EXPERT: Alex Golesh, Auburn is COOKING on the Recruiting Trail

0:00The Auburn Tigers add trade proctor and there is more recruiting news as Auburn hits the trail hard. You are locked on Colin Crossover, part of the Lockdown podcast network, 14 every day. A crossover edition of Locked on Auburn and Locked on the portal I'm your host Brian Smith. This crazy guy over here, I still hang out with occasionally, that is Zach Blackery. We are trying to give you all the greatest of information regarding the Auburn Tigers today. They've done a really good job getting started here with their recruiting class act. Trade proctor has committed, we will get to him but we also have a host of players to discuss most of which I know personally, Baron Battle Miami and Combine's Auburn's recruiting has taken a big step forward right out of the gate for Alex Gowish. First off, did you know anything about trade proctor before this?

1:01I knew a little bit, I'm just curious, I have some good stories for Auburn folks, why don't you just curious, what did you do? Yeah, I've seen his name and that was about it. I knew he was tied in and I think it kind of stopped. There goes by Tank Proctor, which is awesome, which is great. I'll take all the tanks that you could possibly have whenever you go to battle, but 6'4", 213 pounds, kind of a rangey, long, athletic kid. The more I look at trade proctor, Tank Proctor, the more... I like to admit, Brian, you and I have talked so much about how important the tight end is than Alex Gowish's system. I think this guy kind of checks the boxes when you talk about versatility. I could see him being a pass catcher. I could see him being attached to the line. I could see him put them in the back, build an H-back. I understand why House Gowish would want Proctor to be a part of the signing class. I knew about him as well. He plays an American heritage for those that don't know. And if you're not familiar with that program, it's as elite as it gets.

2:03South Florida, they're a national program. They're quarterbacked to sign with Texas. I think that puts it into perspective. They also have a guy by the name of Malatite Tony that once played there a year ago. So again, he knows what it looks like to be around dudes. More even in practice than anything. So he's going to be more prepared. And here's the backstory. I was at Battle Miami representing coastline stars this past weekend. And I'm talking to Andrew Ivers and Tom Loy about some of the guys from the combine that they just had the opening or whatever down and stuff. And that was the first kid that was brought up. This is before he announced, hey, I'm going to Auburn. And it's hilarious. Andrew tells me that they had a gal filming. And he'd send her, okay, we've got enough filming him. And then he scored like 11 more touchdowns in one-on-one. I'm like, what? Like he destroyed everybody. Usually the big body kids like that, they can't run routes for crap. But if you're scoring that many times again, he plays at Heritage, Coach Smith, there's Tremendous, at Staff's Tremendous, he's going to come in way more polished than most guys.

3:05And if you want, if you go to like X or Instagram and type in his name and go look, the film speaks for itself just on one-on-ones. And then you can go look at his highlights when everything says the same thing. He's going to play the point you made about him being a guy that's going to be important, that tight end. Here's the really good bonus. When he's on the field, the opposing defense isn't going to know where he's going to line up. It'll be slot. It'll be out wide. He'll be what I call move, tie in like the H back or in the hip. You don't know where he's going to be. That is so annoying as a defensive coordinator. You want to have while you're ducks and row. When he's on the field, that will not be a possibility. You're going to have to guess. So he's going to be on linebackers. That's just not going to work. He will smoke them. Yeah. And the tied-in room is going to be interesting for Auburn. So they brought in Jake Johnson from North Carolina. He's a senior. So by the time proctor gets here, those guys won't play together. But he'll be behind presumably a Jonathan Eccles, who followed Golis from South Florida. Xavier Newsom, who followed his coach from Howard.

