Brooks picks up first offer

Monrovia, Calif., tight end Eric Brooks was one of the many impressive looking prospects at last weekend's Rivals.com Junior Day at Anaheim (Calif.) Servite. The 6-foot-1, 240-pounder more than passed the eyeball test and looked the part of a solid Division I recruit. The good news is that the college coaches tend to agree.

"I've been getting a whole lot of mail," Brooks said. "I got my first offer the other day from Colorado State. I found out about it last week, and I just got the letter from them today. I plan to go out to their summer camp and check out how things are there.

"I'm also hearing from Washington, UCLA, Arizona, Oregon State, Utah, Nevada, Colorado, and a lot of other schools. A bunch of different schools have just been sending me mail."

Brooks hopes to continue to improve his stock this summer at stops at the NIKE Training Camp and at Oregon State and Colorado State.

"Oregon State is a team I'd like to be getting more attention from," he said. "I grew up in Oregon, and I liked Oregon and Oregon State a lot. I know somebody that goes to school up there, and they've never really had a big time tight end and I think I could bring that to their program.

"I grew up a football fan. I wasn't a fan of any one school, really, but you could say I'm a USC fan, I guess. It would be nice to get an offer from them, but I'm not really sure if I'm going to hold out or anything. Right now I'm getting more offers and waiting a little bit to make my decision."

Brooks was named his team's most valuable player on offense in 2005. He had 34 receptions for 301 yards and had two scores in 2005. Brooks also racked up 26 tackles, 11 assists, two sacks and a fumble recovery.

"I'm a good receiver, and I do a lot of work on my blocking," he said. "I want to be a complete player."

A complete player that could end the process before his senior season starts.

"I don't want to worry about it, and I just want to focus on the season and my team," he said. "I don't know if I'll get the offers I want before the season and if I don't then I will wait until after the season to see if I get any more.

"Playing early will probably be the biggest factor for me. I want to play early and I want to go somewhere with a good location and everything. I'm not trying to stay close to home or anything, but I want a place where I can go and feel comfortable with whether it's close to home or not.

"I don't know when I'll be ready to make a decision. I'm not sure if I'll get more offers after the season or if I'll get some good offers before the season starts. If I get enough before the season starts I'd like to make the decision early, but I'm not going to rush into a decision if I don't have many offers."