Recruitment process comes ‘full circle’ for Geordon Porter

To say that college football recruiting is very dynamic in nature would be an understatement, but there’s still something to be said about a long and methodical process yielding the desired results in some cases. ASU was Rancho Cucamonga, Calif. wide receiver’s Geordon Porter first offer nearly a year ago. Despite a large volume of suitors pursuing him for nearly 12 months, he ultimately settled on the first school he fell in love with.

Following the public announcement of the Etiwanda high school standout, we caught up with his father, George Porter, to describe the journey his son and the entire family embarked on in February of 2017 that culminated with Geordan’s becoming an official member of the Arizona State squad.

“The first time we stepped on campus, we fell in love with what we saw at ASU,” Porter recalled. “We’d never share – most people wouldn’t know – but we were like, ‘Should we commit on the spot?’ We were like, ‘Well, we can’t do that yet. It’s the first one.’

We liked everything, even from Coach Graham to Donnie (Yantis) to (Rob) Likens to (Billy) Napier, you could just see that there was a special brew there, particularly with Napier. You could just feel it. It just was a matter of time. you could see it.”

Apprehensions over then head coach Todd Graham’s job security, caused the Porters to not commit to the Sun Devils then, even though Porter stated: “To be honest, ASU was always Geordon’s first choice.”

The wide receiver was receiving a lot of recruiting attention from Notre Dame, a school he committed to on November 2nd and decommitted from just over a month later on December 9th.

“So, we went with Notre Dame, and then still it didn’t feel right for Geordon,” Porter recalled, “and I just told him, ‘Man, let your heart guide you where you want to go, what you’re feeling.’ We really fell in love with the offense when (ASU) played Oregon. It was bombs away, Manny (Wilkins) was throwing it here and we were like, ‘Man, we could fit in this beautiful, it’s just too bad”

It was no coincidence that ASU’s new head coach, Herm Edwards, was hired the same week the decommitment from Notre Dame took place. The impact that hire by Arizona State had on the family was profound, but keeping established relationships with some of the returning coaches was just as significant.

“Herm Edwards comes along and we are like, ‘What? Wow.,” Porter commented. “This could be what we want.’ So, he comes along and we were like, ‘We need to open our recruitment up because we really like the people that he kept on staff. Likens was our guy in the first place, we trusted him that he could get the job done and he knows us already, we got a relationship there. Donnie stays and then Herm – I heard nothing but the greatest things from him.

“I haven’t talked to anybody who hasn’t said, ‘That guy (Edwards) is amazing,’ and I talked to a lot of people. We’ve been all over the world when it comes to college football in America. I’ve talked to (Jeremy) Pruitt, the defensive coordinator of Alabama, (Nick) Saban, I’ve talked to all of them, Jimbo (Fischer), everybody. I’m telling you, I talked to a woman at ESPN who was a producer, she goes, ‘You know Herm? I worked for Herm and he is great.’ Football players in the NFL, everybody has said remarkable things about this guy. So, there it was, it was cemented there.”

Porter still kept all options open, namely UCLA and Texas A&M (“they came crazy hard”), because this time around they wanted to make sure that the school his son commits to will now truly be the right choice for him. Another new relationship that had to be established at ASU was the new wide receivers coach, Charlie Fischer, and that was a process that progressed smoothly and was naturally just another factor in the wide receiver’s decision to become a Sun Devil.

“He’s sharp,” Porter described. “He’s in the same (coaching) tree with Likens, and we sat and talked in our living room, he knows his stuff. He’s sharp. It didn’t take me long to get that. He and Likens used to work together before. I trust Likens that – as good as he was at wide receivers’ coach – he’s not going to just come and bring some shabby guy in. No.

“Likens has had 10-plus (former players) in the NFL, and Likens sat in my living room and went over stuff with Geordon. I called around to people: Bryce Treggs’ dad (whose) son went to Cal and plays for the Eagles, Kenny Lawler’s (dad). I know all their fathers; I make a phone call (and ask), ‘What’s up with this Likens guy?’ They are like, ‘Man, fantastic wide receivers coach.’ Boom.

“And I feel like he knows how to use Geordon and the wide receiver coach (Fischer) between him and Likens… coaches like to hire people like themselves, typically. So that’s what I wanted to see and I felt real comfortable with him. Likens is not going to let that thing be a hole punched in the boat with that at all. I feel like he’s on top of it.

I just feel like all the right moves were made.”

There’s no denying the wide receiver’s speed, who was clocked a year ago running a 4.32 at the 40-yard-dash at 16 years old, and a more recent timing in the 100 meters have him coming in at 10.61 seconds. Porter is confident that if his son would devote more time to track this past year, he could get down to the 10.4-10.5 range. But that feat may be closer than ever to achieve.

“Well this year is different because now we’re able to focus on solely track and field,” Porter explained, “and get that extra month in and he’s older. He’s bigger, he’s stronger than he was last year. He’s 185 pounds now, 6-foot-2. He’s matured, he’s already stronger, dunking the basketball every kind of way. He’s just an older kid. We feel he should be able to run in the 10.4, 10.5 (100-meter second range) without much of an issue this year before the season is up.”

To label Porter as a one-dimensional player, would not only be unfair but also disingenuous since he has proven during games that he’s a more well-rounded player at his position.

“If you look at the first play on his (highlight) tape, it tells you everything about him”, Porter remarked. “He catches the slant between the linebacker, safety coming at him and a corner. He breaks a tackle from the linebacker, he juked the safety – so he has wiggle, he has toughness – then he runs past the safety to the house.

