CJ Baxter continues progressing, a positive development in a room Steve Sarkisian is excited about
Despite Quintrevion Wisner‘s selection to the preseason All-SEC first team on Friday, much of the focus on Texas’ running back room revolves around CJ Baxter‘s recovery from a training camp injury last year that sidelined him for the entire 2024 season.
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Texas head coach Steve Sarkisian was asked about Baxter on Tuesday at SEC Media Days.
“I think CJ is coming along,” Sarkisian said. “We had a nice visit two weeks ago about where he was at. There’s always going to be days when you’re coming off of a significant injury like his where he feels great and looks great. There’s other days where maybe he’s a little bit frustrated because he’s not quite where he wants to be yet. That’s okay.
“Like I told him, we’ve got a long season to play. The last thing I want to do is throw him out there when he’s not all the way to where I know he mentally can play at an extremely high level. He is exactly on track of where we would hope he would be right now. He’s doing everything we’re asking of him. Training camp, that’s the next phase when we get to that.”
Reports from Inside Texas’ Eric Nahlin paint a rosier picture than Sarkisian let on. Baxter’s recovery has been one of the top storylines of the summer for Texas. The former five-star is listed at 6-foot-1, 227 pounds and looks the part of a five-star back ahead of the 2025 campaign.
As Sarkisian mentioned, the Longhorns want to make sure Baxter’s recovery is done correctly. That might mean some limitations early in the year but with just over six weeks until kickoff, there’s a lot of time for Baxter to look more like the back that joined the company of Ricky Williams and Earl Campbell during his freshman season. In 2023, Baxter became the first true freshman running back to start in the first game of his Longhorns debut season since Texas’ second Heisman Trophy winner in Williams. Williams was the first to do it since Campbell.
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If there’s any sort of slow down or a road block, Sarkisian likes what he has in Chad Scott‘s room. After all, one of them in Wisner is a preseason first-team All-SEC selection and rushed for 1000 yards last year. The backs behind Wisner? Sarkisian is ready to see what they can do.
“Ideally, that’s a great complement with Tre and Cedric working together,” Sarkisian said. “I’ll be honest with you: I’m fired up about Jerrick Gibson and what he did as a true freshman for us last year. I’m fired up about Christian Clark, of how he’s come back. That room is solid for us. We feel good about the room. We’re probably going to need all those guys, and James Simon and Rickey Stewart too.”
Gibson rushed 78 times for 377 yards and four scores in 2024, notching 100 yards on 16 carries against Florida and rushing nine times for 35 yards against Clemson in the College Football Playoff. Clark missed the entire 2024 season with an Achilles injury suffered just days after Baxter’s. Simon was a top-200 prospect in the 2025 class according to On3, while Stewart was a four-star according to most major services.
The room has depth, and Wisner proved in 2024 he can be a reliable option in the SEC. But the ceiling of the room depends on Baxter’s recovery and ability to improve upon what was a solid freshman season behind Jonathon Brooks in 2023. Six weeks from kickoff, the returns on his recovery continue to be positive.
