Handicapping 5-star Galveston safety Jonah Williams’ decision this Saturday

The long anticipated decision of Galveston (Texas) Ball safety Jonah Williams will be made this Saturday at 6:30 p.m. at Kermit Courville stadium. Williams has taken a measured, mature approach to the process.

Sure, like any other recruitment it has seen its shifts, but there haven’t been too many major plot twists. The major plot twists that have happened occurred outside of Williams’ doing, namely the defensive coordinator change at LSU and Texas hiring baseball coach Jim Schlossnagle from Texas A&M. At the time, with A&M poised to finish National runner-up in baseball, many felt the Aggies held the inside edge.

Texas has been chugging right along, having been in the lead group since switching Williams’ offer from linebacker to safety, though the Horns have never been perceived as the outright leader. But, should they be considered that just days away from Williams’ announcement?

Let’s take a look at the major participants.

Texas Longhorns

The Longhorns have been charging this entire calendar year with Steve Sarkisian , Blake Gideon , and Terry Joseph all making stops by Ball High School.

We’ve often heard of genuine interest from the Williams camp, but that hasn’t necessarily been noticeable in Williams’ fact-pattern. I talked with Jonah’s parents, Billy and Annie, about that in May and they assured IT that Texas was a real contender. They mentioned how Jonah’s brother, Nick, was a one-time Texas baseball commit.

Still, at times it’s been hard to reconcile what we’ve heard about Texas and Williams’ own actions. As one example, he didn’t take an official visit to Texas during June, but he did take an official visit to the rest of the schools on this list.

The background noise of Texas having a real chance has existed all spring but it really picked up this summer when Texas hired Schlossnagle away from A&M. A&M is where his brother ultimately signed to play baseball before forgoing college in favor of a shot at the Majors. Nick Williams, who now lives in Austin, was taken in the second round of the 2012 MLB Draft. After Schloss was named coach, Jonah Williams made a late July visit in which he connected with the new baseball coach via FaceTime. That call is said to have gone very well.

In addition to playing baseball, Williams also has the opportunity to play wide receiver if safety doesn’t work out. Texas receivers coach Chris Jackson has made that clear. There are some who believe Williams has as much. upside at receiver as he does safety.

Between football and baseball, Texas has a compelling pitch, but the Horns aren’t alone in that regard.

LSU Tigers

LSU is both a perennial football and baseball power. Despite LSU struggles on defense, there’s still plenty of excitement due to LSU’s explosive offense and overhaul on defense with new defensive coordinator Blake Baker . Baker, a native Houstonian and former Texas Graduate Assistant, is an energetic up-and-comer who has been very aggressive in this recruitment.

Williams genuinely likes both aspects of LSU and there have been times, like with A&M, where the Tigers have been considered the leader.

LSU is working overtime to get this over the line but so too is Texas.

Texas A&M Aggies

There’s a pretty heavy A&M influence in Galveston County that extends beyond former Ball two-sport athlete Mike Evans.

In football, the Aggies have done well to connect with in-state recruits under new head coach Mike Elko, who has previously been safeties coach in addition to defensive coordinator.

Since Schlossnagle gave way to his former hitting coach, Michael Earley, we just haven’t heard the same buzz around A&M that we once did.

USC Trojans and Oregon Ducks

I view these two in a similar way. Williams certainly likes both programs but I don’t know anyone who believes he will he go that far away from home. Both schools have been very proactive and Oregon’s baseball program has actually done well to recruit him for that sport as well.

It would be a shock if he ended up on the West Coast and that far away from home.

Handicapping the Field

Texas 50%

LSU 30%

A&M 10%

USC 5%

Oregon 5%

*****

We’ve seen some shock commitments this cycle (with some that haven’t stuck). If we saw that again with Williams picking Oregon or USC, I highly doubt it would stick on Signing Day, but you can’t question the motivation of those two schools.

All of these schools are all still working the phones extremely hard and working every angle they can think of.

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