Larry “Andre” Grier III has been good at almost everything he’s tried when it comes to sports.

Grier was a championship and all-star quarterback in the recreation leagues, an all-conference basketball player in middle school and a stellar outfielder in baseball. He continues to play all three sports at Ayden-Grifton High School, but it’s on the gridiron that Grier has achieved the status of major college prospect.

The 5-foot-10, 175-pound defensive back won’t be going far to make the transition from prospect to Football Bowl Subdivision athlete after making a verbal commitment to play for East Carolina on June 20. He chose the Pirates after receiving an offer June 15 and made the pledge during an official visit to campus June 18-20.

On the surface, it would appear ECU was the natural choice for Grier, who grew up in the shadow of ECU’s campus, a mere 10 miles away in Ayden, NC. He regularly attended Pirate football games growing up and his high school coach is an ECU grad and former student manager for the football team. And despite growing interest, the Pirates were Greer’s lone scholarship offer when he committed.

“He really didn’t have that much interest before this year,” said Ayden-Grifton coach Garrett Wingate, who worked with ECU’s football program from 2007 to 2013 under head coaches Skip Holtz and Ruffin McNeill. “But he went to some campus in February and March and put up some really good numbers. When that happened, I started getting on the phone and calling everybody and the interest started to show up.

“The ones that showed the most interest were Appalachian State, ECU and Old Dominion. But he went on the official visit (to ECU) and the next thing you know he’s a Pirate.”

Grier, who was primarily recruited by ex-ECU defensive back star and safeties coach Damon Magazu, was hosted by current Pirate defensive back Alex Moye on his official visit. Like Greer, Moye is almost a local product, hailing from nearby Farmville.

“We went to his house and talked about a lot of stuff,” Grier said. “And during the visit I really got to see East Carolina and all that it is outside of football. I really enjoyed that.”

The decision extends a football career that began when his father, Larry Grier Jr., enrolled him in a flag football program at age 6. Grier Jr. had been a wrestler and an All-Pitt County defensive back during his playing days at North Pitt High School. But the younger Grier wasn’t just exposed to football. He also played baseball and basketball, and was good at them all.

“I’ve always been good at football,” Grier said. “I was the best player on my (recreation) team. Quarterback was my main position. We made it the championship all the time and I always made the all-stars. I was pretty good at basketball and baseball, too. But I’ve loved football since I was six years old and it was always my dream to go pro and play college football.”

Grier entered high school as a quarterback at South Central High School in nearby Winterville but wound up not playing. He instead played baseball before transferring to Ayden-Grifton during the spring of his freshman year.

Wingate was Ayden-Grifton’s offensive coordinator when Grier arrived on campus. He would be promoted to head coach in the spring of 2025. But it was obvious from the start that Grier would be a great addition to the Chargers’ roster.

“We knew we had a good player,” Wingate said. “We just didn’t know how good until he kind of grew into himself.”

Grier appeared in nine games as a sophomore for Ayden-Grifton, producing 28 tackles and an interception. He followed that up with a breakout 2025 campaign for an 8-5 team that advanced to the state playoffs. Greer ranked second on the team with 75 tackles, made 3.5 tackles for loss and an interception. He contributed double-digit tackles in three games, highlighted by a 12-tackle performance against North Lenoir.

The 38-13 win against North Lenoir also produced one of the season highlights for Greer.

“In the North Lenoir game their kid was running outside,” Grier said. “He thought he was free. But I tracked him down, all the way to his side of the field and it was a really big hit. I knocked him into the sideline.”

“He was decleating people,” Wingate added.

It’s that physical style of play that is one of Grier’s best assets, according to Wingate.

“He has the speed (4.4 in the 40-yard dash),” Wingate said. “His speed is God-given. He’s as fast as he can be. He has explosiveness and he can jump through the gym. He has all those things that are God-given.

“But the one thing that we can’t coach them on is aggressiveness. If you have the ball and come downhill, he is going to hit you. I think that’s the thing that stood out most to coach Magazu. I think in this day and age where soft is kind of in, it’s rare to see a kid sacrifice and put his body on the line just to make a tackle and hit somebody out of nowhere. He will do that.”

Grier is still trying to figure out when exactly he’ll enroll at ECU. He’s a valuable outfielder for Ayden-Grifton’s baseball team and a guard on the basketball squad.

“I haven’t really thought about that yet because I really do want to play baseball,” Grier said. “I’m still figuring out what I want to do.”

Grier is part of a big June flurry of verbal commitments received by the Pirates. ECU landed 16 pledges during the month, including seven from in-state prospects. Entering July, the Pirates had 17 overall commitments.