Epps: Alabama freshman Jones is rated too low at five stars

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. — College freshmen just can’t impress us much anymore.

High school football players, the really great ones, are almost celebrities even before they can attend prom. They’re idolized in YouTube videos with really cool music in the background. We know all about them before they enroll in college courses.

As prominent sports sociologist Harry Edwards said last year before national signing day, high school stars are “almost totally commodified — a product to be developed and marketed.”

This is the SEC, so these five-star athletes typically arrive on campus and play a reserve role. Some redshirt. Others never play at all.

Even Bobby Burton, chief operating officer of Rivals.com, projects a 55-65 percent success rate out of his Web site’s top 100 athletes. We are often disappointed. A highly recruited freshman, even at the age of 18, cannot possibly be underrated.

But then you see this big, physical receiver with incredible hands and the ability to make cornerbacks fall down with his route-running skills, and you realize we might have one of the first underrated five-star players. You realize that Quintorris Lopez Jones, better known as “Julio,” might actually be better than any of us believed.

He’s excelled in the biggest moments, his three best games coming on the road against SEC opponents. He’s already been immortalized in a Daniel Moore print, which captures his touchdown catch against Georgia. He caught six passes for 103 yards against an impressive Tennessee secondary.

Last Saturday at LSU, Jones caught seven passes for 128 yards, including a 24-yard catch in overtime to set up the winning score and keep No. 1 Alabama undefeated. Why go to Jones, a freshman, in such a situation?

“I don’t think many people can cover him, to be honest with you,” quarterback John Parker Wilson said.

A freshman can make athletic plays and outrun defenders and catch tough passes. But this freshman, he drags around bigger defenders and carries piles and displays other feats of strength that don’t seem possible from a teenager. (We’re seeing similar feats from Georgia’s A.J. Green.)

“It’s just like a dunk in a basketball game to see somebody work like that,” running back Glen Coffee said of Jones carrying would-be tacklers on his back. “You think, ‘I’ve got to do that myself.’”

Jones has shown us that the best way to confront hype is by simply ignoring it. Alabama coach Nick Saban has done his part, making Jones and the other Crimson Tide freshmen unavailable to the media.

But teammates say Jones never celebrates a touchdown — not even in practice when no one is watching — never boasts, never seems distracted by all the adulation. Earlier this year, tight end Nick Walker claimed Jones “has no ego at all.” Jones acts like a freshman only in the sense that he knows his place on the team as a first-year player.

“I don’t think he’s trying to live up to any hype,” Alabama offensive lineman Drew Davis said. “He has his head on straight and he goes out and competes every week. His mentality and work ethic surprised me. He’s very committed to the team.”

In reality, Jones is pretty much Alabama’s entire receiving corps and one of the main reasons his team will play for an SEC championship. Jones has 40 catches for 634 yards this season. The next leading wide receiver, Mike McCoy, has 16 for 191. Saban said the team needs to find a consistent No. 2 receiver. Can you imagine this team if its No. 1 was just a typical freshman?

“I think his resiliency in terms of his maturity and being competitive and being able to play with consistency and how hard he plays in the game, I think those are tremendously positive characteristics for him,” Saban said. “You never know when you get a talented guy if they really have those things. He played that way in high school, and he’s certainly carried that over to here.

“It’s not only his catches, but his attitude and effort running after the catch.”

Wilson said the team often talks about Jones’ ability to drag defenders around after the catch and gain extra yards. And then, of course, they talk about his ability to grab most balls thrown in his general vicinity.

“There was one in practice one day when he made a one-handed catch behind his back,” Wilson said. “It was easily the best catch I’ve ever seen.”

Of course, those stories only add to the legend, fuel the hype.

“But you know,” Coffee said, “I think he’s lived up to it.”