How Cayden Green Navigated COVID, Recruiting and His NFL Dreams to Get to Oklahoma

Being born on Oklahoma soil, plus family ties to the state and a high school coach who played for the Sooners all played a role in his recruitment.

ORLANDO — There were a lot of factors that pulled Cayden Green to Oklahoma.

But maybe none were as strong as a couple of Kansas City Chiefs, and their college position coach at OU.

Green is the Sooners’ newest massive offensive lineman, a 6-foot-5, 315-pound left tackle from Lee’s Summit, MO, just outside of Kansas City, where he cheers for Chiefs left tackle Orlando Brown and center Creed Humphrey. Knowing that OU assistant coach Bill Bedenbaugh coached them both — and many other current NFL o-linemen — in Norman and helped them both reach Pro Bowl levels was a big part of Green signing with Oklahoma on Dec. 21.

In fact, one quarter of this year’s Pro Bowl offensive line roster is comprised of former Sooners, including Lane Johnson and Trent Williams.

“Yeah, I mean, it’s crazy,” Green told AllSooners. “But at the same time, not really. Because Oklahoma is really an offensive line-heavy school. That’s a big part of why I picked them. Because if you can make it here, then you can make it to the big leagues.”

Green is in Orlando for Tuesday’s Under Armour Next All-America game, one of seven members of the Sooners’ 2023 recruiting class playing in the game. In all, there are 13 future Sooners from this class who earned high school All-America recognition.

Recruiting can be funny like that. Humphrey was a U.S. Army All-American but was rated a 3-star prospect by Rivals and ESPN, while Brown was a consensus 3-star and didn’t get All-America accolades in high school.

According to the 247 Sports database, Green is a 4-star prospect and is the third-highest ranked o-line recruit Bedenbaugh has ever signed at OU (behind Brey Walker in 2018 and Savion Byrd in 2021).

As a high schooler, Green got to meet both Humphrey and Brown.

“I got to meet Orlando once; talked to him a little bit,” Green said. “I met Creed quite a few times, talked to him on social media. They’re just good guys. Quality guys. And they’re quality football players. And of course, I’m a big Chiefs fan.”

It was at Lee’s Summit where Green met former Sooner running back and current North High School coach Jamar Mozee, who played at OU from 1999-2001 — during Brent Venables’ first stint in Norman. When it came time for Green to be recruited, Mozee played an integral role.

“He was the reason for all that,” Green said. “I was still fairly unknown, so I didn’t have like, a bunch of schools following me. So it was him who was sending out the tapes. Because he’s got connections everywhere. He was who the coaches were talking to. He was my buffer, telling me where to go, where not to go, what to do, what not to do, what to say and all that. Really, my recruitment, of course it was me playing and all that stuff, but it was really him. He had probably the biggest part in that.”

Still, it was up to Green to do his part. His first collegiate offer came during the second semester of his freshman year — it came from the Kansas Jayhawks — and then, just like that, recruiting was over.

COVID shut everything down.

“It kind of went silent for a while until I played my sophomore season,” Green said. “But it really took off for me probably the middle of my sophomore season. After that, I was going on visits once everything opened up.”

During that down time, Green was doing what he could to stay ready.

“Yeah, it was tough,” Green said. “But the good thing for me when COVID came around, I had just gotten my first offer and went on my first visit — to Kansas. So when COVID came around, I wasn’t a big recruit yet. I wasn’t making a bunch of noise or on anybody’s radar yet. So that ended up being a good thing for me, because I didn’t really miss much like some of my older teammates did.

“Me, I was still training. So I was with my trainer, and I would just post these workout videos I was doing with my trainer and then just tag all the schools that followed me and all the offensive line coaches that followed me. Coach B was one of the ones that would always like my posts. He seemed to be one of the ones that was keeping up with me.”

Meanwhile Green began to take care of his business on the field. The last two years, he had preseason scrimmage matchups with North Kansas City, where fast-rising defensive end prospect P.J. Adebawore was on his way to 5-star status. They went up against each other several times in practice this week in Orlando, and it brought back memories of their high school showdowns.

“It was a good competition. I would say it’s pretty much even,” Adebawore told AllSooners. “He did good things to me and I did good things to him. … I definitely did a lot better my senior year. It was definitely fun. Good comp. Wish I could have went up against him more, honestly.”

“Yeah, it was fun,” Green said. “It was good on good. We hadn’t really seen competition like each other when we’d been playing, so it was good. A good test.”

Green, said OU offensive coordinator Jeff Lebby, was a tremendous prospect. According to 247 Sports, he’s the No. 9 offensive tackle prospect in the nation.

“Cayden, obviously, as highly recruited as there is with the o-line,” Lebby said. “Can do a lot of different things. Just a massive guy who knows how to play. Tough and mean and physical and is incredibly athletic.”

“Cayden has been incredibly solid. He’s been great. The recruitment with Cayden has been fun. Incredible talent but an incredible guy. He has a great family.”

A family with Oklahoma ties, who are in Orlando this week taking it all in.

Green’s parents were athletes at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, and he was born in suburban Broken Arrow before the family relocated to the KC area.

“It’s always been kind of my dream school,” Green said. “But aside from that, just how many linemen they put into the league every year — being an offensive lineman, of course, that’s pretty appealing.“