This Sentell’s Intel rep has the latest with 4-star transfer portal receiver London Humphreys. He ranks as the nation’s No. 1 WR and the No. 5 overall prospect for 2024 on the 247Sports Transfer ratings. He was seen as a 3-star recruit and the nation’s No. 66 WR prospect in the Class of 2023 on the 247Sports Composite.
London Humphreys pretty much does everything fast. He ran 10.63 in the 100 meters in high school. That was during a period of his life when he had to be talked into playing football.
He spent his freshman season at Vanderbilt and didn’t spend much time at all scampering for a 49-yard touchdown against the Georgia Bulldogs earlier this season.
Humphrey placed his name in the transfer portal last Monday and didn’t take long to schedule an official visit to check out all things UGA.
Fast. Fast. Everything fast. He spent Friday, Saturday and early Sunday afternoon in Athens kicking the tires on all things Bulldog.
He told DawgNation before the visit that the biggest draw to playing in Athens was simple to him.
“That ability to get better every day against the best in the country,” he said.
That was before the visit. What does he think now about his chance to be a Bulldog? He said that was still part of it.
“Definitely part of it,” he said. “Having that level of development there. I would also add the unbelievable support and just the number of people around you who care so much about you.”
That was a stark difference from his high school days. He took officials to Vanderbilt and Virginia and settled on playing for the Commodores in his hometown. Those officials were quite different from the experience of his three days in The Classic City this weekend.
He got noticed when he was around town. A lot.
His player host, Peyton Woodring, did a solid job of showing him around. He spent time with that core group of the freshmen ‘Dawgs that would be in his same class like tight ends Lawson Luckie and Pearce Spurlin III and offensive tackle Monroe Freeling.
“It just seemed like everyone knew everyone,” Humphreys said. “And they’ve only been here for six months or a year. It was really cool.”
He did get to speak to Georgia quarterback Carson Beck. They didn’t share much more than say what’s up, he said.
“We chatted for a second,” Humphreys said. “That definitely would be a huge factor if he stuck around and he was there.”
If he does choose the ‘Dawgs, that’s the same core of guys that would be celebrating his touchdowns as a ‘Dawg. He’d give a dap or a head nod to Woodring as he sprinted on the field to add every extra point.
That meant something to him during his weekend visit. He got to see the ‘Dawgs practice on Saturday.
“I thought it was a very efficient practice and liked how everything operated,” he said.
Georgia sees him as a “Z” receiver on the right side of the formation. Georgia receivers coach Bryan McClendon and the ‘Dawgs made sure he knew he was wanted and needed in Athens.
“BMac showed me a lot of how the coaches and the why of all things he does,” Humphreys said. “Coach [Kirby] Smart just expressed his belief of what I am capable of and how he envisions this coming year.”
The facilities were more than impressive to him coming from Vanderbilt. It would be hard for them not to be.
“The facilities were unbelievable and the level of functionality between everything was unreal,” Humphrey said.
He described the OV as very business and straight to the point. Yet this last week of his life has felt like a “whirlwind” to him as well.
When he left Athens this afternoon, he had a clear picture of what he could accomplish at UGA.
“I definitely can see myself there,” he said. “Just how they operate. The people who are there. The coaches who are there. I can 100 percent see myself in Athens.”
The contrast here is just for a sliver of time he’s going to slow things down and think. He has no immediate plans for any decisions. Or any future visits lined up.
“These next couple of days I will have to think through everything and really go from there,” he said.
Humphrey said he’d like to sleep a little bit on his upcoming decision. Georgia said they’d like to know his decision sooner rather than later, but they also understand he’s got some stuff here that he does need some time to think about logically.
He does present himself in conversation as a logical thinker.
“Starting this process earlier in the portal window, I would say I have time on my side,” he said. “No one has time on their side with the transfer portal. There’s just time. I want to make the right decision. That is all.
With that, that’s a perfectly good official visit recap interview. Even for a transfer portal recruiting that has trimmed all the fat and fluff from those fun weekends with a laser-like focus.
Yet our journalistic rounds have not been accomplished here without a chronicle of one very important topic.
That would be the London Humphrey haircut.
That is a hairstyle that a Georgia offensive guard by the name of Ratledge certainly loves.
Mullet talk: The origin story behind the London Humphrey haircut
Humphreys is a simple young man. He’s planning on deleting Twitter once he’s made his college decision. He feels that social media is not good for most athletes.
