers,” Greene said.
It is a foundational understanding of why he is interested in playing at UGA. At least to some extent.
“That’s where my Dad is from and all my family on my Dad’s side,” he said. “They are from Savannah.”
That said, he elaborated on why his interest in UGA might range a little deeper than that.
“Honestly, you know it would be a blessing to play at Georgia and have all my Dad’s family at Georgia see me play out there,” Greene said. “They are all out there. I would say that [family ties] it plays a factor, but I feel like they might offer me the best opportunities for me as well as my family.”
Earnest Greene: Taking a lap around that loaded top 10
Greene has been able to visit two programs from his top 10 to. USC is down the road and he has paid them a visit. Ohio State also signed Wyatt Davis, a unanimous 2021 All-American, out of stout St. John Bosco in 2017.
He got to see Columbus in his freshman year. There was also a trip to check out Texas A&M previously, too.
“Those are the only schools that made my list that I have actually visited,” Earnest Greene said.
Greene will be an early enrollee. He said recently the only trip he had planned for when visits are restored on June 1 would be to Alabama in that month.
“I will probably try to get everywhere that I can before I start taking my official visits,” he said.
He said that all schools in that top 10 are relatively close to one another.
“That’s because I haven’t been able to step on campus at any of these schools recently,” he said. “I would say they are all pretty close. I would love to see who steps out in front of the other schools once I start stepping on these campuses.”
What is he looking for?
“First and foremost, I want to go to a school that has a good entrepreneurship program,” Greene said. “That’s what I know I want to major in. I also want to look into player development with the coaches and the players. Not so much the player-coach relationship because I know that coaches come and go at these big universities. But the player development part of their program. I also want to go somewhere with a great strength program.”
His first offer from inside that top 10 was Oregon. His latest offer came from Texas.
The huge Chicken Alfredo fan rates as the nation’s No. 2 offensive guard for 2022 on the 247Sport Composite scale. He did relay that most of the schools which are recruiting him seem to have a specific position in mind.
The recruiting industry tagged him as a guard a couple of years ago. He said it was when he was two inches shorter. The 6-foot-5, 330-pound rising senior started out his sophomore year at right tackle at Bosco and shifted after four games to left tackle in his 2019 season.
He’s still the left tackle for his Braves.
“Most of the schools I have put into my top list are recruiting me at tackle,” he said. “That’s basically the only position I have played my whole life. I guess it was because of my measurables. The recruiting services all think I will pan out as a guard. But right now I’m pretty sure I’m being recruited at tackle.”
The thinking here is he’d be a combo lineman. Greene would be adept at the right tackle and either guard position in a rugged conference like the SEC.
Earnest Greene: A few more of his thoughts on UGA
He said Georgia was “most definitely” a candidate to receive an official visit. He hasn’t settled on those yet.
“I was going to look to get an official from over there,” he said. “Georgia is probably one of the schools which will get one.”
Why did Georgia make that list?
“I did a bit of homework on the university and the program at Georgia,” he said. “I know just last year that both of their offensive tackles went in the first round. I don’t think any university had done that in a while. I’ve built a pretty good player-coach relationship with coach [Matt] Luke and coach Kirby Smart. Those are the biggest things. That relationship and the player development part where they send players to the league at my position now pretty much every year.”
Luke likes a few things about Greene’s work on tape.
“He basically tells me that he likes my ability to bend and my athletic ability,” Greene told DawgNation. “He says I am pretty physical at the point of attack. He just tells me a lot that I am a top priority in this class for him.”
“That’s pretty much our relationship. We talk a lot. Pretty often. Those are pretty much the things he tells me every time we talk.”
Assistant offensive line coach Eddie Gordon is another primary contact. It seems every recruit basically shares the opinion that Gordon walks on water on the recruiting trail.
“Coach Gordon, that’s really my dude,” Greene said. “I’m in contact with him every other day if not every day. The one thing I like about coach Gordon is that some of these coaches are robots. They just want to talk about football. Coach Gordon will talk to me about life. With coach Gordon, he’s not pushing me to go to Georgia. He’s just wanting me to make the best decision of my life for my life. That’s why he’s so different from a lot of the other dudes out there.”
It is wild to see how much UGA’s Q-rating for a California All-American has grown in just four year. If this was a story on a 2017 recruit, then DawgNation might have wondered what sort of skinny chance the program might have here.
Then the Rose Bowl happened on the first day of 2018. Then Kendall Milton signed with Georgia. JT Daniels came along, too. Brock Bowers signed in the 2021 class. Georgia has also imported 5-stars from Arizona and Nevada in the last two years that everyone wanted, too.
Distance, he said, is not a factor for him with Georgia. Or any school.
“I’ve totally noticed that every year there have been more and more recruits from out here committing and signing to Georgia and then doing well there,” he said. “It will be cool here, but I wouldn’t say the location or where the other recruits are from are now going to Georgia will play a factor in my decision. It will just be the best school and the best fit for me and my family.”
