From 2003 to 2007 Florida safeties coach Ron English served as the defensive backs coach (03-05) and defensive coordinator (06-07) at the University of Michigan. During a recent interview with The Michigan Insider English reflected upon some noteworthy recruiting misses during his time in Ann Arbor. In part five he recaps the story of late decommitment of former five-star defensive back Jai Eugene in 2006. If you missed parts one through four of this series, be sure to check out English's account of Demarco Murray wanting to come to Michigan, Desean Jackson being a 'done deal' for the Maize & Blue, that time Michigan turned down Beast Mode, and When Ronald Johnson decommitted.

Ron English: “So we're on Jai Eugene (at Michigan), and he's a good player. We want him, and we needed him, and all that stuff. Fred Jackson recruited Louisiana, so we're going to go down (together) and see him. We go down after Katrina and Fred drives me around one of the wards, and I've never seen anything like it. It's like The Wizard of Oz. You're seeing cars tucked into second story windows, and in trees, and all that. It was crazy. But you go down to the French Quarter and they had taken care of all of that. So anyway… (back to) Jai Eugene, we go to Destrehan, we go to the school, and we finally get Jai committed. In fact, Jai Eugene commits to us on national TV at the Army Game. Now, we go (back) down to his school… I go down… this is January. One of the recruiters down south, he was at Tennessee… (he said), ‘what’s up Ron? How are you doing man? Hey, you know (Eugene’s recruitment) is just starting now? Whoever has the biggest bag is going to win.' At that time I didn't really believe that kind of stuff was going on. I didn't know. I thought it was just talk.”

“But Jai stays committed, and we go down to the final weekend. Now it's Monday… it’s either Monday or Tuesday of the signing week, and Wednesday is Signing Day. Fred comes to my office (and says),’ Ron, you've got to talk to Jai. He's talking about he's not coming. You’ve got to talk to him’ Of course I love Fred. I start immediately chuckling. Just like this (I said), ‘Jai, what's going on man?’ (Eugene said), ‘Coach, they came to the birthday party on Sunday… and you know my daddy just got out of jail and they got him a job, and they got my momma a house, and they said they were going to take care of my baby. I gotta go to LSU. I said, ‘Jai, you do. You gotta go to LSU.’ And he goes to LSU.”