{"id":73238,"date":"2025-03-31T15:00:53","date_gmt":"2025-03-31T19:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/?p=73238"},"modified":"2025-09-16T21:34:44","modified_gmt":"2025-09-17T01:34:44","slug":"ohio-state-plucks-the-top-2026-safety-recruit-out-of-sec-country","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2025\/03\/31\/ohio-state-plucks-the-top-2026-safety-recruit-out-of-sec-country\/","title":{"rendered":"Ohio State Plucks Top 2026 Safety Recruit Out of SEC Country"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>March has been a busy month for the Ohio State recruiting efforts. After earning the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/2025\/03\/25\/ohio-state-lands-another-top-in-state-2026-recruit\/\" target=\"_self\">commitments of three offensive linemen<\/a>, the top 2026 safety recruit in the country pledged his services to the Buckeyes. <a  href=\"https:\/\/247sports.com\/Player\/blaine-bradford-46136704\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Blaine Bradford<\/a> joined the 2026 Ohio State recruiting class from Baton Rouge, Louisiana on Monday. According to the <em>247Sports<\/em> composite rankings, he is a five-star safety, the top safety in the recruiting cycle, and the 23rd-best player regardless of position. He joins long-time commit Chris Henry, Jr. as the only composite five-star athlete in the class thus far.<\/p>\n<p>Despite coming from deep within SEC country, the Buckeyes swiped Bradford away from the likes of LSU and Texas.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">BREAKING: Elite 2026 Safety Blaine Bradford has Committed to Ohio State, he tells me for <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/On3Recruits?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@on3recruits<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The 6\u20192 205 S from Baton Rouge, LA chose the Buckeyes over LSU, Oregon, &amp; Texas<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOhio State is the best place for my development and for my future.\u201d<a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/HkUeZgMBbW\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/HkUeZgMBbW<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/i4t7SFFByK\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/i4t7SFFByK<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Hayes Fawcett (@Hayesfawcett3) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Hayesfawcett3\/status\/1906707099112866086?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">March 31, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Bradford is the latest in a long line of top-end safety recruits. Last year, five-star Faheem Delane committed. The year before, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cfb\/players\/caleb-downs-1.html?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2025-03-31_cfb\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Caleb Downs<\/a> transferred in with Jaylen McLain who is projected to man the back-end of the secondary with him in 2025. Bradford is a six-foot-one, 207-pound thumper at the safety position. He plays well above his weight and <em>247Sports<\/em>&#8216; Gabe Brooks even claimed that he could play as an off-ball linebacker if he added some mass.<\/p>\n<p>Bradford has a high football IQ and great play recognition. He&#8217;s a weapon who, when he keys in on a run, runs like he&#8217;s shot out of a cannon downhill to make the play. When making the tackle, he&#8217;s as sure as it gets. He drives through the ball carriers and can blow up the play with ease. He could be a great box safety in college and would be a great compliment to a free-range coverage safety. Bradford\u00a0has the speed to keep up with the burners outside and is a multi-sport athlete for his high school.<\/p>\n<p>Some experts expect Bradford to be the type of player to challenge for playing time as a true freshman in 2026. The 2026 recruiting cycle is heating up and now that the Buckeyes have eight commits, Ohio State is sitting with the seventh-best class according to <em>247Sports<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo: Lori Schmidt \/ Columbus Dispatch \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The top 2026 safety recruit has spurned the likes of LSU and Texas and will looks to be the crown jewel of the Buckeyes&#8217; defensive haul.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4051,"featured_media":73246,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,2,17,35609],"tags":[33428,34876,79,33635,33234,73],"class_list":["post-73238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bigten","category-featured","category-news","category-ohio-state-buckeyes","tag-2026-recruiting","tag-chris-henry-jr","tag-college-football","tag-faheem-delane","tag-jaylen-mcclain","tag-ohio-state-buckeyes"],"modified_by":"Michael Kovacs, ADMIN","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4051"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73238"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73238\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":73344,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73238\/revisions\/73344"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/collegefootball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}