4:08Then they bring back Ryan G, which is a guy that I like. And then they signed DJ Broughton. I think he's going to be in the thick of it. Pretty early on in his career. Especially Golis shows so much loyalty to his guys. Is kind of what we've seen. This is the first high school commit of the Golis era. And that has to mean something for a guy who really seems to be big on having his guys. So curious to see how that kind of shakes out over the course of the early part of his time at Auburn. Another little backstory. Eccles was at IMG. Early commit to Tennessee. So there's your connection. Freaky athlete. He can do anything. He can play like a big tight in flex. Tight in that so that's they're going with the style here. Once I saw Eccles going to Auburn, I knew they were really going for guys that were versatile. So that that's really important. Yeah, and Golis is I mean, it's fitting. I mean, you look at his his trend up. He's a tight in guy.

5:08Yeah, and so I do think it's fitting that that proctor what's his first commit. So fun stuff. Yeah. Out of this group of kids that I sit you today, we're going to go over each one. I know you don't know as much about them. Are you surprised at all that Auburn hit the ground running this fast with recruiting? Because like the until I got this weekend, and I'll go over all the kids that like I deal with and several of them are being recruited by the Tigers. Yeah. They're hammering it. What's what's your take and what have you heard through the vibe before we go on individually here? Yeah, I mean, it definitely seems like this staff is kind of put a bow on the portal stuff, which is probably normal throughout calls football. The windows closed. You may get a few names, you know, if schools held on to a name longer than or as long as possible. They have 48 hours to do that, which I think is like business days. So I think that could actually even happen. Going into Wednesday if a school really, really wanted to hold it. But yeah, like that's kind of who Alex Golis is.

6:12That's the way he kind of sold himself to the Auburn family when he got here. He said, no, nobody's going to work harder. That's how you up, Brian. You're starting to see Golis. Up here and all these pictures on social media with all these different trainers throughout the Southeast, which is what you want to see. And he looks progressively more tired in every single one of them, which I have no issue with. You're the head coach at Auburn. You need to be tired. That's okay. That's okay. Yeah, of the names you sent me, there's several. Bryce Woods is the guy I wanted to ask you about first. And maybe it's because he's listed as a corner. And, you know, me, I love my cornerbacks, but doesn't seem to be really ranked yet. So Bryce Woods, Atlanta, Georgia, goes to Woodward Academy. Is he a guy that could be like a late riser and we start seeing him kind of a send up recruiting rankings over the next few months? There's two reasons I say 100% that will happen. Number one, he has an Ohio State offer.

7:14Well, Ohio State offer is a corner. What are the odds that he sucks, Zach? What are the odds? Pretty low. That screams at least four star to me. Yeah, and he's at Woodward Academy. I got to know Bryce very well. He was actually messaging with him earlier today. Well, that is a kid that's extremely polished on and off the field. He was one of our starting corners at Coastline Stars this past weekend about on Miami, along his hill, the six one, 180 some pounds. He knows what it looks like to go against a elite kid. He's been a guy for a long time. I mean, what a surprise. He's not ranked higher. Woodward Academy, every school in the country recruits them. It doesn't look like two, four, sevens ranked him at all. So I'm sure somebody watches tape and puts them in their database or whatever. He'll shoot up. You know who else offered him? May of last year? Uh-oh. Who? USF. You carry over your stuff. You literally take your files with you to the next destination. Like John, the Eccles kid.

8:14You know, they were, they brought it. He committed to Tennessee sign. They ended up at US a half goal. It was a part of his recruitment originally. And it's his relationships are how everything works. And I can tell you straight up, like Bryce is a kid that he's very open-minded. And he's 100% relationship-based. Like where he goes. So Auburn's one of the schools on his list. He'll visit. We'll see how it goes. And I think that's why this is so important. When we come back, we'll talk about several more of this. So many. It's a fun problem to have, Zach. I'd rather have a lot of information to discuss then less. I can assure you that. So let's talk about that next right here on this. Crawl super locked on Auburn and locked on the board. Today's show is brought to you by our friends over at Game Time. There's nothing like the college football season. It is now finally over. Congrats to my alma mater, the Indiana Hoosiers for winning the National Championship. Everything that goes on, all the bands, all the fun. Everything else, you could be right there in the middle of it

