Josh Barajas surprised many when he committed to Penn State after most felt he was a strong Notre Dame lean. Barajas surprised many again on Friday when he flipped his commitment from Penn State to Notre Dame giving the Irish a 4-star linebacker for the class of 2015.
Barajas, an Indiana native, is ranked as a 4-star prospect by 247 Sports’ composite rankings and is a consensus 4-star prospect across all of the major recruiting services ranking as highly as #113 overall by Scout.
At 6’3”, 210 lbs heading into his senior season, Barajas has the height the Notre Dame staff looks for in their inside linebackers but will need to hit the weight room between now and next summer to add the necessary weight needed to play inside backer on the college level, but he has the frame to easily be able to accommodate  adding some good weight.
Before originally committing to Penn State, Notre Dame was considered the odds on favorite to land Barajas. Two months to the day of committing to Penn State, Barajas realized that Notre Dame was the place for him.
In addition to having offers from both Notre Dame and Penn State, Barajas also held offers from Michigan, Ohio State, Oregon, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Virginia Tech, Wisconsin, and Boston College.
Barajas, the 9th overall commitment for the class of 2015, is only the third defensive commitment for Notre Dame at this time joining safeties Nicco Fertitta and Prentice McKinney. McKinney recently gained a 4th star from Rivals making Barajas the second 4-star defensive commitment for Notre Dame.
With the addition of Barajas, Notre Dame adds another versatile inside linebacker to go along with the haul of inside backers that signed as part of the class of 2014 – Nile Sykes, Greer Martini, and Nyles Morgan.  Given Barajas’s versatility and Notre Dame’s likely use of more 4-man fronts, Barajas could end up playing any of the positions in the Notre Dame linebacking corps.
Adding Barajas to the #ShamrockSoliders15 after he initially committed to Penn State is a huge win for the Notre Dame coaching staff and gives the Irish recruiting efforts some well-timed momentum with the Irish Invasion on the horizon.
Josh Barajas Highlights
Archangel, just to follow up on the Midwest Catholic School 5, Barajas and Taylor are now committed, and it looks like ND has moved back into the pole position for Boykin. I thought we would lose him because he had stated a preference for early playing time and we are starting to fill the depth chart at WR.
Cornell, for now, APPEARS to be a lost cause, though the issues with him may have started under the prior defensive administratioin and a profiling issue.
With Hilliard, they’d done everything but close, and gave it an A+ effort, of course it’s results that count.
With Barajas and Taylor and the putative Boykin it is a very good haul of the original top midwest Catholic School targets.
With Hilliard it would become outstanding.
Barnett was a STUD!! I watched him play a game last season and he was tremendous. Guess the facilities at Oregon are enough to make you switch from South Bend. Nothing much left except the kid out of Servite(Ca)Let’s hope they can get on his list.
I agree, Shaz. A loss, but not too painful given the depth at QB. I think we can even go without a QB this class and get a stud next cycle. What do you think?
With that scholarship now becoming available again it might actually turn out to be a blessing.
One that could be used to beef up the defense or add a ruuningback that will be needed to fill the ranks when Cam departs after next season.
Still, I wouldn’t count Kelly and his staff out just yet.
It’s still early with a lot of time between now and signing day (and a whole high school football season yet to be played) and they always seem to come up with something.
Should ND now fail to sign a QB in place of Barnett, the decision to red shirt Golson his freshmen year, and then play Rees last year while Zaire was red shirted, now seems to have been the right move.
With Kizer also on board, there are still 3 quality QB’s with plenty of eligibility remaining.
WELL WITHOUT BIG TIME QBS WE GO NO WHERE, GO GET BARNETT BACK
Yo bj – Barnett is a WKG. “WRONG Kinda Guy.” Stop crying about not signing someone who didn’t look-the-part to me (he’s White) from the beginning. You want a “BIG TIME QB”? Tell me – what ever happened with Jimmy “Golden Boy” Claussen? Losses happen with big ego’s.
Thank you for your comments Donald Sterling.
