Welcome to the Fold: Marcus Caffey

Depth at running back was an issue this year. This was further compounded by injuries, of course. The current recruiting class has 13 commitments with the addition of Marcus Caffey earlier today. Five of those players are running backs.

Caffey is a bigger back, standing 6' and weighing in at 191 pounds from Atlanta's Grady High School. According to rivals he is our highest rated commitment to date, All of our current high school commits are 3-stars except for the unrated Randy Gregory. Caffey rated the highest of those with a 5.7 on their scale. If you like other numbers he has 4.5 speed, and has roughly the same size as fellow running back commit Doug Gentry.

Caffey makes next year's running back rotation very interesting, and with all these backs I think the move of Al-Terek McBurse to slot receiver may be permanent. Ralph Bolden will be the presumptive starter. Akeem Shavers was recruited for immediate depth while Reggie Pegram has experience. Gentry, Caffey, and Akeem Hunt are all true freshmen, while I can see Brandon Cottom as more of a fullback to support Jared Crank.

Getting Caffey seems to be a pretty good win because a lot of solid SEC schools were going after him. Arkansas, Kentucky, Tennessee,  and Georgia were showing interest. He had 911 yards on 78 carries during the last stat update I could find.  Grady finished 11-2 on the season, losing in the third round of the state playoffs to Peach County. He has been a three year starter, so I like that he is a player that brings experience to West Lafayette.

There wasn't a whole lot else I could find on this kid, but he seems like a pretty solid get. One of his key games this year was a game at the Georgia Dome where Grady won 7-6 on a 70-yard TD run by Caffey. You can never have too many speedy athletes in this game. As usual, here are some YouTube highlights to finish.