Pitt football has secured its fourth verbal commitment for the Class of 2005. Dominic Jones of Brookhaven High School in Columbus, Ohio. Jones plays Cornerback. He is either 5’8″ or 5’9″ and 182 pounds. According to his profile, he will be most dangerous as a kick returner.

First, like most Pitt fans who feel rather burned after last year, the impulse is to be somewhat dismissive of the signing and say, “call me when he actually signs the letter of intent.” I’m still working on getting past that.

The next thing is to get past the obvious puffing of Jones. Take this statement from the Post-Gazette story.

Jones, who will play corner and return kicks and punts, is the Panthers’ most highly rated prospect. The Insiders, a nationally recognized recruiting Web site, has him ranked as one of the top players in Ohio.

I’d love to know where Insiders ranks him like that. Here is the national top 100. Here is the Midwest top 100. There are 34 Ohio prospects listed. Jones is not among them.

I’m not trying to tear the kid down. Of course prospect ranking is hardly and exact science. He’s drawn interest from Penn State, Michigan and Minnesota, suggesting that the kid has a lot of talent. Keep this in mind. Pitt was the first and so far only one of the schools to actually offer him a scholarship. Kind of suggests he is a little lower on the depth/priority charts of the other schools. What happens if those other schools whiff on some CB prospects? You know they’ll be sniffing around him again.