He said literally his whole family on his Dad’s side still resides in the 912 area code.
“Literally my Dad out here is the only member of his family that is not in Savannah,” Greene said.
There’s a little more juice to the story here.
“My Dad was always a Georgia fan and a [Atlanta] Falcons and a [Atlanta] Hawks fan, too,” Greene said. “Those were all his favorite teams growing up. Everything in Georgia.”
He’s been to Georgia a couple of times, but not UGA.
“Whenever I was to make a trip to Athens to go see Georgia I was going to make a trip to Savannah then to go see some of my family in Savannah, too,” he said. “That would be before I came back home.”
When his father played for the Chargers, he met his mother while she was at San Diego State. He just settled there with her side of the family in California.
He also wears No. 71. That’s the number he chose to be different. But when he did, he couldn’t help but notice that some of his favorite linemen like Trent Williams and former Georgia All-American Andrew Thomas wore that same number, too.
Former Crimson Tide standout and current Cleveland Brown Jedrick Wills also wears that jersey, too.
A quick lap through the Earnest Greene top 10
He said that he speaks to someone from each of these ten programs just about every day. Oklahoma and Ohio State also sound like very strong contenders here, too.
What is the reason why each of those programs could be his school?
Alabama: “Alabama is always going to Alabama. I want to say you can name at least double-digits of offensive linemen that they’ve sent to the first round in the last 10 years. That’s a lot of O-lineman to send to the first round. Alabama has always been an offensive line powerhouse. I looked to them as a kid. Coach [Nick] Saban and the legendary coaching he has done. Alabama has to be a priority among any recruit’s top schools.”
Florida: “Florida is in there because when I watch their offense I kind of like what they did last year. I liked what they did with their tackles. They had a really explosive talent last year and they have a lot of guys going there. I’ve built a pretty strong relationship with [offensive line] coach [John] Hevesy as well too and that’s pretty much why Florida made the cut.”
LSU: “I’ve built actually a really really strong relationship with [receivers coach and recruiting coordinator] coach [Dameyune] Craig and coach Ed Orgeron. That’s Coach O. I talked to them twice a week over the quarantine and I’ve seen what they have been able to do with a couple of their guys and I just like the program.”
Oklahoma: “They offered me my freshman year, too. That’s when I was younger. They set up like a big offensive tackle school. They’ve sent a lot of the bigger offensive tackles into the league and they do that year-in and year-out. I’ve built a strong relationship with [offensive line] coach Brent Bendenbagh and coach Lincoln Riley. I talk to coach Bendenbagh every morning. We’re in contact every day.”
Ohio State: “They recruited me at a very young age in my freshman year. They showed they believed in me and then but honestly one of my mentors I look up to like a big brother is Wyatt Davis. He came from the same school as me. I talk to him about a lot of stuff. He just tells me how great of a program that it actually is and how good it will be for my individual situation. I also like Ohio State because they have a program called ‘Real Life Wednesdays’ where they go into and break into stuff you could do for your life after football. That’s real life. They talk about that, they help players get internships and they just prepare players for life after football.”
“That really sticks out to me alongside the fact they are always in the playoffs, they are a powerhouse and they are a really good well-run program. I talk to [offensive line] coach [Greg] Studwara and coach [Ryan] Day often. They have been on me pretty hard and I like what they have to offer, too”
Oregon: “Coach [Mario] Cristobal coming from Alabama an offensive line powerhouse he knows what he is talking about. Obviously, I know [offensive line] coach [Alex] Mirabal is a really good coach. They just put out Penei Sewell. Everybody is talking about how Penei Sewell might be one of the best tackle prospects in a couple of years. They were also the first team to ever offer me so it shows that they believed in me at an earlier age. That shows that they really saw something in me.”
Texas: “Texas is in there because I’ve built a pretty strong relationship with coach [Steve Sarkisian] and coach [Kyle] Flood when they were at Alabama. By them moving to another school and still having that same strong interest in me they have a lot of good talent over there. That’s probably why but also with coach Flood, his track record of player development and all the offensive linemen that he’s sent to the league.”
Texas A&M: “When I was on my visit with A&M and I was talking to their coach and they actually liked my potential. I saw that they did really well last year and they have one of the better offensive lines in the country last year. So that’s A&M from the player development standpoint and I’ve built a pretty strong relationship with [offensive line] coach [Josh] Hinson.”
USC: “They’ve always talked and preached to me about me being a top priority in their program. That always plays a bigger factor. They’ve actually been sending a couple of lineman in the first round every year so their player development is what I really look at.”
Oregon was his dream school growing up.
Give him credit with his takes on all these schools. He’s very logical and about his business. He’s not considering a school that doesn’t already have a proven track record of putting OLs into the NFL.
“My Dad has always preached the player development angle for me,” Greene said. “Just the schools that know how to get it done can make me the best player I can be in my situation.”
Check out his sophomore year tape below. He’s currently playing his junior season this spring out in California during the pandemic.
SENTELL’S INTEL
(the recent reads on DawgNation.com)
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