“It’s not just about speed. He’s got great hands, he can run short (and) intermediate routes. He’s got fantastic vision; when he gets the ball, he can take it from a 5-yard catch to the house and he’s got a high football IQ. He knew that was going to happen before he caught that ball. He said, ‘If the safety is here (from when he watched the film) I knew I was going to go to the house on the play there.’ He’s tough, he’s a very smart kid – he had Duke offers, he had Notre Dame offers. He bypassed that because he said, ‘I want to get a degree from ASU. ASU’s got a good school, I’m going to get my masters there from the business program if I choose to. But I want to go to the NFL first and foremost. I want to get a good education.”

Porter sees his son’s elite speed complementing a veteran wide receiver unit that may be lacking players with such a skillset.

“It’s just that when you run 10.4, you run 10.6 – not that many people at the college level (or) the pros run that fast,” Porter said. “It’s a weapon that you’ve got to use and since (the Sun Devils) have a lot of guys that run possession (routes), a lot of what he will be able to help ASU do is stretch the field and USC can’t squat on people like they did last year. Now they have to take him seriously, they have to take a safety over to help if he is beating that corner. I don’t know too many corners who run a 10.4, 10.6 in the Pac-12. Just flat out, they don’t.

“And he is 6-2. That’s why they were so hard on Geordon and they really wanted him because Likens felt, Napier felt that he’s the piece that could really allow the deep ball, and Manny throws that little deep ball. That’s not the only ball he throws, but we like that because we feel like we can get to that next layer. I call it the ‘O-zone layer’…that’s that (Dede) Westbrook ball he was getting from the dude who got the Heisman (Baker Mayfield), the ‘O-zone layer’. That’s what you used to see from the Miami Hurricanes when they had the kind of speed Geordon has. He gets down the field, throw that sucker up and go get it.”

Porter sees ASU as being very NFL-friendly, sending former players such as Jaelen Strong and Tim White to those ranks, and he’s hoping his son can follow one day in their footsteps.

“You (ASU) got arguably – well, I wouldn’t argue – the best receiver in the Pac-12 right now,” Porter noted. “N’Keal Harry is going to leave next year and he is going to be a first or second round pick, to me. I’d put money on it. It’s been very wide receiver friendly. Geordon said, ‘I want to be the next guy.’ It gives us an opportunity to play at a great school, a program that is building a great location that trains athletes outside of what ASU is doing.

“We felt ASU was the school to beat. Texas A&M was looking good; Chip Kelly was calling me until the moment we committed. Some awesome, outstanding prospects for other schools we could have gone to. It was a thing where do we feel someone could step in place and provide us with what we felt or what we saw? We thought ASU is what it could be for what we wanted. We felt the offense is more designed for him, we felt the environment – close to home – was more designed for him, (Geordon) said, ‘Dad, the head coach (Edwards) reminds me of you.’ That was a beautiful compliment and he has that effect. That’s what is going to make him successful. There are a lot of homes he is going to go into and be a father-figure that people will relate to, a positive image of a coach who cares, who’s there to build the individual person beyond the football combination and trust with moms and dads.

“It was one of those deals where people were knocking heavy but at the end of the day, we just really thought that ASU was going to be our home and no one seemed to be able to change our mind.”

Porter said that his son informed the ASU coaches sometime last week that he was going to sign with the Sun Devils. In previous weeks, they were transparent with Arizona State about the visits they were going to take and appreciated the fact that Herm Edwards and his staff never pressured them to make a commitment earlier than they actually did.

“I think they felt secure in knowing that we were going to go with them,” Porter said. “That’s one thing I liked about coach (Edwards): he gets it. Even today, I had everybody calling me and he’s like, ‘I’m just waiting for my speed receiver. When you sign the letter of intent Mr. Porter, we are right here.’

“Everybody else has got the hard sell, the push and everything. Here is Geordon Porter, he could go anywhere in the world and Herm came and closed it, along with everybody else. (With Edwards) it was like, ‘I trust you, you trust me. I got you, you got me.’ That’s the kind of relationship I want with someone. It comes off authentic, genuine, that’s who I am. I like that, it’s refreshing. That’s what I wanted for my son. I feel Likens is the same kind of guy.

“I felt like, ‘my word is your word, your word is my word. We are going to take a trip (college visit) here but we are coming with you coach.’ And okay, it’s a handshake. The old-school way. Your word is your honor. We are totally excited. I can feel going into this, I’ve seen a lot of faces, a lot of places, a lot of folks. But I really think ASU is on to something special and we feel excited to be a part of this.”

Porter sees tremendous upside with the ASU program and claimed that he wasn’t surprised at all to see the success the team enjoyed with its 2018 recruiting class. He feels that returning and new talent will certainly help the team reap the rewards this season.

“I feel that with all the receivers coming back,” Porter stated, “most of the line coming back, you just picked up a couple real big studs to add to the flavor, you got a quarterback in the Pac-12 – which is important – who has been there, done it. You got N’Keal Harry (who) I could see taking two (defenders). Geordon could be a benefit to him to take people off the top and let him go one-on-one more along with the other great receivers that are there.

“We feel like it’s a special place, we feel like we are on the frontend of something big. I’m a businessman: you don’t come in at the back of the stock, you come at the beginning of the stock. I feel very confident it is the best move we could have made for Geordon Porter.

“We just felt really good about ASU and ASU stayed with it and closed. Donnie was great, stayed true to (Geordon) and just stayed there and boom, it paid dividends. Geordon said, ‘It was a year ago this time my first visit was ASU.’

“Full circle.”

Note: Jack Harris contributed to this article