Texas Tech football: Big-time JUCO OT sets official visit date

Jeremy Flax, a highly-sought-after JUCO offensive tackle, has set an official visit date with the Texas Tech football program.

Given the struggles of this year’s Texas Tech football team, the lack of depth on the current roster, and the program’s recent struggles on the recruiting trail, it seems a certainty that head coach Matt Wells and his staff will be looking to the JUCO ranks to provide immediate help for next season.  One of the program’s highest priorities in that market is Jeremy Flax, an offensive tackle from Independence Community College, which was featured on the last two seasons of the Nextflix documentary series Last Chance U. 

The 6-foot-6, 315-pound tackle is a redshirt freshman meaning that he wasn’t on the field last year during the filming of the show and given that Independence will not be featured on the next season of the wildly popular show, fans will have to wait until the 2020 season to get to see Flax in action, unless they want to take in some Jayhawk Conference football this fall.

Rated a 4-star prospect by Rivals.com and a 3-star by 247Sports, Flax is seeing his stock soar as the 2019 early signing window is now less than two months away.  His profile on the latter of those sites shows that he’s picked up offers from the likes of Kentucky, Oklahoma State, Kansas State, Arkansas, and Tennessee since the start of October.  It is also that site that shows Flax has set up an official visit for Tech on the weekend of November 15-16 when the Red Raiders host TCU as well as an official visit to Kentucky the following weekend.

https://twitter.com/BiggFlax/status/1181745035626401792?s=20

The native of Detroit, Michigan could potentially be a walk-in starter on next year’s Red Raider team.  Both of Tech’s starting tackles, Terence Steele and Travis Bruffy, will exhaust their eligibility this season and while sophomore Casey Verhulst has filled in admirably at times when Steele has been banged up, there are no certain answers at either tackle position after this season.

6-foot-5, 310-pound Will Farrar has seen some action this year in a backup capacity but mainly at guard.  Meanwhile, it seems like neither of the two true freshman tackles on the roster, Landon Peterson and Trevor Roberson, are ready for a full-time starting job as Peterson needs to add weight and strength and the 7-foot, 350-pound Roberson needs to shed some baby fat and improve his footwork.

That the program only signed two offensive linemen in the most recent recruiting class is obviously a problem.  What’s more, there are only two linemen currently committed tot he 2020 class, 3-star prospects Caleb Rogers from Mansfield and Larry Moore from Missouri City.

Tech must sign at least four offensive linemen in this year’s class.  Set to lose three starting seniors (guard Madison Akamnonu is also in his last year of eligibility) and possibly junior Jack Anderson who may head to the NFL after a junior season that was cut short by an injury sustained in the Big 12 opener against Oklahoma, the depth along the offensive front could be severely compromised if Wells and Co. don’t add a stable of capable players in the current class.

That’s why Flax is such an important priority for this program.  We all love to focus on the offensive skill position players but it won’t matter whether it is Alan Bowman, Jett Duffey, or Pat Mahomes in the shotgun for the Red Raiders next fall if the line can’t keep him upright.  Therefore, keep an eye on Jeremy Flax and pay close attention to what Wells is able to do in closing out this offensive line class.  It could be one of the more important storylines of the offseason.