Ponderosa’s Jon Major a force on gridiron
For the second straight year, the top high school football player in Colorado has committed to CU.
Ponderosa High’s Jon Major, the No. 1 player in the state and No. 75 player in the country, gave Colorado a verbal commitment late last month, passing over schools like Michigan, Oklahoma, Oregon, Tennessee and Wisconsin.
Major is a four-star defensive end, according to recruiting service Rivals.com. Scout.com rates him as a five-star linebacker. He was recruited to Colorado as a linebacker, but has the talent to play anything from the defensive line to the secondary, his coach said.
He’s tricky to classify because he plays just about everything.
“He is such a student of the game that we only have to explain a concept once and he is able to execute it perfectly,” Ponderosa football coach Randy Huff said. “We didn’t find anything that Jon couldn’t do.”
Much of the time, Major played a hybrid position on the Ponderosa defense. He could rove between outside linebacker and defensive end between plays and drop back as far as the safeties if the play called for it.
The Jon Major File
Height: 6-foot-4
Weight: 230 pounds
40-yard dash: 4.5 seconds
Shuttle: 4.0 seconds
High School: Ponderosa High School (Parker, Colo.)
Intangibles: “He speaks with his play,” Ponderosa High coach Randy Huff said. “I know he is constantly encouraging his teammates, but he is certainly not a rah-rah guy.”
The position quickly became the anchor on the Ponderosa defense. Major made 109 tackles his sophomore season in high school pads and also snagged an interception and three fumble recoveries.
As a junior, he had 107 tackles in eight games, two fewer than his sophomore season, with an interception and 3 fumble recoveries. His senior season, Major made 151 tackles, 23 for loss, and recovered six fumbles.
Major also moved onto the offensive side of the ball his junior season, taking snaps at tailback and quarterback.
He’s thrown passes and he’s caught passes. He’s made handoffs and he’s taken handoffs. He’s even kicked a field goal. And on offense, he’s still a bruiser.
“Watching his highlight reels on offense, it looks like he’s still the one giving out hits,” Huff said. “He has definitely learned to be the person dishing it out and not taking the shot.”
With versatility comes work ethic, Huff said. Major, in addition to playing football and baseball during the school year, carries a 3.65 GPA.
“He has great discipline to get everything done well,” Huff said. “He will not finish something that isn’t up to his standards.”
Major follows former Columbine lineman Ryan Miller, the No. 1 player in the state in the 2007 recruiting class.
With the commitments from Major and Miller, Colorado is also starting to re-establish its footing with recruiting in the state, and it’s keeping the out-of-state poachers at bay.
Impact players like LenDale White, Jeff Byers and Lamarr Houston all left the Centennial State in the last five years to destinations like Southern Cal, Texas and Nebraska.
Colorado recruited the state’s top prospect in 2005, Maurice Greer. But Greer did not qualify academically and he never enrolled at CU.
The last top player in the state to enroll at Colorado was offensive lineman Brian Daniels in 2003. He led the Colorado line and earned All-Big 12 honors his junior and senior years.
Contact Campus Press Staff Writer Justin Coons at justin.coons@thecampuspress.com.
