The Best of the WPIAL: Top Five

The Best of the WPIAL is a feature series running through the most highly-rated players from the Western Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic League – or high school football in the greater Pittsburgh area for the uninitiated – in the Rivals.com era. Rivals began releasing lists of the nation’s 100 best prospects in 2002 and the Rivals250 followed that in 2006. This list contains only the top 40 players by high school ranking, not college or NFL production.

Western Pennsylvania has always been a cradle to some of football’s most outsized talents and personalities and many of them come within recent memory. You can read the introduction to the series here, and see numbers 40 through 36, 35 through 31, 30 through 26, 25 through 21, 20 through 16, 15 through 11, and 10 through six. Below continues the final five countdown.

If you live in the city or around the city of Pittsburgh, it’s hard to escape the shadow of Aliquippa (Pa.) football. The Quips have been one of the largest talent pipelines for the college and professional ranks in the country, producing players like Darrelle Revis, Mike Ditka, Ty Law, and many others. In the class of 2008, 6-foot-6, 233-pound freakshow wide receiver Jonathan Baldwin joined that fraternity. The big outside receiver was a standout on the football field, basketball court, and track for Aliquippa, earning Division I scholarships to multiple schools across multiple sports and competing for playoff spots and championships in all three. Baldwin ran a stupefying 10.7 100-meter dash as a senior, which is incredibly impressive at his size – or any size. Baldwin’s combination of athleticism and size attracted football offers from across the country, including Michigan, Florida, USC, and Miami (Fla.), but Baldwin followed the Aliquippa tradition of playing his college football for Pitt. He was something to behold in a Panthers uniform, Baldwin caught 128 passes over three seasons for Pitt for 18 touchdowns and 2,337 yards, averaging over 18 yards per reception over the course of his career. His talent as a deep threat made him difficult to ignore as an NFL prospect and after posting a 4.49 40-yard dash at the NFL Combine, Baldwin was selected in the first round of the 2011 NFL Draft by the Kansas City Chiefs. Unfortunately, they may have been the high-water mark for Baldwin’s career. He caught 44 passes for 607 yards in the professional ranks, but scored only twice and lasted just three seasons in the NFL. Baldwin was traded from the Chiefs after two years to the San Francisco 49ers and lasted just one season before being cut. He did not hang on with the Detroit Lions after being claimed off of waivers for the 2014 season due to his inability to pass a physical.

Justin King was one of the most-heralded recruits to ever emerge from western Pennsylvania when he was coming of age in high school. An electric two-way player who excelled at both running back and defensive back, King did everything for Gateway while he was on the Gators’ squad. King was rail thin, but he was explosive, totaling over 4,500 rushing yards in his high school career and scoring 59 touchdowns. Although his production jumped off of the page less on the defensive side of the football with 25 tackles and an interception, he was a shutdown corner that defenses rarely tested. Most colleges viewed King as a cornerback at the next level and he was offered by Florida, Miami (Fla.), Michigan, Ohio State, Pitt, USC, and Penn State coming out of the high school ranks. King elected to follow in the footsteps of his stepfather and head coach Terry Smith, who was an All-American for the Nittany Lions. King continued his electric ways on offense for Penn State as a true freshman, accounting for 393 yards on just 31 touches in his first season while also pulling duty on the defensive side of the football. King’s efforts earned him First-Team Freshman All-American honors. From his sophomore season on, it was all defense all of the time for King, as he started every game of the 2006 season at right cornerback. King recorded 30 tackles, six pass break-ups, and an interception in that season, making the All-Big Ten list for his efforts. Perhaps his most impressive performances came against Ohio State and Tennessee and All-American receivers Ted Ginn Jr. and Robert Meachem. Between the two games, the two stand-out receivers caught just six passes for 48 total yards against King. Unfortunately, much of the rest of his career has been hampered by injuries. King declared for the NFL from Penn State after his junior season and his lightning-fast 4.31 time on the 40-yard dash in the 2008 NFL Combine saw him selected in the fourth round, King battled lower-body injuries in every year of his career after that. The former Gateway Gator lasted for six seasons (including a brief stint with the Steelers) in the pro ranks, collecting 116 tackles, a sack, and an interception before retiring after the 2013 season.

