USC football finally gets going on 2023 offensive line recruiting with long OT pickup

USC football fans have been begging for offensive and defensive line recruits all offseason, and the Trojans coaching staff finally answered their calls and picked up three-star Offensive Tackle Tobias Raymond out of Ventura High School in Ventura, California.

Raymond, rated as the No. 69 tackle in the 2023 class, is also the No. 88 player in California. The No. 1 aspect of Raymond that stands out is his length. He's 6'7", which is of course perfect. Unfortunately, he only weighs 250 pounds, but he of course still has his whole senior year to bulk up.

And it's most certainly possible that he'll still need to bulk up in his first year or two at SC too, but it will most certainly be worth it. That length as a tackle is crucial for any offense. And as far as Lincoln Riley's offense goes, he doesn't even favor 300-pound linemen.

This system is designed for long and athletic linemen who are quick on the move and can keep up with a very fast-paced offense; the Courtland Ford type, to give a USC example.

Raymond is likely not going to grow into a 300-pound guy, but he just doesn't need to if he's going to be playing for Riley. As long as he has the length, he's fine.

Four other Pac-12 teams were after USC football's new OT Tobias Raymond--Cal, Washington State, Arizona, and OSU.

National recruiting director for Rivals and Yahoo! Sports, Adam Gorney, is also not sold that USC football should've been scared away by Raymond not being the thickest lineman.

"If you look back through the NFL draft you can see that a lot of the guys who have been drafted early were guys that looked like this in high school. They weren't the filled-out 300-plus pounders that they looked like when they were in college, so I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. I think USC saw him and got intrigued by his size and athletic ability, and he can certainly develop into an elite offensive tackle"

- Adam Gorney, Rivals

This upcoming recruiting class now has eight commits in it. Only Raymond is an offensive lineman, but it's still a good class.

It features a five-star QB in Malachi Nelson, a five-star WR in Zachariah Branch, a four-star athlete in Makai Lemon, a four-star safety in Braxton Myers, and two four-star RBs in Quinten Joyner and A'Marion Peterson. (All recruiting ratings and rankings in article are as of 247Sports).

It's listed as the number 15 class in the country, and it's average recruit rating (94.62) is head and shoulders above the 14 programs with classes ranked ahead of the Trojans.