LAWRENCE | Kansas wide- receivers coach David Beaty walked over to running back Jocques Crawford, who was slouched in his seat and counting down the minutes until he could disappear from his first media scrum as a Division I football player.</p><p>&#8220;Hey, cover boy,&#8221; Beaty said.</p><p>Beaty and Crawford shared a knowing laugh. On Tuesday afternoon at KU media day, Crawford couldn&#8217;t help but feel as if he were swimming in a fishbowl.</p><p>&#8220;I&#8217;m overwhelmed,&#8221; said Crawford, a junior-college transfer and native of Memphis, Tenn. &#8220;Just for the fact that I haven&#8217;t even played a D-I down yet. This is a lot. I just feel very blessed.&#8221;</p><p>Crawford, the 2007 national junior-college player of the year, is the most anticipated Kansas football recruit to step on campus for coach Mark Mangino. And the reasons are plentiful:</p><p>&#8226;He is the most highly regarded player in the incoming recruiting class &#8212; a four-star talent according to Rivals.com &#8212; the season after KU pushed its way onto the national scene, and there are simply more eyes on the program now.</p><p>&#8226;KU needs to replace 1,000-yard rusher Brandon McAnderson, and the timing of Crawford&#8217;s signing with the Jayhawks seems all too perfect.</p><p>&#8226;He comes with some well-publicized baggage, so people will be watching him. Before his senior year of high school, Crawford was charged with felony aggravated rape, and he pleaded down to misdemeanor simple assault. Interest waned from the colleges who were interested in Crawford, the No. 20 overall running back in the 2006 class.</p><p>Kansas has given Crawford a second chance. The program has also handed the 6-foot-1, 230-pound ball carrier the No. 3 jersey, worn by NFL cornerbacks Charles Gordon and Aqib Talib. So the Jayhawks certainly aren&#8217;t shielding the new guy from the spotlight.</p><p>&#8220;There are a lot of expectations,&#8221; Crawford said. &#8220;I&#8217;m just hoping to live up to them. I don&#8217;t want to let anybody down. I don&#8217;t want to let myself down.&#8221;</p><p>Crawford has the confidence to talk about playing in the NFL someday. But he also comes with the humility of having played two years at Cisco (Texas) Community College in a ranching town of 3,000 people. He has paid his dues.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s been very hard having to take the back door to D-I,&#8221; Crawford said. &#8220;I&#8217;m very anxious, but at the same time I have to be patient. I can&#8217;t try to rush into things and get out there and not know the plays and then get demoted again. It&#8217;ll just come with time.&#8221;</p><p>How much time is the question. Crawford is competing with junior Jake Sharp, who ran for 821 yards and seven touchdowns as a change-up back for McAnderson last year. As of Tuesday&#8217;s practice, the fourth of the fall, Crawford hadn&#8217;t worked with the first-team offense yet, according to Mangino. But you get the feeling it won&#8217;t be long.</p><p>&#8220;He&#8217;s got everybody&#8217;s attention,&#8221; center Ryan Cantrell said. &#8220;When he&#8217;s out running the ball, everybody on the sideline is sitting there watching him. He&#8217;s a completely raw talent. He&#8217;s naturally strong. He&#8217;s got great vision, great feet, he&#8217;s an all-round good player.&#8221;</p><p>Cantrell handicapped the running-back competition in a telling way: &#8220;Jake&#8217;s lightning fast, and Angus (Quigley) is a big bruiser, and Jocques is pretty much a combination of both of them.&#8221;</p><p>Since moving to Lawrence in early June, Crawford has undergone many adjustments. Off the field, he&#8217;s getting used to the classes, which he says are much more demanding than in junior college. He says that he likes living in Lawrence, which is somewhere in-between Cisco and Memphis in population and manageability.