Texas Tech football: Another 3-star defensive back decommits
Saturday, the Texas Tech football team lost yet another 2019 defensive back when 3-star safety Brandon Joseph from College Station decommitted.
It is a good thing that the new Texas Tech football coaching staff is out on the road recruiting because the Red Raiders now have plenty of spots to fill. Saturday, another opened up when 3-star defensive back Brandon Joseph from College Station, Texas decomitted becoming the fourth pass defender to jump ship since Matt Wells replaced Kliff Kingsbury as head coach.
Joseph committed to the Red Raiders in July after visiting Texas Tech and Arizona. The 6-foot-1, 185-pounder also holds offers from Northwestern, Colorado, Iowa State, Purdue, Utah and Vanderbilt among others. He is ranked the No. 79 safety in the nation and the No. 127 player in the state of Texas.
This is the latest in a string of players to reopen their recruitment in the wake of the coaching change in Lubbock. Joseph is the sixth player to renege on his commitment to the Red Raiders including 4-star defensive end Steven Parker of Dallas (the highest-rated recruit in the class) and 3-star QB Maverick McIvor from San Angelo.
In addition, Tech has seen defensive backs Keeyon Stewart and Alex Hogan of Houston and Markel Reed of Temple also express their desire to explore other options. This is not great news for a position group that needs an influx of talent.
In 2018, Texas Tech had the third worst defense in the nation against the pass allowing 288.3 yards per game. The Red Raiders allowed 46 passing plays of 20 yards or more, ranking 106th in the country.
Unfortunately, Tech will have to replace both starting safeties next season. Seniors Jah’Shawn Johnson and Vaughnte Dorsey have exhausted their eligibility taking with them 110 tackles and five interceptions. While all of the corners that saw significant playing time this year are set to return, this is a secondary that needs to find a way to be more competitive and bringing in new faces to battle for playing time could only be a positive.
But now, there are no defensive backs currently committed to Tech’s 2019 recruiting class, which has dropped from 19 commits to 13 in just over a week. The class is now ranked just 8th in the Big 12 and 65th overall.
dark. Next. How players that left the program did in 2018
Certainly, the Red Raider coaching staff will start to replenish their class in the upcoming weeks but how much they can do prior to the December 19-21 early signing window is yet to be seen. But what we do know is that there now must be a heavy influence on finding defensive backs which was once considered to be a strength of this class.