Arizona football recruiting: 3-star safety Rhedi Short talks July 3 decision date

Is Arizona on the verge of landing yet another defensive back?

The Arizona Wildcats have their calendar marked for July 3, the decision date set by 3-star safety Rhedi Short. The 6-foot-1, 185 pound safety out of Cathedral (Los Angeles, CA) is ranked 57th in the nation among all safeties, and is considered to be a high-end 3-star. It’s pretty much down to two schools: Arizona and Oregon, despite offers to Arizona State, Washington and UCLA.

He was once a UCLA commit, but decommitted just one day after taking an unofficial visit to Arizona and one week after his Oregon unofficial.

I’ve heard conflicting reports, but most say that Arizona is the leader. I’ve been told by Oregon insiders that he hasn’t been a top priority, while others have told me that Oregon is making strong surge and a few say it’s a toss up. Prior to speaking with Rhedi, I had Oregon in my Crystal Ball. It seemed as if he was all about Oregon and Arizona just faded softly in the background. Now, I’ve switched it to Arizona, but this could go either way.

To settle any uncertainties, I spoke with him before his announcement.

"Yeah, I had just come off my Arizona visit and I really enjoyed that," he said. "I was at Oregon the week before and I really liked that one too. I had been thinking of decommitting (from UCLA) just to give myself more of an opportunity and I feel like it did give me that."

Most believe that it’s down to Arizona and Oregon, but there’s a new school that has come into the mix.

"Penn State too," Short said when asked if Arizona and Oregon were his finalist. "I always liked them growing up and I’ve been talking to their safeties coach. I’ve talked to someone from each staff everyday. All the schools want me as a safety."

While Short didn’t tip me off in any direction, he did bring up his relationship with Arizona commit Greg Johnson once again. Although he also brought up the fact that he’s been talking with a few Oregon commits as well.

"Yeah, I told you before that I’m close with Greg (Johnson) and we’ve been talking a lot," he mentioned.

This commitment would give Arizona an extremely young and crowded secondary. In this class alone they would have safeties Xavier Bell and Scott Young, to go along with corners Malik Hausman and Greg Johnson. I’m still convinced Tony Fields is also athletic enough for a safety position as well a la Marquis Flowers.

Arizona is also in play for quite a few members of the secondary, including Jaylon Johnson, Jaylon Redd and Isaiah Pola-Moa. Add in the five safeties from the 2016 recruiting and the youth of Demetrius Flannigan-Fowles, Anthony Mariscal, Antonio Parks, Sammy Morrison and Jace Whittaker.

As a junior Short racked up 78 tackles on the season, three interceptions and a sack through 13 games.

His junior year highlights are below:

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