Want to attack every day with the latest Georgia football recruiting info? That’s the Intel. This rep offers up a follow-up to the commitment of Pennsylvania speedster Yazeed Haynes. He ranks as the nation’s No. 83 WR and the No. 635 overall prospect for 2023 on the 247Sports Composite ratings.

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Yazeed Haynes committed to Georgia yesterday. The DawgNation commitment story had all the bells and whistles.

Haynes is a 3-star on the 247Sports Composite and the On3 Consensus. Rivals.com has him as a 4-star prospect at receiver.

There is some back-and-forth in scouting circles about whether his best position is at receiver or defensive back. For the record, Haynes prefers receiver with that topic.

The early enrollee is game-breakingly fast with a reported hand-time in the 40 of 4.39 seconds at a summer camp at Penn State. That’s despite not being a track guy or running track for a while now.

Those are all the details one can find with a few clicks.

Want to know why Haynes will likely eclipse the projections of all those recruiting rankings?

There’s a moment in his life that stands as a very important catalyst in him going as far as he can in football.

Haynes said he lost his older brother, Shaheed Jackson, to violence when he was in the third grade. That was back in 2013. He was approximately eight years old. His older brother was just 18 years young.

New UGA receiver commitment Yazeed Haynes shared this treasured photo of him with his older brother Shaheed below. Shaheed passed away at the age of 18 when he was just in the third grade. (Courtesy photo) (Courtesy photo/Dawgnation)

Haynes pays respect to his lost brother before every game. He will write the phrase “HeedWorld4L” on his tape to honor Shaheed’s memory.

“My one brother, well, he sadly passed away,” Haynes said. “He is one of the reasons why I really keep playing this sport. Because I know he would be happy right now seeing me doing everything and what I am doing for myself and for our family.”

When times get tough, he only needs to look down on his tape.

“That really helps me keep going,” he said.

It is hard for Haynes to talk about football and not bring up his family. He’s the youngest. Definitely the fastest. Nobody else in the family can clock a 4.39 in the 40.

“My Mom and Dad really love watching me play football,” he said. “It really makes them happy and they want me to make it far. I’m really doing all this because I love the sport and I want to do it for my family because they enjoy watching me play the sport and they want to see me make it far.”

Make it far in football. He will bring up that phrase a lot.

Good thing he can cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time.

Yazeed Haynes is part of a big football family

He’s passionate about football. For a lot of reasons.

Check out this tackle he made way back when he was nine years old playing for the Delaware Dolphins.

“I’ve been playing football since I was four years old,” Haynes said. “Once I started playing, I just really fell in love with the sport. Then come around like sixth grade, I got a bad concussion. My Dad was like I don’t want you to play football anymore.”

He was sidelined for his sixth and seventh-grade seasons. He also missed some of his eighth-grade games. Haynes tried to find another outlet aside from football.

“But you know I wasn’t really feeling all the other sports,” he said. “Not like football. I was just like I need to play football. So I did eventually. It was after seeing some doctors and convincing my Dad to finally let me come back. Once again, I was really happy playing sports again.”

The youngest boy in the family is now on his way to play for the national champions. That will be a great source of pride in his family. They’ve all dreamed this.

“I had another brother who also played football,” Haynes said. “He went off to play (Division II) college ball but that was kind of it right there. My other brother also played football. You see I have a lot of my family that played football but nobody really made it like as far as I am about to make it.”

When he plays, he plays for all of them.

“I know a lot of them are pulling for me to see me make it far,” he said.

When he visited UGA back in June, he was still committed to Penn State. He was also previously committed to Rutgers. In the hours leading up to his UGA commitment this week, he posed a countdown page on his Instagram story that was titled “third time’s the charm” counting down the hours to his commitment.

Haynes brought up his family often in a wide-ranging DawgNation interview earlier this week.

He got an immediate family feeling when he visited Georgia for the first time. McClendon felt like family. So did the head coach of the Georgia Bulldogs. He got that vibe the first time he sat down to speak with Kirby Smart.

Fran Brown, the new Georgia defensive backs coach, has also established a relationship with his family.

“He and my father are already kind of close now as well,” Haynes said in regard to Brown.

Haynes will be in Athens this weekend for a couple of days for the traditional cookout weekend. It ends the summer before the staff switches the gears to season prep during the dead period for visits in August.

He only came back from his official visit with a shirt. The plan is to come back with more red and black after this weekend.

It will be interesting to see if the ‘Dawgs break out the slip-n-slide that has shown up at that event in the past.

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DB? WR? Team? Yazeed Haynes answers that question

Haynes was named the wide receiver MVP at a Rivals.com prospect camp this summer. That’s probably why Rivals is the only ranking service that lists him as a 4-star recruit.

Those evaluators saw up close what he could do. As stated earlier, his heart races a little faster when he’s playing receiver.

But he’s open to playing both positions.

Penn State recruited him to play both spots. Georgia has focused more on recruiting the 6-foot-1, 170-pound senior at receiver.

“College coaches do talk about the possibilities of me playing DB with my size and how I could be a great DB,” Haynes said. “Honestly, though, my heart is at receiver because it is what I have been playing ever since high school and that’s what I work at. But playing DB wouldn’t be too much for me.”

“I would do it if that’s what the team feels is best. I want to help the team win. If they feel like it is best for me to go to DB and not play receiver, then I would be open to doing that.”

Smart kid, right? He said he holds a weighted GPA of 4.2 in his classes. Haynes plans to major in business and one day own his own company.

Georgia receivers coach Bryan McClendon made a great impression here in this recruitment.

“I love Coach BMac,” he said. “I love his energy and dedication to the game. Just like talking to him is like talking to another family member. I can relate to a lot of the stuff he says.”

Haynes regrets that he stopped running track a few years ago.

“I used to run track but I stopped a few years ago just to focus on football,” he said. “Which I regret now because if I kept running track then that 40 would be a lot faster.”

How does one know a player is really fast? That’s when he talks about a 4.39 in the 40 and that he could be a lot faster than he is right now.

That’s fast.

Have you subscribed to the DawgNation YouTube channel yet? If so, you will be able to see special 1-on-1 content with UGA names like Jake Fromm, Gunner Stockon and Brock Vandagriff here.

3-star WR Yazeed Haynes was once committed to both Rutgers and Penn State. (Twitter photo) (Courtesy photo/Dawgnation)

SENTELL’S INTEL

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