Atlanta is the epicenter of recruiting in the SEC. There’s no other way to put it. Atlanta is pretty much the capital of the conference. Sure the offices are located Birmingham, but all the stuff that people care about (i.e. the SEC championship game) is in Atlanta. And most of the time the basketball tournament is in Atlanta too.

The problem with tracking recruiting in Atlanta is that Atlanta itself isn’t particularly daunting. It’s a good city of around 450,000 with good football talent, great food, some cool stuff and a horribly large and sometimes difficult to navigate airport with a decent subway transit system as long as you are going north or south.

But I decided to be more detailed and cover the entire Atlanta metropolitan area that covers about 150 counties, 2,500 cities and approximately 250,000 miles. Those are rough estimates. So Atlanta, Stone Mountain, Decatur, Griffin, Woodstock, Lawrenceville, Jonesboro, Stockbridge, Gainesville, Douglasville, Doraville, Centerville, Panthersville, Fayetteville, Cartersville, Sandy Springs, etc., etc, are all in here!

Here is a breakdown of how 2017 recruit is going in the ATL and comparing it to the past two seasons.

2017

5-stars: The one five star prospect, Robert Beal, is actually heading to IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida.
4-stars: 7 SEC commitments
3-stars: 6 SEC commitments

A lot yet to be determined here and a ton of SEC targets are still out there. One thing that has to be mentioned, however, is Georgia’s aggressive recruiting in this area under new head coach Kirby Smart. Four of the seven four-star prospects are Bulldogs verbals, including cornerback William Poole III, offensive lineman Netori Johnson, linebacker Jaden Hunter and wide receiver Trey Blount.

In the next level of prospects, Tennessee has gotten verbals from three-star athlete Marquez Bembry and linebackers Solon Page III and Mo Burnam. Although Bembry was caught this checking out other options this week.

2016

5 stars: 1 SEC signee
4 stars: 7 SEC signees
3 stars: 23 SEC signees

Auburn secured the signature of the only 5-star prospect in area that signed with an SEC program, defensive tackle Derrick Brown, who chose the Tigers over Tennessee and Georgia on signing day. The Tigers also got a couple of 4-star prospects with defensive tackle Antwaun Jackson and wide receiver Kyle Davis.

Georgia wasn’t empty handed as 4-star defensive tackle Julian Rochester and running back Elijah Holyfield signed with the Bulldogs. Tennessee (S Nigel Warrior), Florida (DE Jordan Smith) and Ole Miss (DE Charles Wiley) also signed 4-star prospects.

Of the 3-star prospects, South Carolina signed five prospects to lead the way.

2015

5 stars: The only two Atlanta-area five-star prospects went to Clemson (OL Mitch Hyatt) and USC (OL Chuma Edoga), respectively.
4 stars: 17 SEC signees
3 stars: 27 SEC signees

With prospects such as Arden Key and Preston Williams, this group should begin to creep into the SEC narrative this season. And to prove how diverse the Atlanta-area prospects are in their selection of programs, the 4-star prospect signees broke down as: Georgia (5), Auburn (4), Tennessee (3), Alabama (2), South Carolina (1), LSU (1) and Ole Miss (1).

The 3-star prospects broke down as: South Carolina (6), Georgia (5), Florida (4), Tennessee (3), Auburn (3), Vanderbilt (3), Missouri (2), Ole Miss (1)

Expect the prospects in the Atlanta Metro area to continue to spread their SEC allegiances from one end of the conference to the other but expect Georgia to be even more aggressive in this part of the state as Kirby Smart wants to own the state of Georgia.