Tuesdays with Gorney: Elite California QBs are leaving the region

In his weekly series, Rivals National Recruiting Director Adam Gorney offers his thoughts on recruiting topics and storylines that impact the national landscape.

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Over the weekend, I saw some early Heisman odds and there were five quarterbacks on the list. Oklahoma’s Spencer Rattler led Georgia’s JT Daniels, Clemson’s D.J. Uiagalelei, Alabama’s Bryce Young and Ohio State’s CJ Stroud.

Five quarterbacks. All from the West including four from Southern California. None playing in the Pac-12.

That left an impression and it speaks to the Pac-12’s struggles on a national scale. Oregon is recruiting really well. USC beat Clemson and others for Korey Foreman and has a commitment from California’s No. 1 prospect this cycle in five-star corner Domani Jackson.

But, man, missing out on these quarterbacks hurts.

Daniels started his career at USC but after being injured and replaced by Kedon Slovis, he transferred to Georgia where he takes on Uiagalelei and Clemson this weekend in a primetime matchup.

Young, who at one time was committed to USC, is taking over for the Crimson Tide and could lead them to another national title. Rattler is next in line of NFL first-round draft pick quarterbacks for the Sooners. And big things are expected of Stroud, who really emerged as a national recruit in his senior season, after winning the starting job in Columbus but wasn't recruited that hard by the Trojans. In Ryan Day’s offense, with those receivers, he should be phenomenal.

The counterargument here does hold some water. Foreman has superstar potential. Drake Jackson at USC is dominant. Kayvon Thibodeaux at Oregon should be a top pick.

But two many elite players are leaving the region.

Five-star running back Kendall Milton chose Georgia over USC and others. Five-star running back Bijan Robinson picked Texas over USC, Ohio State and others. Five-star running back Najee Harris picked Alabama over Michigan. Five-star running back Joe Mixon picked Oklahoma. There are so many other examples.

In the 2021 recruiting cycle, the entire Pac-12 had four five-star signees. Alabama and Ohio State had five apiece. In 2020, the Pac-12 had three five-stars in the strangest year ever for USC recruiting when the Trojans finished dead last in the conference with no QB pledge. That same year, Georgia and Clemson had five five-stars each, Alabama had four and Ohio State three.

The Pac-12 is not a bad conference. Oregon could make a run at the College Football Playoff this season. USC has the pieces to do something big. UCLA looked very good in the season opener (albeit against Hawai'i) and could make a statement when LSU visits this weekend. Others have had their moments.

But I keep coming back to all these quarterbacks at all these national powers. All of them except Rattler played their high school ball in Southern California. All of them ended up leaving. That is a big missing piece as a Pac-12 team has not won a national title since 2004.

It’s been a busy two weeks to open the high school football season as I’ve seen Bellflower (Calif.) St. John Bosco, Miami (Fla.) Central, Los Alamitos, Calif., and San Diego (Calif.) Lincoln in person and then a ton of games on ESPN and other places as well. Here are some quick thoughts on some of the top players I’ve seen so far this season:

Earnest Greene: The four-star offensive lineman from St. John Bosco is an absolute beast who can push anybody around but what was most impressive is that after an interception this past weekend, Greene turned and ran to catch the Miami Central defensive back down the sideline and save a touchdown. To see a 328-pounder like Greene move like that was really impressive.

Matayo Uiagalelei: Off the edge, the 2023 four-star is very good mixing power and speed and he beat Florida State commit Daughtry Richardson a few times. He has really impressive athleticism on defense and is a legit target at tight end as well. Is he a surefire five-star? I’m not there yet but he’s really impressive and not just DJ’s little brother anymore.

Wesley Bissainthe: The four-star linebacker slipped in the latest round of rankings because there is some concern about his size but he was outstanding in Miami Central’s loss to Bosco. He was arguably the most impactful player on the field, covering so much ground to make tackles, always around the ball and even though Bissainthe is skinny, he is physical and fast at linebacker and had a great showing.

Malachi Nelson: It was not the best night for the 2023 five-star quarterback but it’s so clear how good the Oklahoma commit can be when he’s on. Nelson is unstoppable when he has a clean pocket and he can deliver the ball. It’s on time, it’s accurate and he has snap on his passes or he can put it where only the receiver can get it. He wasn’t great throwing on the run and had some missteps throughout the night but Oklahoma is getting a great one.

Makai Lemon: Lemon did his best work Friday night playing cornerback where he shut down the San Diego Lincoln top receivers, he intercepted a pass, knocked another one away in the end zone and looked really comfortable there. The 2023 four-star is expected to play receiver at Oklahoma and while he was quiet on offense Friday night he has a long resume of dominating at receiver.

Jahlil Florence: The new Oregon commit is ranked as a high three-star prospect. That might be too low. He had a more impactful performance at least in this one game than his four-star teammate (and fellow Oregon pledge) Jalil Tucker, He’s a legit 6-foot-2 who shut down some talented Los Alamitos receivers and he was great on offense as well. After seeing Florence in action, it’s surprising more national programs didn’t come after him. A big recruiting win for the Ducks.

Connor Weigman: The Texas A&M commit was the best quarterback - if not player - I saw on television over the weekend. Such a smooth and accurate passer, incredible feel for the play, surprisingly fast when he had to escape the pocket and run, Weigman was absolutely fantastic. The high four-star looked capable of heading to College Station and competing for the starting job early in his career.

Gunner Stockton: There is no arguing with the production or the leadership or the running ability or the feel for operating his offense and orchestrating things on the field. There will be a debate whether the Georgia commit is definitely a five-star quarterback (is he someone we see as a potential first-round NFL Draft pick?) and a lot of the big gainers in that game came on short dump-offs where the receiver made things happen with the ball in his hands. Stockton has a lot going for him, there’s so much to like, but the question of whether he’s a five-star quarterback will be debated.

I can’t write much about Bradenton (Fla.) IMG Academy unfortunately because that powerhouse played Bishop Sycamore out of Ohio which clearly has major issues that need to be addressed at a school level. It seems to have played Friday night before traveling to play IMG on Sunday, which brings up its own set of issues. The ESPN team calling that “game” was openly upset with seeming fabrications Bishop Sycamore made about having a certain number of Division I players on the team and openly talked about worrying about “player safety” because the team was so overmatched. It was a complete waste of time for IMG to even show up and play.

I would have rather watched an intra-squad IMG scrimmage. The competition would have been far better. IMG won 58-0 and that was it being courteous. It could have been 100-0 easily if not worse. It was a shame this game even happened mainly for player safety sake on both sides. Imagine a top-flight IMG player gets hurt because Bishop Sycamore’s “leaders” were making a cheap attempt to gain publicity by playing on national TV?

In a great weekend of high school football games that personified competition, hometowns, Friday nights and superstar players. This was a bad way to finish things up.