“There’s a time and place for everything,” Jayden Daniels said Friday as he faced the throng of media at the NFL scouting combine.
Daniels was responding to a question about knowing when to run and when to pass, but he easily could have been talking about his life up to this point. From San Bernardino, California, to Tempe, Arizona, and Arizona State. From Arizona State to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and LSU where he won the Heisman Trophy. Now to the NFL combine where he met with team officials but declined to work out, Daniels’ decision-making has been on point.
He is expected to be among the top three quarterbacks selected in next month’s NFL draft. On Friday, Daniels was asked to assess his greatest change over the last five years.
“I would just say my growth as a person, not even as a football player, just an overall human being,” he said. “From 18 all the way to finishing my last game at 22, you know, it’s been a long journey but just my growth as a person. That’s the biggest change.”
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Daniels began his college career at Arizona State, rejecting programs such as Alabama, Tennessee and Florida. His signing was considered a major coup for then-head coach Herm Edwards. Daniels was regarded as the No. 2 dual-threat high school quarterback in the country, the No. 4 recruit in California and ranked 44th overall in the 2019 ESPN 300.
I met Daniels in February 2020. He had just finished his freshman season as Arizona State’s starting quarterback and the season had been impressive: he completed 205 of 338 passes for 2,943 yards and 17 touchdowns through the air. He also ran for 355 yards and scored three rushing touchdowns.
We met at a Black Quarterback Summit sponsored by the Global Sports Institute. I moderated a panel discussion that included quarterback legends James Harris, Warren Moon, Doug Williams and Marlin Briscoe. The panel also included Dwayne Haskins, who at the time was with the Washington Commanders, and Daniels.
During the discussion I remember asking Daniels which NFL quarterback he watched and admired. I expected him to say Lamar Jackson of the Ravens. Daniels and Jackson were similar in stature and style of play and appeared to be on the same upward trajectory. Daniels started his first game for Arizona State in the fall of 2019, the same year that Jackson embarked on what would be his first NFL MVP season.
But to my surprise, Daniels cited Colin Kaepernick, the San Francisco 49ers quarterback to who led the 49ers to the Super Bowl after the 2012 season.
Daniels said that he was a 49ers fan growing up and that, as a young player, he was inspired by Kaepernick on the field, and later, by Kaepernick’s activism. Beginning in the 2016 season, Kaepernick began kneeling during the playing of the national anthem to protest police violence in the African American community as well as social and economic inequity.
“Growing up, I watched Kap at Nevada when he beat Boise State, and as I got older I started to understand more of what’s happening in the world,” Daniels said at the time. “I feel like he’s standing up for our rights and for minorities who are being taken advantage of. It’s something he stood for, and he got a lot of respect from me because he knew what was right and what was wrong.”
Daniels also had warm words for Edwards’ predominantly Black coaching staff. “I know they’ll have my back no matter what,” he said. “Most of the staff is Black, too, so just walking around the building, I see all these Black men and knowing that I can talk to them about anything — not only football, but problems in the world — is a great feeling.”
Two of the participants on that panel are no longer with us. Haskins tragically was killed in a highway accident in April 2022 at age 24. Briscoe died two months at later at 76.
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As Daniels rushed to his next media appointment during the combine on Friday, I asked him about Haskins, whom he had befriended. The two stayed in touch after the quarterback summit. Daniels said he was devastated when he learned of Haskins’ death. “He had so much life in front of him,” Daniels said. “That really hurt.”
While Daniels cited Kaepernick as his favorite player, it was actually Jackson who widened the door to acceptance for quarterbacks like Daniels whose athleticism was often held against them. Jackson was drafted at the bottom of the first round largely based on doubts about his ability to play quarterback in the NFL. There were suggestions floated that Jackson should switch positions.
He set the league on fire instead and has been doing it ever since. More importantly, he mostly put to rest the thinking that quarterbacks like Daniels are not NFL-ready. There are the inevitable comparisons with Jackson. They both have the same slender build. Both are elusive runners.
Today, Daniels enters an NFL where there will not be speculation about him changing positions as there was about Jackson. The new reality in the NFL is that a team cannot win big without a dynamic quarterback and Daniels is regarded by many as the most dynamic quarterback in the draft — and that includes Caleb Williams of the USC, the projected No. 1 pick.
Daniels played down the comparisons with Jackson, but acknowledged them.
“Lamar is a great player,” he said. “I don’t like to compare myself to anybody, but there are some similarities with [what I’m doing and] what he’s doing. Kudos to him. He’s the GOAT of this, running and throwing. I’m just following suit behind him.”
Ultimately, Daniels chose to leave Arizona State. After a disappointing 2021 season, he believed he needed to improve and needed to face stronger competition. The decision to attend ASU was an important step. So was the decision to leave.
Daniels committed to LSU in March 2022.
“When I transferred, I just wanted to go and have the opportunity to compete against the best,” he said. “The SEC has the best competition, the best football, so having that opportunity to be able to just go out there and get better each and every day.
“It was very important I mean just my journey overall to get to this point. I walked my journey. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. I wouldn’t trade how I got here, how long it took me, or anything like that.”
Daniels often refers to his journey. What’s more impressive are the decisions he has made along the way that thus far have earned him a Heisman Trophy and put him in position to be the top player chosen in the NFL draft.
There will be no celebrating just yet, however. There’s a time and a place for everything.