Published Nov 2, 2021
Jay Johnson’s 'bluntness' leading to major recruiting successes
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David Folse  •  Death Valley Insider
Staff Writer

“You are amazing, the best we have ever seen, you are great, you are fantastic.”

That’s usually the spiel that high school prospects hear on the recruiting trail; college coaches telling them how great they are and how they can come in and make an immediate impact for their team.

That’s not how things work for Jay Johnson and the LSU baseball program.

While he and his staff are on their way to securing the top-ranked recruiting class in the country for the 2022 recruiting year, the new LSU coach has done it through honest, and at sometimes critical, assessment of prospects skill sets.

Just ask 2024 commitment John Pearson out of West Monroe.

“He told me I was a good hitter, but I wasn’t a great hitter. I know that and I appreciate (Johnson) being honest with me. If I want to get to where I need to be, I need to hear stuff like that. I know there is stuff I need to still work on, but Coach Johnson said I’m far away from being a great hitter. He didn’t mean it in a mean way; it was more a constructive way. It’s really unique because that is not what you usually hear from college coaches recruiting you.”

But for the Tigers head coach, honesty is the only way he knows how to recruit.

“I don’t know if that specific approach came from anywhere,” he said. “I just know that I’m a straightforward and honest player. I want to be a great baseball coach and a great leader of a team. I don’t ever want to be known as a salesman. There is of course an element of that in our business, especially when you are competing for the caliber player that we are competing for here (at LSU).

“What’s important is that we make a good decision for our program and the player makes a good decision for their life. If you think about a 16, 17, 18-year old player, the first high impact decision that they are going to make with their life is what college they choose to go to. They need to do that based on real and factual information. The only way I know how to do that is by being straightforward.”

Johnson has also done that by hiring one of the top pitching coaches in the country as well in Jason Kelly, who has helped secure verbal commitments from some of the top arms in the country.

“I brought Coach Kelly here for a reason,” Johnson said. “I think he is a very complete pitching coach. He can resonate with players throughout the age groups we are recruiting quite well. He builds good relationships with them. He is very good at what he does; just a great person. All those skills are very important on the recruiting trail when we are talking to elite pitchers.”