Master Teague III is a three-star (composite) running back from Murfreesboro, Tennessee who has received offers from over 20 schools including Georgia, Auburn, and his home Tennessee.
Ultimately, Ohio State was a late offer to the 25th ranked running back in the 2018 class, but they were able to secure a commitment from Teague.
In a 2018 class that already includes four-star running back Brian Snead and four-star H-back Jaelen Gill, Teague seems to round out the position, but also he seems to be held in lesser light in the recruiting world than his fellow Buckeye commits.
Perhaps the commitment to play with the Scarlet and Gray could change that.
It wouldn't be outlandish to think that Teague could benefit from committing to the Buckeyes — other Buckeyes in the past have certainly seen it happen to them.
One that sticks out in recent memory is fellow class of 2018 recruit defensive end Brenton Cox.
On April 25 — the day that the Stockbridge, Georgia defender announced his commitment to Ohio State — Cox was a four-star recruit who was an important piece of the Bucks' 2018 recruiting class.
Fast forward to today, and Cox is a five-star recruit. With the high school football season being over, is it plausible that Cox's star count was altered by garnering attention from a premier school and choosing to go there?
Well, maybe. But another thing that might have contributed to Cox's added star is his performance at a few camps during his recruitment and leading up to today.
At The Opening Atlanta in March, Cox ran a sub-5.00 40-yard dash and a sub-4.5 shuttle (sixth best among defensive linemen) while being measured at 6-foot-4.5 and 247 pounds. Cox then participated in Under Armour's All-America camp series and then this past weekend at the Rivals Five-Star Challenge.
Impressive showings at these three high-profile camps can certainly help a recruit's stock, and it seems Cox was able to use those camps to his advantage.
Former Buckeye star and current Jacksonville Jaguar Michael Bennett also saw his recruiting path change drastically after receiving an Ohio State offer. If any recruit can say their recruiting path was drastically changed due to an offer from the Scarlet and Gray, it's got to be Bennett.
As of January 31, 2010, Bennett gathered offers from NC State, Indiana, Wake Forest, Cincinnati and Ohio State. Any schools stick out to you?
Bennett played both offensive and defensive line in high school, and Ohio State took note of his potential on the defensive side a lot earlier than plenty of other premier college football programs. As a matter of fact, in deciding where to play, Bennett eliminated schools that were considering him as an offensive lineman and stuck with his guns on the defensive line.
At the end of his recruiting trail, Bennett had received offers from Stanford, Northwestern, Michigan, USC, Penn State and others. This is by no means a shot at NC State or Wake Forest, but it is really hard to compete with perennial college football powerhouses like those listed above.
And it seems like Ohio State was the first one in on his recruitment and could be attributed as jump-starting the whole process. The team can't be given all the credit — Bennett earned those stars himself — but lots of attention seemed to come his way after a Scarlet and Gray offer.
So, could Master Teague add a star to his recruiting name now that he's committed to Ohio State? Well, the answer isn't really cut and dry. He might, but it's no guarantee.
An important thing to remember with recruiting is that these things are not set in stone and that recruiting rankings are generally fluid and constantly changing. (This is a lesson I learned very quickly while trying to find old recruiting rankings. It seems that once a recruit gains/loses a star, information about him being ranked differently disappears somehow. Magic, methinks.)
As things currently stand with 247, there are 32 five-star recruits per class (one per first-round pick in the draft) and 303 four-star recruits. Also worth noting is that 247 currently has Teague ranked as the 504th best player in the class and the 25th best running back.
As would seem natural with the competitive nature of football, recruits can constantly improve (and lower) their rankings with performances on the field and at camps. And, of course, the higher you go, the tougher the competition is.
April 25, Brenton Cox was the No. 43 overall prospect in the class of 2018, only 11 spots away from gaining his fifth star. While the possibility can't be ignored completely for Teague, he would have to climb over nearly 200 recruits to put another star next to his name. It certainly seems possible for him to move up in the overall composite rankings, but it would be quite the feat if he were able to move up 200 spots and become a four-star recruit.
And as is the case with Bennett, it wasn't necessarily that he moved up due to the attention received from the Buckeyes, it was that other schools started to recognize his talent on the defensive side of the ball more and so recruiting databases like 247 started paying attention as well. And some of that might have had to do with the Buckeyes being in early on him, but there's no surefire way to know that that's what kickstarted his ascent in the rankings.
Teague is the first three-star recruit to commit to the Bucks in the class of 2018 and is one of only 26 three-star recruits to get an offer from Urban Meyer and gang (there are currently 147 offers for the class of 2018 and 85 scholarship spots on the team). For one of those prized scholarship spots to be offered to Teague certainly has to be special in the eyes of the coaching staff.
