Alabama picks up two commitments

HOOVER — Alabama got some momentum for its 2009 recruiting class when two defensive prospects committed on the eve of SEC Football Media Days.

Defensive end William Ming from Athens and cornerback Gerald West of Mobile told Alabama coach Nick Saban they were coming on Tuesday.

Ming is 6-4, 250 pounds and is the ninth-rated defensive end prospect in the country, according to rivals.com. The four-star prospect picked Alabama over Auburn, LSU and Oklahoma.

West is not quite as touted as Ming, but the 5-11, 160-pound defender is the first cornerback to commit to the Tide for next year. He is the son of former Mississippi State running back J.J. Johnson. He had played at Davidson but transferred to Faith Academy.

Alabama now has 10 players committed to next year’s class, four of those judged four-star prospects by rivals.com.

Auburn and Mississippi State have been much more active early in the process.

Auburn has 20 players committed, including four four-star commitments.

MSU coach Sylvester Croom said he’s got commitments from 19 players. It’s not a strategy, he said, it’s just how events have unfolded.
“I was one of those guys that didn’t want to offer a scholarship until after guys started playing their senior year,” Croom said Wednesday. “If you wait that long, you won’t get any.”

SEC TV network no sure thing: Television has been good for the Southeastern Conference.

The league’s contracts with CBS, ESPN, Raycom Sports and FSN South have brought in more than $100 million over the past decade. But all four deals expire after the 2009 football season.

SEC commissioner Mike Slive says the conference will think long and hard about its next step.

The chance to broadcast SEC football and basketball could spark a bidding war, with CBS, FOX and ESPN among the suitors; the process would likely result in a significant raise over the current deals.

Or the SEC could move in a different direction, starting a league-owned television network. The Big Ten and Mountain West conferences each own TV networks, which show league games in addition to the conferences’ existing TV contracts.

Both networks have struggled to convince cable providers to carry them on cheaper “tiers.”

As a result, relatively few cable subscribers receive either channel — a problem of which Slive is well aware.

Slive says the SEC has been considering both options for two years. And the decision-making process isn’t finished yet.

“We will make a final decision this fall, a full year before the existing contracts expire, giving us a year to implement the new agreements in whichever direction we decide to go,” he said.

No shortage of speed for Gators: Urban Meyer knows speed. The Florida coach has recruited plenty of it over the past few seasons, with noted speedsters Percy Harvin and Chris Rainey among the stars on his roster.

Rainey, a sophomore tailback, was acknowledged as the fastest Gator last season, and he isn’t shy about defending his title.
So when true freshman tailback Jeff Demps arrived on campus, Rainey issued a challenge: A head-to-head 40-yard dash, with bragging rights on the line.

Demps is no slouch. A two-time Florida high school champ in the 100-meter dash, he ran the 100 in 10.01 seconds at the Olympic trials in June.

According to Meyer, the two backs set up a 40-yard head-to-head race in a field behind a dormitory on Florida’s campus. And Rainey walked away the winner, by a nose.

“We’ve got some speed,” Meyer said with a smile. “I’d like to watch that. I wasn’t there, but I’d have liked to. Could’ve probably sold about 10,000 tickets for that.”

Vanderbilt’s Johnson nearing milestone: Bobby Johnson is becoming a familiar face at SEC Media Days. For a Vanderbilt coach, that’s quite an accomplishment.

Johnson is entering his seventh season as the Commodores’ head coach. It’s the longest run for a Vandy head man since George MacIntyre logged seven years, from 1979-1985.

“They said we couldn’t do it,” Johnson joked.

In 70 games at Vanderbilt, Johnson is 20-50, including an 8-40 mark in the SEC. Last season, the Commodores finished 5-7, one win short of the program’s first winning season since 1982.

The improvement has Johnson feeling confident.

“If we take care of our business and play as good as we can, we’ve got a good chance of winning,” he said.

Quotable: Mississippi State’s Sylvester Croom, on reports that the Atlantic Coast Conference is considering a weekly, NFL-style injury report: “I don’t have a problem with it. It’s easy to say probable, out, maybe. Just cuts down how much I have to say.”