Blue-chip, truly elite quarterbacks are a rare thing to find. They are some of the most sought-after athletes in the country for both college and professional football, as so few can play the position at a high level. That’s why Penn Hills (Pa.) quarterback Anthony Morelli became such a hotly-recruited phenomenon when he was in the high school ranks. The 6-foot-5, 205-pound pocket passer looked fairly similar to something you would in a lab if you were trying to design the ideal drop-back quarterback of that time period. Morelli was a five-star quarterback in his class of 2004 and Pennsylvania’s top player, edging out future NFL quarterback Chad Henne, among others. Morelli was recruited by out-of-state programs like Ohio State, Michigan State, and UCLA, but there was a more local flavor to his recruitment. Neither Pitt nor Penn State wanted the five-star to leave the Keystone State. Morelli committed to Pitt in the month of August as he was heading into his senior season of football, but that didn’t last. By time National Signing Day had rolled around, Morelli flipped his commitment to Penn State, citing an in-home visit with Joe Paterno and worries over the future of the Big East. Morelli started the 2006 and 2007 seasons for Penn State, but he never truly lived up to the expectations that many had for him. Despite throwing for over 5,200 yards and 31 touchdowns in his career for the Nittany Lions, Morelli drew criticism for being far too turnover prone. Morelli took over 40 sacks in his career at Penn State while throwing 19 interceptions and completing 56% of his passes. Morelli was signed to an undrafted free agent contract with the Arizona Cardinals after the 2008 NFL Draft, but did not make it with the team past the preseason. He has since moved on to coaching young quarterbacks, first at Plum High School in the Pittsburgh area and currently in the state of Indiana.

The first five-star prospect from the WPIAL since Dorian Johnson in 2013, Lamont Wade is by far the youngest player in the top five of this list. Wade is an all-everything five-star at the cornerback position and one of the best defensive backs in the country regardless of position. Despite his relatively small stature (Wade is only 5-foot-9 and 182 pounds), Wade’s ultra-competitive nature and impressive instincts, athleticism, and coverage skills have placed him in the top 10 nationally among all 2017 prospects. Wade has been recovering from an ankle injury sustained during his junior season, but he’s still competed aggressively during the offseason camp circuit, attending his second Rivals Five-Star Challenge and coming home with a defensive back MVP award. Wade started out uncharacteristically slow at the Five-Star Challenge but turned things around in a major way in Atlanta, leaving little doubt as to what makes him one of the best football players in WPIAL history. As Rivals.com Midwest analyst Josh Helmholdt noted: “[Wade] just did not look his normal self in the one-on-one session, but when the lights turned on and the competition heated up for 7-on-7 play the five-star came alive and took home the defensive back MVP trophy after just missing on the award at the 2015 Five-Star Challenge. Wade led all defensive backs with nine pass break-ups, including two on the final series that sealed the win for Team Armour. Wade also recorded an interception and was the emotional leader of his championship squad.” Wade’s prodigious coverage abilities have garnered him a national offer list, with scholarships coming from everywhere. Wade’s top 8 list includes schools like Alabama, Mississippi State, West Virginia, and UCLA, but it appears that Penn State, Ohio State, Tennessee, and Pitt could be the biggest contenders for his services as his recruitment heads into the stretch run. The big-time cornerback is a major priority for both home-state schools and Pitt and Penn State would be dealt a huge blow if the Clairton (Pa.) star left the staet of Pennsylvania. Wade plans to take all five official visits and make a commitment during the December dead period, prior to enrolling early at the college of his choice.

