When Todd Bates decided to leave Clemson to join Brent Venables’ staff at Oklahoma, the Tigers didn’t just lose one of its top assistant coaches.
Bates was also one of Dabo Swinney’s top recruiters to the point that Swinney gave Bates the title of recruiting coordinator following the 2019 season. With Bates gone, that title had to shift to someone else.
It could’ve gone to Brandon Streeter, who served in that role from 2015-19 in addition to being the Tigers’ quarterbacks coach. But with Streeter having offensive coordinator duties added to his plate in December following Tony Elliott’s departure for Virginia, Swinney opted to give the recruiting coordinator title to one of the youngest coaches on his staff, Tyler Grisham.
Swinney said getting a first-hand look at Grisham on the recruiting trail over the years gave him confidence in giving that responsibility to his receivers coach.
“It was an easy transition. He’s more than ready,” Swinney said. “I’ve been able to be in enough meetings with him and on the road and different settings. He was more than ready to be that on-the-field liaison guy that you’ve got to have.
“We’ve got a whole (recruiting) department, but somebody’s got to tie it together from the coach standpoint to make sure we’ve got all the I’s dotted and T’s crossed. He’s great.”
Grisham, who returned to his alma mater initially as a graduate assistant in 2014, had also worked as an offensive analyst at Clemson (2016-19) before being promoted in 2020 to coach receivers, a high-profile position for the Tigers of late. Since Grisham has been on Swinney’s staff, Clemson has developed multiple NFL receivers, including Hunter Renfrow, Mike Williams, Ray-Ray McCloud, Tee Higgins, and Amari Rodgers.
During his time as receivers coach, he’s helped recruit and develop some of the top wideouts on Clemson’s current and past rosters, including Justyn Ross, Joseph Ngata, E.J. Williams and Beaux Collins. Clemson signed two four-star receivers in the 2022 recruiting cycle in Myrtle Beach High standout Adam Randall and Dutch Fork (Irmo) High wideout Antonio Williams.
Grisham, whose new title came with a $150,000 raise, has also helped land the Tigers’ lone 2023 verbal commitment so far, Edison (Miami) High four-star receiver Nathaniel Joseph.
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