Wisconsin football recruiting: UW offers 4-star QB Avery Johnson out of Kansas

Recruiting is the lifeblood of any major college athletics team, but following it closely as a fan can sometimes be difficult and can often be time consuming. We’ll try and condense all the recruiting news you can use into this bi-weekly (sometimes more) post. It’ll include updates on current commits, including stats from their high school games, as well as news on players the Badgers are still pursuing. Let’s get down to business!

New offer

• 2023 4-star QB Avery Johnson (Maize, Kan.) out of Maize High School received an offer from Wisconsin and Paul Chryst over the weekend, per Johnson’s Twitter account. The talented signal caller also has offers from Arizona State, Arkansas, Florida State, Georgia Tech, Iowa State, Minnesota, Notre Dame, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Virginia Tech and others.

Johnson stands at 6-foot-2 and weighs around 170 pounds. You’ll see in his Hudl tape below that he is a true dual threat QB and has some real giddy up. Gabe Brooks, the Midlands Region Recruiting Analyst for 247 Sports, notes that Johnson has “verified 40 speed in the 4.5 range” who “flashes legitimate home run speed.” He is ranked as the No. 161 player overall and No. 9 quarterback in the country by the 247 Composite and the No. 2 player in the state of Kansas.

His stats from his sophomore season are pretty good. He completed 117-of-207 passes (57%) for 2,109 yards with 25 touchdowns to only three interceptions. He also added another 10 scores on the ground.

What I like most about Johnson is that, while he clearly has the ability to run, that isn’t his first instinct. He keeps his eyes downfield and looks to complete a pass before heading downfield as a last resort. He uses his mobility to create time for his receivers to get open too and you see a lot of broken plays turn into big gains for his team. Johnson throws a nice deep ball, that usually hits receivers in stride, and while his completion percentage isn’t amazing, he doesn’t turn the ball over much.

Johnson is also a key contributor for the Maize hoops team, averaging 13.2 points, 4.4 rebounds, 3.2 assists, and 1.8 steals per game while helping them win the Kansas 5A state championship as a sophomore. He is noted as having “bounce” on his 247 profile which you love to see.

According to Evan Flood over at 247 ($) (I just noticed that all paywalled posts at 247 are free today, Monday, so you should go check it out), Johnson is family friends with UW tight end, and Kansan, Clay Cundiff and has a friendship with notable Kansas-bred quarterback Graham Mertz. Those relationships can only help the Badgers, one would imagine.

Johnson is the third quarterback offered by Wisconsin in the 2023 cycle. The Badgers also have offers out to 4-star Cameron Edge (Smyrna, Del.) and 4-star Brayden Dorman (Colorado Springs, Colo.). As you may know, quarterback recruiting moves at a quicker speed than any other position, since most schools only take one per cycle, and the Badgers like to have a small handful of players on whom they focus.

Wisconsin is thought to be quite high on Dorman and probably hoped he would’ve committed by now, so it’s good that they’re making sure they have other options if he decides to look elsewhere.