Ron – hope you don’t mistake that as a racist remark. It most certainly was not. It unmistakably DOES mention race, but there is nothing bad/negative about being advantaged because of your race, (Travis Waller)
PS – Donald Sterling is a bad, bad man. I’m not offended b/c you apparently misunderstood me. Peace – AND GO IRISH!
On on the flip side, QB B. Barnett decommitts from ND.
Forgive the off topic comment but I just visited the under.com offical roster page. Ishaq Williams is listed at 6.5/271 pounds!
I’m pulling for this kid to finnally be able to let his freakish athletic abilities explode on the field this year. Be it at the 43 end position ripping through tackles and punishing quarterbacks!
Romeo okwara, jaylon smith, Jarron jones, Sheldon day, Jerret grace (hopefully)….everything I’ve read on nyles Morgan says he could be a rotational player as a true freshman. Our secondary looks promising as they have a ton of game Experiance.
I’ve been a little down on this defense. I can say now that I’m hopefull. There’s a lot of tallent on the Irish defense that has been hidden by nix and tuitt. Anxious as all get out to see these kids show what they have!!
the linebacking corps is filling in nicely. Now that Drue Tranquill has been assigned to linebacker, the frosh class will include Kolin Hill,
Nile Sykes, Greer Martini, Nyles Morgan and Tranquill. That’s a nice fivesome. Following that up with Barajas puts us in good stead.
Imagine the pandemonium on the PSU boards and the sky is falling comments. Let’s just all remember this when a commit flips in December. This stuff happens.
Irish Invasion will be awesome!
Happy to get Josh!
Woodrow
This is a great flip! You can never have too many good ILB’s
Whew! There seemed to be some slippage on some of Notre Dame’s Midwestern targets. There was a time when we looked to be the clubhouse leader for
Elijah Taylor, DT Moeller, Jashon Cornell, DE. Cretin Durham Hall, Justin Hilliard,LB Cincy St. X, Miles Boykin,WR Providence Catholic New Lenox, and Barajas, from Andrean. What is noteworthy is that each of these kids
is from Midwestern CATHOLIC schools, considered ND’s sweet spot.
Then Barajas committed to Penn State, OSU appeared to lead for Taylor and Hilliard, and Michigan State seemed to lead for Boykin and Cornell.
Hopefully Barajas is just the first to commit to ND.
2 comments and a question:
1) re: Taylor and Hilliard- Ohio State prevailing in Ohio with elite recruits, even with Catholic HS grads, will be less of a surprise than ever considering Urban’s the coach there.
2) With our recent run on top recruiting classes, can MSU et.al. draw HS stars away from us promising a greater likelihood they can get on the field there earlier?
3) Recruiting innovations like ‘Irish Invasion’ can hopefully offset factors like 1 and 2 above.
Archangel (defend us in battle, by the way) you are bullseying with all three. You are correct on point one, though I concede nothing to Meyer, who specializes in recruiting scum (cf. Will HIll) rather than RKGS. When Hilliard came up for one of his visits, he spent some time looking up the St. X kids who were just there for academic reasons, so that was a tad of a buying signal. Right now, I’m not sure they don’t prefer Tiassum(Indianapolis Park Tudor)to Elijah Taylor.
On your second point, Miles Boykin is a great case in point. He has been on campus multiple times, but has expressed a desire to play early and MSU, and its fine coach, Dantonio, can provide that. We are stacked at wide receiver, and incoming frosh Corey Holmes, would would start as a frosh for half the ACC teams, will probably redshirt.
But this is a sign that we are climbing the mountain. Just as the Niklas/Tuitt departures are, while disconcerting to some, a sign that we have “arrived” so too is losing players because we have a stacked depth chart.
The challenges way up the mountain are much different, but more welcome, than those in the valley below.
On your third point, I’ll see you one and raise you one.
I love the Irish Invasion, it is a RADICAL change in our recruiting, though not without risks. My own surmise is that it will reap more benefits in the 2016 class, but we shall see. The incursion, under the protection of Don Trent Miles, to Georgia State, is another bold step forward. These guys are resolute in recruiting!!