PHILADELPHIA — Nobody Saw it Coming could be the book title about Michael Vick’s NFL career. It would work for DeSean Jackson, too.
At the height of Vick’s career, he spent 18 months in a federal prison and missed two full seasons following a guilty plea for running a dogfighting operation in his home state of Virginia.
At the height of Jackson’s career, he was kicked to the curb by former Eagles coach Chip Kelly over concerns that he was involved with gang members in his native Southern California.
Now, both in retirement from the game they played with such astonishing speed and grace, Vick and Jackson are surprising us again.
The two former Eagles teammates that formed an explosive connection in 2010 sat next to each other Tuesday as first-year college head football coaches promoting an Oct. 30 game between their respective teams at Lincoln Financial Field.
Vick, 45, left his job as a FOX analyst to take over Norfolk State and Jackson, 38, accepted a job at Delaware State. The two men want to turn around struggling programs, but they also plan to positively influence the lives of the young men they coach at the two HBCU schools.
“Every day I’m excited to wake up and put my feet on the floor and go see what the challenge of the day brings,” Jackson said. “The past few years have been a struggle for the Hornets, but since I came in I had to address the culture and I had to put the right kind of guys in here.”
The notion of Jackson, known for fitting into the high maintenance stereotype of many NFL receivers, building team culture might seem unlikely, but he sure sounds sincere about his mission.
“For me, it’s all about discipline and it’s all about mindset,” Jackson said. “Everybody is not going to be fortunate enough to make it to the NFL, so I want to be able to say I helped guys walk across that stage with a diploma and degree. That’s what I want to instill in them. That paper holds a lot more weight than anything you can do on the football field.”
Vick said coaching was always in his plans even when he was playing. He was simply waiting for the right time. That’s very believable because players, especially when he was with the Eagles, gravitated toward him.
“Football is in our blood,” Vick said. “Mentorship is in our blood. Leadership and creating men of character. That was all we were taught from the age of seven up until now. We had coaches that poured into us ... and now we have an opportunity to reciprocate that.”
A blueprint of sorts was presented for Vick and Jackson when Deion Sanders became the head coach at Jackson State, another HBCU school, five years ago.
“Without Deion’s success, our success wouldn’t have been presented to us,” Jackson said. “When I had the opportunity to be in this seat, I reached out to him because I never thought I would be a coach. I’m just going to be real. All those years I played, I saw how much time the coaches spent in the building after practice and with meetings, so that was fearful for me. I said when I’m done with football I don’t want to be nowhere near the building that long.”
Jackson said he also reached out to former Eagles coach Andy Reid as did Vick. Reid played a huge role in their lives. and it makes sense that they turned to him for advice before they started their latest football journey.
After often whiffing in his bid to draft a star receiver early in his career with the Eagles, Reid hit a home run with Jackson, a deep threat unlike any other in franchise history. His 22.5 yards per catch in 2010 remain the most by any Eagles player to ever have a 1,000-yard receiving season.
Vick, of course, got his second chance in the NFL because of Reid.
His fall from grace was one of the most infamous in professional sports history. He needed a sponsor after his prison sentence ended in the summer of 2009. Reid, after lobbying owner Jeffrey Lurie and former team president Joe Banner, went to bat for Vick.
The coach was rewarded in Vick’s second season. In just 12 games, the quarterback threw for 3,018 yards and a career-high 21 touchdowns en route to becoming the comeback player of the year as the Eagles won their sixth and final NFC East title under Reid.
Reid’s words of wisdom to the two newest members of his head-coaching tree were the same.
“I’m very proud of both of them,” the Kansas City coach told NJ Advance Media via a text message. “They need to just be themselves. Just think of how much they can teach their players about being men on and off the field. Those kids are lucky to have them as their head coaches.”
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Bob Brookover can be reached atrbrookover@njadvancemedia.com
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