9:16with Game Time, this season, next season. Don't forget about the NFL playoffs. Zach's Patriots are still in it, much to my chagrin. But Game Time will give you the advantage. No matter what you're looking to do, he gives the advantage back to the fans. The easiest way to unlock amazing football tickets. And experiences in just a few taps. Open the Game Time map. Look for whatever it is that you're looking for. Choose your team event, whatever it may be. It's very simple. All you have to do is click on an event. You go in there, you find the seat. The price will be the same at the beginning of the end. And you can see you or see if you take the guesswork out of fine tickets with Game Time. Use code of locked on college for 20 bucks off your first purchase. Again, that's L-O-C-K-E-D-O-N-C-O-L-L-E-G-E for 20 bucks off. Download the Game Time map today. And if you want to take your game to the next level, Zach, you ever heard of the Everydayer Club, Zach? Have you ever heard of this? You, I think you should. I think everybody should know about the Everydayer Club. Audio, if you take it with you on the go, Spotify, Podbean, Apple, anywhere else.

10:17You can get your ads for free five bucks a month or 50 bucks for the year. Down in the description below, there is a link on Zach's site and on my site. All you have to do is click on it. You get some more information. We've got a discord. All kinds of stuff going on there. Check it out the Everydayer Club. Now let's discuss whichever kids you want to go with. I know all these kids, Zach, I want you to kind of lead here. Fire away. I'll give the scoop on Auburn and the overall player prospect. Yeah, going to be a theme. A lot of Atlanta Georgia kids here. Let's start with Adrian Cole, the safety. He's on the 247 sports composite. He's a four star six to 190 pounds. Big kid looks super athletic. And you say Auburn's interested in him. So is the free world. There. Yeah, Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Tennessee, Ohio State, Texas, and him. This is, I mean, for those you watching this on YouTube, I put this picture in here on purpose. This is just a random photo of Adrian this past weekend

11:20that I took him running. His legs look like Bo Jackson. So I get to say he plays safety. By the way, that 190 pounds, I'm not buying that. I think that's an old measure. There's, if he's 190, that's crazy. But whatever it is, he's a big dude. Really quiet kid. He can cover a lot of ground. I saw him play live this past season. He plays at Douglas County. One of the best programs in the country. He's one of only three guys to pick up Teddy Gerard. He could go into Notre Dame this past season. He could play free safety. He could play in the box. He could be a nickel wine backer. He could do all kinds of things. He's a hitter, but he's also extremely intelligent. His recruitment is really open. He's supposed to get down to Auburn. This is a really important recruitment for me because defense suppliers are the difference at the top of the SEC. Could we talk about that all the time? To be honest, you freeze did. Obviously, he's saving did. Recruiting is the difference on defense.

12:20You can kind of scheme offense and the offense that go where he'll make it work. And he's got a lot of talent now. Auburn's offense off your auto fund next year. But if they're going to climb to the top of the league, guys that look like this, have to join your secondary and wine backer group. Do you want to go? Which we've seen. We saw this staff put an emphasis on retaining some of the younger guys that are similar to that. Eric Winters and new boy Fagans and Blake would be like those type of defensive backs. I mean, yeah, you want as many of those guys on your team as possible. And that's really the difference. This is the next way. Like he's the rare safety that can play at 210. Kind of like Eric. Like Winters is big dude. But he runs the basket. Cole's the same thing. That's the closest comparison for Auburn fans that are familiar with Winters. He's another guy that was super intelligent that I went and saw play down an air prize. Cole's some kind of deal plays a weak competition. Yeah, and you know, Ohio State and Georgia more than like

