Simi Fajemisin Flying Under the Radar, Visiting Gonzaga

During this very, very dull time in college basketball news, the one saving grace during this period is when word breaks about recruiting official visits.  This morning, news broke about a gigantic (literally) prospect who has an official visit set up with Gonzaga.

"I’m visiting Gonzaga on September 25," said Fajemisin. "And I’ll definitely visit San Diego, but haven’t set a date yet."

The prospect is Simi Fajemisin, and if I misspell that at any point during this post I apologize but it doesn't exactly roll off the fingers.  Fajemisin is a 6'9'', 270 pound prospect from Lynnwood High School in Washington.  He falls into what would be the recruiting class of 2010, which has become a very difficult class to nail down if you are a Gonzaga fan.  The wrap on Fajemisin is the same for basically every other enormous high school prospect: he has to learn how to use his relatively new size.  A recent ESPN.com evaluation of him said that he is one of the top unknown prospects on the West Coast but he has some serious work to do as far as getting himself in shape to play 30+ minutes of big time college basketball.  With that being said, they note that he has a remarkably smooth stroke for a man of his size and he is a pretty decent rebounder.  His size will remind people of a guy like Josh Smith but Smith is obviously much more polished an is definitely not flying under the radar.  

Fajemisin's visit will obviously be important in dictating whether or not he actually receives an offer from Gonzaga.  At this point he only has offers from San Diego, Portland St., and Long Beach so he will have to really impress the Gonzaga staff to pull out an offer but I imagine they will give him a jersey and let him bang around with guys like Rob Sacre and Will Foster and see how he fits in.  Fajemisin is a player that, if he asserts himself, can be very good down the line around his junior year but it will take a lot of work to get him there.  The key for the staff is to dictate if they believe he is more of an Abdullhai Kuso or a Mamery Diallo.  With all the youth on this team and the lack of scholarships, the latter option would be catastrophic if Mark Few decides to offer a scholarship.  Like we have detailed a number of times, Gonzaga only has three available scholarships in the next two recruiting cycles but Fajemisin does pass the eye test as far as what we would like to see a 2010 scholarship be used on.  He's a big and would provide depth at the position but we'd love to see Gonzaga get a player who can help immediately rather than throw a scholarship to another project.

The news about Fajemisin may also mean that the staff is very pleased with what they are seeing out of guys like Rob Sacre, Andy Poling, and Sam Dower to the point where they think they can afford another project type big.  We'll keep you updated if anything else comes across and we are working to secure various interviews to learn more about the newest Zag prospect.