How Austin Simmons avoided 2 grades to play in the

• Tom VanHaaren, ESPN Staff WriterAug 13, 2023, 07:09 AM ET Close ESPN

• staff author Signed up with ESPN in 2011
• Finished from Central Michigan

Austin Simmons has already completed his associate’s degree and is just two years from getting his bachelor’s.

He’s a star football player, among a number of elite quarterbacks in the Ole Miss Rebels’ crammed QB space, and a left-handed pitcher who tops out at 94 mph and could have a pro future on the diamond.Austin Simmons is 17 years old.He might not have a chauffeur’s license but over the summer he went from the No. 77 prospect in the 2025 class to avoiding the rest of high school to enroll 2 whole years early at Ole Miss. Numerous FBS coaches informed ESPN they could not think of another instance in which a recruit reclassified two years ahead.Editor’s Picks 1 Related”I seemed like I might push myself to another level and I seemed like I could attain a lot more by doing this,”

Simmons stated.”Finishing my high school credits prior to I’m in 10th grade, if you have an opportunity like this to take another step even more, you ‘d honestly not want to lose out on that opportunity.”How his future plays out as a two-sport professional athlete at a Power 5 school, trying to balance college as a 17-year-old kid, is unknown, but how he got

to this point and how he had the ability to pull this off was no fluke.The choice to speed up the procedure started in sixth grade, when Simmons’household decided he was academically and psychologically ready to progress at a different rate. They believed he might deal with being pushed, so he started homeschooling, taking high school courses through an online school.Rather than sitting in a class five days a week and working through a term created by the school district, Simmons took classes seven days a week, consisting of during the summertime, to get back at further

ahead. “When I was homeschooling, I would have my SAT preparation teacher and she would always be there with me each and every single day, “Simmons stated.”She would enjoy me do my work and help me get ready for the SAT, so we were killing two birds with one stone. I was generally studying and attempting to prepare myself for the SAT while I was completing high school courses in middle school. ” Austin Simmons signs up with a loaded QB space at Ole Miss. Ole Miss Over the previous 2 years– his only two years in high school– his week was filled to the

brim with sports and academics. Monday through Friday, he would typically train with high school and collegiate baseball players in the morning, work out, run, train with his quarterback coach two times a week, start classes around noon and surface around 4 p.m., deal with a tutor for a couple of hours and then participate in practice if it was arranged. “That was truly challenging, especially with doing all those courses,” Simmons stated.” The advantage has been my papa and my mom pushing me in academics.

My papa has actually helped push me to survive and having him around made something that appears so challenging, it made it like it was pretty easy.”Simmons would deal with tutors and his virtual teachers for four to five hours a day, seven days a week and flew through the curriculum. He started taking his very first college courses in what would have been his ninth-grade year( 2021-22) and took a full load of classes with 15 credit hours per semester.At that point, he had actually fulfilled all his scholastic requirements and graduated high school. Due to the fact that he had actually taken sophisticated courses and college credits, his grades were worth more than the normal 4.0 scale and

he finished with a 5.3 GPA. He was technically still a high school student for athletic eligibility functions, however he was then an university student academically.Despite being homeschooled, he was still qualified to bet athletic groups due to the fact that he satisfied the requirements of routine presence from the Florida High School Athletic Association by going to an approved house school program.

He was handling his courses while playing football for Pahokee High School and tossed for 3,161 lawns, 24 touchdowns and 9 interceptions last season– by age, his sophomore year.Despite Simmons’dad, David, being a high school football coach, it wasn’t up until Simmons was 10 that David actually thought football would even be an option for him.” I actually wanted him to play baseball, I never really wanted him to play football,” David said.