13:20that you really don't need a whole lot more ranking. I'll take Kirby's opinion over about it. Sorry. Yeah, especially at DB. So that's Adrian Cole, the four star safety from Douglas County over in Atlanta. Jim Aaron Simmons, wide receiver, four star from Tallahassee Marta. Another solid member of the 2027. For those of you on YouTube again, he's Jim Aaron's the one on the left here. The other one we talked about in a second's key on stand for Jim Aaron's for reek first play. The tournament for us, coastline stars coverage. We played low pro, which is a top five national seven on 17. Everybody's covered. So Teddy throws it up to Jim Aaron. And Jim Aaron goes up and takes it off this kids head. It would have been a sports center. We didn't play it was the best play I saw in the tournament at any of the games I was at. What are we the first play? He's the kid you put in the dunk competition. He's five 11 or so. I bet his votes over 35. He's got speed.

14:21He had three touchdowns in the very first game. Explosive, unexplosive, four to four to state Auburn. You name a school Clemson, whatever they want it. He can play slot. He can play outside. But to the point that we've talked about multiple times on locked on Auburn where I come on your show speed. He runs by guys at the end of the day and goal is his offense. If you don't have kids that run by guys, it's not going to work. You can play him inside or out. Doesn't matter. He will smoke you. So he can really really run. And again, the bounces are ridiculous. You can put him in the dunk competition. And then we'll talk about the guy next to him. Keon stand up for. Yeah, this is another receiver. Five, nine from Athens, Georgia. And once again, he's got offers from everybody. Yeah, Keon is the typical slot. But there's something different about him. His hands are insane. We had a practice Friday night before battle Miami.

15:22He literally did not drop a pass. And over an hour, it's nothing but just constantly catching. But that's insane. And he makes crazy catches. One hand to catch is warmups for him. He's more fun for me to watch in the games. Like, he'll catch a 50 yard pass with one hand. And he's halfway looking at it. His gift is his hands. Then after that, he makes people look dumb. He ran through the entire defense on one plate for a touchdown. Every team of the country needs a Keon standard for. The question is, can you get him? He could go in and play a Georgia or anywhere else. He's a true slot. He's got some bounce to him. But at five, nine, if you don't get hands on him and again, he's playing a slot. It's hard. It's almost impossible to cover him one-on-one. He actually lives in Covington, the Atlanta area. And he drives over to Athens every day. It was crazy. But great kid, academically inclined. For those that don't know, Athens Academy is an elite prep school. So in these five minutes from UGA, but I don't think he's going to go there. All right, Tay Walden, Jr.

16:22Listen as an athlete. From, is that call your bill, Tennessee? I think it's callable. It's just outside of Memphis. It's a program that's always had players speed on speed. Six, one and a half, something like that. He can play a quarter or receiver for us, for coastline stars. This is a kid that played both. He's the only guy we had played both ways. And like every single receiver we have is going to play FBS football. Do you think with like the Travis Hunter movement, you're going to see more kids try to do that? Here's the thing. When I first met him, because I'd never spoken to him until this past weekend, I was talking about recruiting. It is like Tennessee, Georgia, Aubrey. Like it's, you know, who you would expect for a kid from Memphis. He said it kind of depends on which schools really want me both ways. I'm like, holy cow. I'm like, I don't think Georgia's really going to let you play both ways. You believe that. But just the fact that it's even mentioned is about all you need to know. And like, we just threw him in there, that corner in one of the games. And it's just like, it doesn't matter. His footwork is so fluid and he's so athletic.

17:25You could teach him outside receiver, slot receiver, or corner, I wouldn't care. He's one of the fastest players in the country. Extremely explosive again. I would assume Auburn. One thing for that is they want to stretch the field. But if he ended up playing defense at Auburn or Tennessee or something, it wouldn't shock me either. Yeah, it looks like his recruiter for Auburn is Cody Burns. So that'll be interesting if he's recruiting him as, you know, the receivers guy, or if he's recruiting him as just, you know, kind of the assistant head coach. That's interesting. Yeah, I mean, you kind of let this play out and his film this spring from spring ball and seven on seven might dictate where he ends up playing. He might have several schools recruiting on both sides of the ball. The problem to have. Yeah. All right, Zaden Gamble, another defensive back. He's from Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Fort Star crossed the board. Looks like Auburn's on Zaden as well. St. Thomas Aquinas, as tradition richer program is there is,