It can get bad, he feels. That’s in contrast to his positive outlook on life.
His priorities and values are set. When his teammates at Vanderbilt wanted to put plans together for anything in the group chat, he’d be one of the first to respond.
If he chooses Georgia, I have no doubt he will have his playbook absorbed and memorized by the first day of spring ball if not weeks earlier.
When he shows up every day, he will handle himself like a professional. He will be the same guy. The same sponge. Every day.
That’s why he places the most personal investment into his game. He realizes his speed is his No. 1 tool in his toolbox to make plays. But the second thing here reflects his approach to the game.
“I kind of hate like talking about myself in this manner but regardless I would say just being able to be consistent,” he said. “If that’s an answer I can say there. Once I am on the field, it is not a wavering thing where my team says ‘I hope he runs the right route’ or “I hope he reads the coverage correctly and converts’ because I feel I have a lot more to learn with football because of the short amount of time I have played, but that’s something I think is one of the skill sets that I have worked on because that comes with time and repetition.”
“That’s a big factor for me with football. That people don’t see from a fan’s perspective. They don’t see the plays on the field. They just see the catch happen and that’s that. But everything leading up to the catch is more important. The catch is just the result of everything you did before it."
Humphreys wants to be like your favorite song on the streaming up. Press play. He reps it out the same way every day and just keeps building off that. Being a consistent playmaker.
He’ll just be the guy doing all this with the business in the front and a party hanging out the back of his helmet draped onto his shoulder pads.
That’s the mullet. Is that the source of his 10.63 speed in the 100 meters? What about the 11 feet, 2 inches worth of broad jump he cleared in high school?
“It was the springtime of my senior year of high school,” he said. “Baseball and track season rolled around for me. I don’t know the mullet has always been a thing. A bunch of my friends had them and you know baseball is the perfect time of the year to do it. Might as well. I’ve enjoyed it and liked it and kind of stuck with it.”
“I don’t really see a need to switch it up yet.”
London Humphreys: The one thing he said that shows he’ll be successful
Humphreys tried playing football as a freshman in high school. He was talked into it, but he was on the junior varsity and didn’t play much. He was there, by his admission, because a lot of his friends were playing football.
That interest in the sport waned from there and he dropped football. But there was a revival before his junior season. As it turns out, the strength coach was the receivers coach. He stayed on him about coming out for football. He kept selling him.
“Run some deep routes,” he said.
“We need a guy like that,” he said.
His head coach at Christ Presbyterian Academy, Ingle Martin, was a quarterback for Steve Spurrier at Florida.
“I would see him in the hallways a bunch and he would say something to me,” Humphreys said.
Yet CPA still rarely throws the ball. They did to Humphreys, though. He totaled up approximately 2,200 yards and 27 touchdown catches in those two seasons.
The big reason he came back out? That was the chance to get his college paid for by playing football.
Humphreys was super athletic. His mom, Erin, was an All-American in the decathlon at South Carolina. His dad was an All-American pole vaulter at Auburn and a former track coach at Vanderbilt.
The 4-star WR said that his mother is still probably the best athlete in the family. But he used his ball skills as an outfielder in baseball and a high-flyer in basketball to adapt quickly to football.
There was also that blinding speed on a 6-foot-2-plus frame to contend with.
That’s a different baptism into the sport.
He was candid enough to say that the physicality of football was shocking to him initially. He’d been a track guy and played basketball and soccer growing up before finally investing into playing football.
So why does he play football now? Does he love the game? Or just do it because he’s good at it?
Humphreys had a very mature answer there.
“I would say my why now was when it really came to play there’s a part of me there,” he said. “There’s the NFL dream there obviously. But there’s also I want to see how good of a football player I can become. For me, it is really as simple as that. How many skill sets can I gain or improve upon that I already have? Just kind of see the growth of something. That’s what I enjoy to see. Like last year or a month ago or a week ago I could not do this or I did not know what I was doing. I would say it is as simple as that for me.”
“I want to see how good of a football player I can become.”
Humphreys is, in short, in love with the idea of getting better every day.
And by testing himself against some of the best players in the country every day to find and unlock his best football.
That shows why he’d be a very good culture fit into what thrives at Georgia.
SENTELL'S INTEL
(check on the recent reads on Georgia football recruiting)
