Texas A&M Football: What Antonio Cromartie brings to the Aggies’ staff
On Monday, an interesting addition was made to the Texas A&M Football team.
Antonio Cromartie, former New York Jets All-Pro cornerback announced that he had been added to the Texas A&M Football support staff. The gut reaction here is something like “wait, I don’t remember Antonio Cromartie playing at Texas A&M.” That’s because he didn’t.
Cromartie played for Florida State in college before being selected in the 2006 NFL Draft. He would end up becoming one of the best cornerbacks of his generation with four Pro Bowl appearances and a First-Team All-Pro selection at his peak.
Most recently, he played for the Indianapolis Colts for a season before hanging it up for good. He has been relatively quiet until announcing his new job with TAMU.
Texas A&M Football will feel his presence, even in the early days
The following sentence may sound redundant, but it’s the truth. Antonio Cromartie could do absolutely nothing as part of the TAMU Football staff and he would have a profound impact on recruiting and team morale.
The presence of a generational quarterback at any school is a huge get, much less a school that already excels defensively. But that’s the brilliance of Cromartie so far — he isn’t just sitting around doing nothing.
A single day into his tenure on the Aggies’ staff, it was reported that he had reached out to a 5-star linebacker in Harold Perkins. Here’s the tweet:
Antonio Cromartie has also reached out to 5-star linebacker Harold Perkins already, i’m told.
— AggiesToday (AT) (@AggiesToday) April 6, 2021
Has made his presence felt early, and has been working his tail off on the trail already.
Perkins is the top outside linebacker in the 2022 class and one of the top recruits in general. As the 2nd best run defense in college football last season, the Aggies pride themselves on stuffing the run with strong linebacker play.
Perkins would be a perfect fit on a defense that has found production out of lower-rated players. In all likelihood, he would develop into their best outside linebacker in a while.
It’s clear that Antonio Cromartie cares about this job, and if he continues to hit the recruiting trail hard, an already strong Texas A&M recruiting staff could have just become even better. Other SEC teams will need to up their game if they want to keep up with Jimbo Fisher’s staff.
Next. TAMU consensus top ten in early rankings. dark
We’ll likely hear more out of Cromartie and hopefully, he’ll see an expanded role in the staff as time passes.