When diving into the world of college football recruiting and trying to figure out where a prospect is going to end up committing, it is important to decipher who says what.
This is not to take anything away from the hard-working reporters who cover the sport, but when certain people say something or make a prediction, it tends to carry more weight than others. We saw this take place earlier in the year with 5-star ATH Nyckoles Harbor. The night before signing day back in February, a litany of recruiting predictions came in, showing that Harbor was expected to go to South Carolina. At the end of the night, 247Sports’ Director of Recruiting Steve Wiltfong — one of those reporters whose opinion carries some weight — changed his prediction to Oregon. It seemed as if Harbor was going to be a Duck, until the next morning, Wiltfong changed his prediction back to South Carolina, and the 5-star ATH became a Gamecock.
Wiltfong generally has a pretty good feel for what is happening.
So over the past week, while recruiting predictions flooded in for 4-star DL Xadavien Sims to go to both the Oklahoma Sooners and the Oregon Ducks, Wiltfong’s prediction on Wednesday afternoon — a log for Dan Lanning and the Ducks — should give Oregon fans quite a bit of confidence.
Sims is rated by 247Sports as the No. 121 overall player in the 2024 class, and the No. 16 defensive lineman. He will announce his ultimate commitment on Saturday afternoon, the same day that 4-star QB Michael Van Buren announces — another player who is favored to go to the Ducks.