Notre Dame picked up a verbal commitment on Saturday night in the form of 5-10, 170 safety Nicco Fertitta. Fertitta, a native of Las Vegas and son of UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta, committed to Notre Dame while on a visit this weekend as the Irish wind down spring practice 2014.
Excited to say I'm officially committed to THE University of Notre Dame #GoIrish #WeAreND pic.twitter.com/V6mHS329Ad
— NICCO FERTITTA (@NFsoCrucial) April 5, 2014
Notre Dame first offered Fertitta back in January and was one of the first major programs to offer along with Boston College, Arizona, Hawaii, and Utah. Ever since Notre Dame offered though, the Irish were considered the front runner after Fertitta referred to the offer from Notre Dame as a dream offer.
Notre Dame now has six commitments in the class of 2015 after Notre Dame picked up commitments in the last week from wide receiver Jalen Guyton and safety Prentice McKinney. Wtih safety being a large need in the class of 2015, Brian Kelly and his staff have clearly made it a priority to add depth to the position early in the process with the additions of Fertitta and McKinney.
Fertitta hails from the same high school, Bishop Gorman, as returning starter Ronnie Stanley. Fertitta also joins a growing list of Notre Dame football players with famous fathers. Junior wide receiver Corey Robinson is the son of NBA legend David Robinson and Torii Hunter Jr is the son of Detroit Tiger outfielder Torii Hunter Sr.
Nicco Fertitta Highlights
Here’s what Kelly will get from him:
(1) a kid that will work hard and model the practice field and off-field behavior of Joe Schmidt, albeit on scholarship.
(2) a physical kid, though small, who likes to smack people.
(3) a kid tailor made for running downfield on special teams.
(4) A kid who finds the ball and brings the carrier down when inerted in
Van Gorder’s special packages on third down. He loves to hit.
(5) No surprises.
Notre Dame is close to the Gorman program and to the Gorman coaches. They have a great idea of what they got and what they did not.
Or, the kid never sets foot on the field. Nobody has any clue.
All that may be true but they still could have waited to offer him.
This probably had everything to do with all the BK talk about Fertitta being a RKG. Make a project out of him… at the very least, maybe he can be a special teams stud and add some depth in the secondary.
I’m obviously not a recruiting expert…. but my reaction to this commitment was similar to Mike’s…. the other schools that offered him didn’t excite me.
this is surprising. But the entire clan Fertita, including Lorenzo, has been the primary funding source for Bishop Gorman’s astounding athletic facilities. They are staunchly and unabashedly Catholic.
The Fertita family holds controlling interest in the Station Casino complex. They are preceived as being civic minded and corporate citizens, in contradistinction to the whiny, anonymous primary shareholder of the Wynn Casinos (Wynn and Encore)
By DNA and by learning at Daddy Lorenzo’s knee one would expect Nico to be tough, but he’s a tad shorter than Redfield, Baratti, Tranquill and McKinney.
We shall see.
This has me shaking my head, too. From what I understand, ND has a limited number of scholarships available for the 2015 recruiting class. You look at his offer list and few, if any schools stand out. Utah, Hawaii, Villanova. Arizona and Boston College may have been the best of the bunch. It seems like they could have waited to offer him.
Eifert had no real major offers coming out of high school either. The kid will either be good or he won’t. No one really knows until it happens.
Well said, Ron Burgundy, well said indeed!