18:26Michael Irvings, Alma Mater. This is a kid I know well. I've seen him a future 50. I've seen him at different events. He's got all the offers. Miami, Florida, Florida State, Notre Dame. You name it. Great kid can fit in anywhere. And Auburn's probably going to get a visit. Probably free safety. Mike playing nickel. He's a kid that's open minded as loves football. This is where it gets fun for me with all these new coaches act. Like I said earlier with Adrian Cole, like if you're going to win at the upper echelon, not like that mid-level SEC team, are you getting the dudes on defense that make a difference? You can scheme so much on offense. Defense, you just got to have guys. This is somebody that can be the back in free safety or something for you. Kind of frame is somewhere to new boy. He needs to add a little weight, but he's very intelligent and playing at STA. Like he's going to be coached differently. It's kind of like American heritage is same thing. So Auburn gets him on campus. We'll see, but he's pretty open. And it's going to come down to his visits. But Auburn's making a really,

19:27heaven goal was from like living for it for a year. It's going to be so big for them. It's going to be so big. Yeah, and one of his recruiters is DVD, which I don't know, it's the area. Yeah, 10 banks is also on there too. So yeah, it says here that he played as a freshman at St. Thomas Aquinas, which is that's rare. That is extremely rare. All right, let's go back to the wide receiver. Jabari Watkins. Get four star receiver from Thomas County Central over in Thomasville, Georgia. Once again, impressive offer list from all over the place. Yeah, he's one of those kids that can absolutely go up and get it. I know that program, well, it's one of the best run programs in the country. Coach Rogers down there is one of my favorite guys. That program is dominant. They just went state again. They won the 6A title, I believe it was. They won it by 40 points, Zach. It's a solid team. It's insane. All right. He's getting Auburn's right in the mix for that.

20:28They've got a really good chance. Four to states, kind of the team, that's where Troy Ward-Poyne back in the day, the 93 Highsman winner. But right now anything goes in South Georgia. UGA doesn't hit it as hard as normal in four to states terrible. This is an opportunity for like a 6-3 receiver. They want speed and on that, but he would be the one like boundary guy. He'd be pretty. You gotta have a little balance. He could run, but he's got size at least 6-3. They dude, a weak recruit can go any school in country. All right. Then let's talk about running back. CJ Cali, he's from Hoover. We were talking about him before we clicked record. It's one of the kind of throw his name out there here at the end, but has a chance to do one of the better running backs in the state. Yeah, he's class of 28. He has put together. He's a crazy workout guy. He loves it. He had his collarbone broken, but he couldn't wait to get back into it. When we were at the airport coming back from the event, he was trying to eat because he's trying to get up to a certain weight. He's like that guy that's super driven,

21:30but he's got offers from everybody. Right now, fly out Auburn Leeds. It's not an if, it's fact. I mean, it's face to face conversation. And he plays at Hoover. He couldn't want to any program in the state or anywhere else. He could play at IMG. He will be a national recruit. Right now, Auburn Leeds and his list of schools is wherever he wants to go. So he'll be a 200, 200 five pound kid coming out coming out high school, and he is a rock. He's put together. Yeah, Bill. Yes. All right. So that's CJ Callie from Hoover. So there's a lot of information in there. Welcome to the seven on seven circuit. Cindy, it's my, it's my time brother. This is what I love. Let's go. Let's go. No, great stuff, great stuff. For all the Auburn folks watching, if you want more of this every single day all the time, check out Brian over at the portal. So however you consume locked on Auburn, you can find the portal there as well. Absolutely. Zach, I appreciate you stopping in. Thank you very much. This has been a crossover locked on Auburn and locked on the portal.