Small town product Simmons has big talent
SAN ANTONIO – Macon is a tiny town in Mississippi, nearly unnoticeable on state maps, about 40 minutes from Starkville and 90 from Tuscaloosa.
There's not much in Macon except that it’s the hometown of one of the best defensive ends in the 2016 class, Jeffery Simmons, and he’s emerging this week at the U.S. Army All-American Bowl as a possible five-star candidate.
“Simmons has a big, strong lower body that makes him extremely explosive,” Rivals.com National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell said.
“He’s a powerful kid who could move inside and he reminds me of Leonard Williams. The pocket gets pushed even if you block him and Simmons is just too powerful to keep him out of the backfield.”
A strong performance at the Alabama-Mississippi All-Star Classic put Simmons on the national map, finally providing the exposure needed for someone who hasn’t been seen too often during his outstanding high school career. Simmons was already a name but he’s emerging as a potential star in the national spotlight here.
That’s the case all too often with top Mississippi talent, so good, so unknown, until they compete on the national stage.
Simmons dealt with being overlooked through the years and while he said it did not frustrate him it was certainly used as motivation to prove he’s just as good – and even better – than a lot of guys from higher-profile areas like Texas and Florida.
“Especially playing in the big games, I was even picked kind of late for this game,” Simmons said. “We’re paving the way for players coming up because of the way we come in and perform.
“Mississippi is not getting noticed a lot. It really is motivating especially me coming up. I felt I was one of the best kids in the nation coming off the edge being able to rush. It’s really motivating me to keep working.”
Location could be an obstacle for Mississippi prospects. It has lots of small schools and not a lot of camps to gain that necessary national exposure. Plus, it's an area where not a lot of college coaches come in and recruit every year.
Maybe that should change. The state is absolutely loaded this recruiting class with wide receiver DeKaylin Metcalf (Ole Miss), cornerback Nigel Knott, Simmons, Raekwon Davis (Alabama) and Justin Connor (Ole Miss) ranked in the top five.
Ole Miss DT commit Benito Jones and uncommitted wide receiver A.J. Brown were outstanding last week at the Under Armour All-America Game. The state is loaded – and not a lot of people know about it, until maybe too late.
“It’s an under-recruited area and it could be just based on geography,” Farrell said. “Not a lot of people go into Louisiana because it’s hard to pull kids out of there, not a lot of outside schools go into Alabama and Mississippi is in between.
“Mississippi gets overlooked and it’s strange because there is so much talent and it’s not exactly like Ole Miss and Mississippi State have it on complete lockdown. It’s an under-recruited area where a lot of talented players emerge late.”
For Simmons, he wants people to know about Mississippi. Another small-town kid, lightly known on the national stage for too long, is coming up big at the Army game.
He’s dominating… and he’s not surprised.
“I’m not frustrated but at the same time it can be frustrating,” Simmons said. “You’re thinking like, ‘Why can’t it be me?’ It’s motivating because you push yourself even harder. It’s just Mississippi. We’re not as well-known as Texas and all those places. Mississippi has talent. I feel we have some of the best talent that comes through the nation and we’re just not getting noticed.
“(My hometown) is so small. Everybody knows everybody. Not many college coaches come in there.
“Macon, Mississippi is so small.”
Simmons' talent, however, is easy to spot.