Ever polite, friendly and outgoing — but immature to a fault — the Chargers young wide receiver spent his first four seasons in the NFL playing around and making a lot of silly mistakes off the field…and not working hard enough so that he could be consistently good on it.
Jackson, of course, has flashed brilliance ever since being drafted (wisely again by A.J. Smith) with a third-round pick in 2005 out of Northern Colorado. But for every time he would raise our hopes with a spectacular play, he would frustrate us with a lapse of concentration. For every smile and word of good will off the field, there would be a selfish lack of judgment.
When Jackson was stopped on suspicion of Driving Under the Influence back in January, I thought it was going to be the end of his Chargers career. Already on probation for the exact same offense, Jackson figured to become the latest victim of Smith’s sweeping attempt to rid his organization of troublesome talent.
Good thing last Sunday he was allowed to stay. Seemingly no longer wet behind the ears, Jackson has grown this season into a legitimate big-time player at wide receiver. And his two touchdowns against the New York Giants included the game-winner with 21 seconds remaining.
More from this suddenly reliable performer should follow as the Bolts now move into the second half of a season that — thanks to Sunday’s win in the final New York minute — will find the Chargers still realistically in contention.
It’s a spot they probably wouldn’t be in, frankly, had Jackson not grown up. Physically, of course, there has been no growing to do…at 6-foot-5 and 230-pounds with speed and power to burn, Vincent is a (Van)-go who has kept himself stuck in neutral throughout the early stages of his career.
Along with the partying and ill-advised driving excursions, Jackson has displayed a frustratingly untimely ability to come up just a bit short on the field when it seemed to count the most.
In the famous New England playoff game of ‘06 — Jackson’s second season — he was wide open for a touchdown catch but blew the easy seven points by irresponsibly landing his second foot on the chalk in the back of the end zone.
Over the past two seasons, though he put up good numbers, Jackson also lost concentration at times, dropping passes that cost first downs and sometimes even turned into Philip Rivers interceptions. When he did make plays, he still showed that he hadn’t fully come of age in the professional sense.
After the Bolts won at Tampa Bay late last season to keep their fading playoff hopes alive, Jackson returned to San Diego and threw a party late that Sunday evening at a local watering hole. The party wasn’t to celebrate the team’s success, but instead was to celebrate his own — being as he had reached the 1,000-yard mark in receiving earlier in the day.
Unimpressed, his teammates sent a loud message to the youngster by en-masse not showing up.
Non-pulsed, Jackson angered his mates again in the second-round playoff game at Pittsburgh when, after catching a touchdown pass for an early 7-0 lead, he gave the crowd a slash-the-throat sign. It was clear to everybody that, as good as he was, he still didn’t 100-percent get it.
A few weeks later, his name again in the news for the second DUI stop, Smith and the organization brought him in for a come-to-Jesus meeting. Either it was going to be time to grow up…or it was going to be time to move on.
The only place Jackson is going these days is to the Pro Bowl. The reason is not because he’s really any better than he was the last couple of years, it’s that he’s better a whole lot more often. In ‘08, Jackson went through a practically invisible three-game stretch in November (with only four catches total) that coincided with the Chargers falling almost hopelessly out of contention at 4-8.
This year, there have been no such letdowns. Jackson has a TD catch in all but two games…and apparently has discovered the level of commitment needed to be a force in the NFL week-in and week-out.
A tell-tale sign of his maturity came after the winning catch Sunday when a simple high-fiving celebration with his teammates was all that was needed to mark the big moment.
Jackson still laughs, goofs around, and is a good bet to trouble a teammate from time-to-time who’s doing a nearby locker-room interview. And he still likes to blast music from his portable, locker-room CD player on occasion (you should see the look on Rivers’ face a few stalls down).
But nowadays, business is business. At 26-years-of-age, Vincent Jackson has grown up like the rest of us — a guy who shows up each day, pulls on his work-boots, and goes about doing the job he is paid handsomely to do.
More mature and still physically gifted, he is capable of producing works of art every time he steps on the field.
– Ello –