“He’s a lefty, he can toss, he can hit and I thought he might be an MLB baseball player.”At the time, he was short and stocky, so his size didn’t match up with being a football player. But his intelligence, work principles and maturity shined through extremely early, revealing his daddy he might have something unique on the football field.Had a push day the other day, topped 93MPH and sat 89-92mph!@PBRFlorida @PerfectGameUSA @KachiBaseball @GatorsBB @InsideTheGators @ChadSimmons_ @ 247Sports @Rivals pic.twitter.com/jT8ROtFOxQ!.?.!— Austin Simmons (@austnsimmons)April 29, 2023 His size ultimately reached the capability and he’s now a 6-foot-2, 190-pound hire with scholarship deals from Florida,

Florida State, Auburn, Tennessee, Ole Miss and a lot of other top-tier schools.Simmons visited Florida in March of 2023, which’s when the concept of reclassifying from the 2025 class to 2023 was first broached. The Florida coaches understood the possibility was there which it might benefit their

program to get him on campus early for both baseball and football.Simmons committed to the Gators in April, and the wheels moved even further into motion to start the reclassification procedure.”We knew he might reclassify in the fall of 2022, we knew he could do it,” David said. “Technically he’s currently done. … We considered what he could do on the field, if he could handle it and if he could do certain things athletically.”We looked at that and thought if he simply waited up until 2025, he would have had his bachelor’s degree by then, that

was a choice, too.” Follow ESPN hiring Complete recruiting coverage” 2024 employees you require to know”Class rankings “| ESPN 300 “Storylines to watch “| Latest commits” Summarizing the 2023 recruiting cycle

“The work had actually currently been done, so it was only a matter of documents and the admissions process to get him into the university. He continued to hear from other coaches at other programs, nevertheless, consisting of Lane Kiffin and Ole Miss. The more he was hired by the Rebels, the more he believed that Ole Miss would be the best suitable for him.”What actually resulted in the decision of going to Ole Miss was really the conversation in between me and Coach Kiffin, “
Simmons said. “He really comprehends quarterbacks and he really knows how to coach

with terrific quarterbacks, too. He understands how to put them in the next level. He knows how to prepare them mentally and physically for the next level.” Same as [quarterbacks coach] Charlie Weis [Jr.] The offense and the way it has been [productive]

, like the numbers it’s installed in the SEC– it is among the things that truly stuck out for me on my go to up there. “Betting Kiffin, within the offense at Ole Miss and the chance it provided with both baseball and football were the ultimate factors that led to the switch.Simmons doesn’t know yet if he’ll have the ability to

play both sports at the expert level, however he was hired to play both at Ole Miss.” Honestly, I’ll take whatever comes first, so naturally I wish to play both sports as long as I can, “he stated.”However, if there’s something that actually stands apart that will provide me a better opportunity, I’ll take that one and just stick to it. I’m going to pursue both and attempt to play both sports professionally, because it’s been done previously, however I’m simply trying to do that till something stands apart.”Simmons’parents thought he would have more growth practicing and training with Kiffin, even if he does not play early in his profession, than he would betting a high school team.Ole Miss has a completely revamped quarterback space with Jaxson Dart returning, however the coaches added Oklahoma State transfer Spencer Sanders and LSU transfer Walker Howard. Since of those additions, Simmons will not have any pressure to begin right away and will be offered the chance to get acclimated and adjusted.Because of his age, there were issues from Ole Miss and Simmons ‘family about how such a young kid would

have the ability to adapt to the college game. Simmons was recruited to play baseball and football at Ole Miss. Ole Miss”The academic part he has, and he’s bigger than most freshmen, “David stated.”Plus, he’s fully grown enough to do it. So, when he goes to Ole Miss, he’ll be training with men that are going to be very first-and second-round picks.” Simmons is positive in himself and is pulling from his experience on the scholastic side, that he will adjust and

handle the brand-new environment. It’s an unique scenario and not one that was created spur of the minute, but rather over the past 4 years

through a dedicated procedure of accelerating his academics and staying persistent

in his regimen. “My mindset is really just to establish my mind, establish psychologically and physically as a player and person, “Simmons stated.” It’s a various type of environment compared to high school in a different state, so it’s a various environment totally, but I will just continue doing what I’ve done and establish myself as a player.”