Catching Up With Recruitin': Football '08

Mississippi State got it's first recruit for the 2008 class when running back Montario "Tojo" Patterson committed to play for Mississippi State back on March 19. Don't ask me why he is called "Tojo" by some because I don't know and I'm probably not going to try all that hard to find out. According to Scout, he is a 3 star and is the #17 player in the state of Mississippi. Rivals also rates him as a 3 star and has him as the #12 player in Mississippi. They also put him as the #47 ranked running back. ESPN also has him as a 3 star and the #64 RB.

He's six foot and somewhere between 190 and 200 pounds depending on who you talk to. Patterson is definitely a speed back, running a 4.4 forty. His junior year stats are impressive as he rushed for 1,858 yards and 17 touchdowns. Unfortunately his school, Biggersville, is 1A so take those stats with a grain of salt given the level of competition.

State was the first to offer and he committed almost immediately. He had "interest" from other schools but I'm not going to bother listing them since "interest" is such a vague term. Pretty good start to the class. None of MSU's current running backs has anything approaching this kind of speed so worst case he should be a good change of pace guy. Running back is actually relatively deep as it is with 4 already on the roster and 2 more signed last year, so Patterson could be the only one MSU will take in this class. Maybe one more, but certainly no more than that.