Inside The Huskies

Looking Behind the Curtain at UW Recruit Ladarian Clardy

The safety from Pensacola has the Huskies among his final 5 schools.

Dan Raley

Ladarian Clardy has the UW among his final 5 schools.
Ladarian Clardy has the UW among his final 5 schools. / UW

It's a wonder that Ladarian Clardy can keep himself from getting a big head and not think he's totally invincible as this widely pursued, 4-star football recruit from the Florida panhandle who everyone wants to sign.

One minute, he's shown on social media riding around in a vehicle driven by Florida State head coach Mike Norvell, the next he's in another ride chauffeured by Mississippi football leader Lane Kiffin himself, with both men giving this kid their best hard sell (as shown below in attached Twitter postings).

On Friday, the 6-foot,180-pound safety from Escambia High School in Pensacola, Florida, revealed he will choose a college football destination on Saturday, Aug. 3, from among Central Florida, Florida State, Mississippi, Mississippi State and Washington.

Yes, the Huskies are in the cross-country hunt for talent here.

“To be honest, I’m like everywhere right now,” Clardy told Warchant, a website that covers Florida State. “I’m just so confused."

He previously had Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Miami and Michigan among his top scholarship choices, but either the player or those schools moved on as the arduous auditioning process drags out.

From the various videos and photos that have documented his recruitment, Clardy seems to be enjoying himself, always smiling and no doubt understanding the power that he holds in determining his future that others don't.

Yet there is a reminder for him to be humble at all times, that won't let him forget that life is hardly fair all of the time, that it can be unbearable.

On June 22, he reposted an image of the Ladarius "LD" Clardy Memorial Impact Award with a simple heart emoji. It involved his older brother. He didn't have to say anymore.

On July 1, 2021, just over three years ago, Clardy's sibling was shot to death while innocently driving a car across Pensacola. There was no road rage, no argument of any kind, no reason for this to happen. Outrageously, it was a case of stupid and heartless mistaken identity.

Ladarius Clardy had just returned home after playing his freshman season as a quarterback for FCS school Kennesaw State in Atlanta. He had been in town for just a few hours. He had gone with a friend to play in a local dice game. Someone thought he was someone else who previously had threatened them. They followed him in two vehicles and put 50 bullets into his car. Pensacola, sometimes a rough military town, was shaken by this.

In January of this year, the second of two brothers was found guilty of first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of Ladarius Clardy as the case weaves slowly through the court system to mete out justice.

These misinformed siblings left one Clardy brother without the other to share in their college football endeavors, to encourage each other and to grow into men together.

Some people seem to think the younger Clardy will find it hard to resist going to Florida State, which is 200 miles away from his hometown, or to Ole Miss, one state over, especially after those recent recruiting car rides with the respective VIP drivers,

Yet Seattle still holds a certain attraction for him, too. You might say another brother lives there.

Two months ago, Clardy posted a photo of him and Devon Witherspoon at a field when they were much younger, growing up in Pensacola, working out together, dreaming about the future, not unlike brothers.

Witherspoon, of course, plays cornerback for the Seattle Seahawks, so Clardy would have a built-in support system if he came to the Northwest.

As Ladarian Clardy chooses his college, he'll make the choice that best suits him. He'll likely go on and have a memorable career somewhere, maybe join Witherspoon in the NFL someday if not in Seattle beforehand.

All along, he sadly won't have any issues staying grounded, knowing the world is about much more than scholarship offers, NIL deals and fawning praise.

For the latest UW football and basketball news, go to si.com/college/washington

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Dan Raley

DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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