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REACTION: Fred Johnson Offers Plethora Of Untapped Potential

When combining his athleticism and traits developed as a two-way player, new South Carolina Football commit Fred Johnson brings high upside to Columbia.
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Late Saturday afternoon, Shane Beamer and the Gamecocks got their second commitment of the week, landing 2024 linebacker and Virginia native Fred Johnson. Johnson was a player discovered through one of Shane Beamer's first football camps in early June, as he put up impressive testing numbers in front of the Gamecock's coaching staff.

The main thing that sticks out about Johnson from an athleticism standpoint is how well he moves for a player his size, as Fred clocked in a 40-yard dash time of 4.52 seconds and a 20-yard shuttle time of 4.20 seconds, all while being measured at 6-foot, three and a half inches tall and 225 pounds. Being able to move that well both vertically and laterally while maintaining this size is something sparsely seen amongst players who are projected to play in the box, but Fred is different from your average football player.

Johnson played both sides of the ball last Fall for the Maury Commodores, lining up at wide receiver on offense and linebacker or edge rusher on defense. Being projected as a linebacker at the next level, Fred already possesses a great deal of patience and awareness in rush defense, which helps him to diagnose zone reads and meshes in the opposing backfield at a much higher rate. Johnson also does a great job of maintaining backside contain when a play goes away from his side of the field and then picking a timely pursuit angle which allows him to get right back into the play if needed.

Being a receiver for the Commodores has allowed Fred to take his footwork and ball skills to a new level during his high school career. When putting all of these traits together, I think that Johnson will contribute early on as a special-teamer and eventually will be the perfect fit as a weakside linebacker in Clayton White's defense. The best news of all is that Johnson is just scratching the surface of what he could be as an SEC linebacker, and we all may look back at Johnson's commitment and call him the steal of the 2024 class for South Carolina.

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