It won’t be a surprise to anybody that former Jeannette (Pa.) Jayhawk Terrelle Pryor is the top-rated player from the WPIAL in the Rivals.com era. Watching Pryor compete in just about any athletic competition – be it football, basketball, ping pong, or anything else – was a sight to behold. The 6-foot-6, 235-pound football player (it’s too limiting to call him a quarterback) dominated everything he ever attempted athletically and may be the best pure athlete that the state of Pennsylvania has ever seen. In the high school ranks, Pryor brought Jeannette state championships in both football and basketball. He was the first player in Pennsylvania history to both throw and rush for 4,000 or more yards, leading the Jayhawks to back-to-back state titles games and winning the championship as a senior. In that 2008 season, his senior year, he not only surpassed the 4,000-and-4,000 marks, he oversaw the most prolific offense in Pennsylvania high school history at the time (the Jayhawks scored 860 points as a team), earned Parade National Player of the Year honors, became the bell-to-bell number one player in the country on Rivals.com, and captured the MVP award at the U.S. Army All-American game. On the basketball court, Pryor also brought Jeannette a state title in his senior season, earned fourth-team All-American honors with Parade, and put up maybe the best performance in a WPIAL championship game of all time – 39 points, 24 rebounds, and 10 blocked shots. A triple-double’s not too bad for his back-up sport.

Pryor’s athletic abilities became the stuff of legend and schools flocked from all over America to recruit him: Pitt, Penn State, Florida, Oregon, Ohio State, LSU and Michigan all wanted Pryor. The recruitment of the five-star quarterback became an absolute circus as National Signing Day approached. Just days before the signing period began, rumors began circulating about whether or not Pryor would sign with any school on February 6th, 2008. The news changed seemingly by the day – yes he will, no he won’t – but when Pryor called a press conference on National Signing Day it looked as if things had been wrapped up for the Buckeyes. Yet, that very morning, Pryor chose to delay his commitment and push things back, and his lack of a commitment overshadowed everything also about recruiting on that day. Pryor continued taking visits after National Signing Day, coming down to a top four of Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan, and Oregon, sneaking in visits in between the state basketball tournament games. Things even got to the point where questions arose about whether or not Pryor would choose to play basketball at the next level and if that could impact his recruitment. Eventually the whole thing became enough for the Jeannette superstar and Pryor signed his National Letter of Intent to play for the Ohio State Buckeyes 42 days after National Signing Day.

Things hardly got less exciting after he signed, as Pryor became a campus sensation in Columbus. Todd Boeckman was an entrenched starter at Ohio State and a first-team All-Big Ten selection who was a sixth-year senior when Pryor arrived, but it took the phenomenal freshman just three games to unseat Boeckman. Pryor was Big Ten Freshman of the Year, throwing for over 1300 yards and 12 touchdowns, rushing for 631 yards and 6 touchdowns, and even catching a fade route in the endzone for his 19th touchdown of the year. Pryor’s career at Ohio State was prolific as he led the team to two Big Ten championships and victories in the Rose Bowl and Sugar Bowl in his three years, accounting for 8,365 yards and 76 touchdowns from 2008 through 2010.

Pryor eventually left the university as part of the “Tattoogate” scandal involving teammates and head coach Jim Tressell. Pryor’s choice to forgo his senior season rather than endure the five-game suspension that he faced from the NCAA was met with his criticism by some, but Pryor’s physical tools were too much for the NFL to pass up. At 6-foot-4 and 240 pounds, Pryor was clocked as running a 4.38 40-yard dash. Pryor has not made a significant impact as of yet in the NFL, and was moved from quarterback to wide receiver. 2016 will be Pryor’s sixth season in the NFL and he’ll be a part of his fifth organization. Still, Pryor has spent time working out with fellow freak Randy Moss and reports out of offseason activities are that Pryor may finally be ready at wide receiver to live up to his incredible physical ability.