Yahoo Sports Saying he's 'growing,' Jalen Ramsey won't critique opposing quarterbacks
Jalen Ramsey wasn’t taking the bait this time. Almost a year after making headlines with his scathing critiques of some NFL quarterbacks, the Jacksonville Jaguars cornerback wasn’t going down that path again in a recent interview.
‘I’m not going to do this again’
Ramsey and Jaguars coach Doug Marrone were guests on “The Adam Schefter Podcast” with the ESPN NFL personality, and Schefter jokingly asked Ramsey to give a breakdown of the QBs his team will face this season.
“You want to do this again, huh?,” Ramsey said. “I'm not going to do this again but, we do play some good quarterbacks this year, of course, but probably the quarterback I'm most excited for is Nick Foles. I don't have to play against him, of course; he is my teammate.
“He is a great teammate, the few interactions we've had has been great. Great man, great player as well. He has nothing to prove to anybody. He's a Super Bowl champion, Super Bowl MVP. So, I hope he comes out here and he plays free and knows he has the support of everybody.”
In 2018, Ramsey called Buffalo Bills then-rookie Josh Allen “trash” and said then-Baltimore Ravens starter Joe Flacco “sucks,” but he didn’t take aim at Foles, though Jacksonville didn’t play the Philadelphia Eagles last year.
‘I’m growing, man’
Schefter noted that Ramsey, now 24 years old, showed maturity.
“I'm growing man, it's year four for me,” Ramsey said. “It's a different me. A lot of people think they know me, they don't really know me. But hey, that's OK.”
Ramsey might not be taking aim at quarterbacks in interviews — not for nothing, but there’s a good chance Jaguars football czar Tom Coughlin laid into him last year for his comments — but that doesn’t mean he’s holding back. In an Instagram Live chat with teammate Leonard Fournette earlier this month, Ramsey said he won’t be giving Jacksonville a hometown discount if he gets a contract extension with the team.
One of the best young corners in the game, Ramsey is known for talking trash and speaking his mind. He’s accepted that he can’t make everyone happy.
“They can form opinions on how this year goes or whatever on the field. But I am human just like them, everybody's human,” he said. “I think [Golden State Warriors center] DeMarcus Cousins recently said it in an interview, we're looked at a bunch of times as superstar athletes and that's how we are looked at but at the same time we're also humans. That goes for myself and my teammates.
“Yeah, this is our profession, this is our job, we’re going to go out there and give it our all. If we don't do good, or if we do good, we know we'll be criticized or praised. At the end of the day, we're all humans. I'm a dad, I get spit up on just like all the other dads out here, change diapers, it's not different, it's not special for me.”
Ramsey’s daughter, Breelyn, is coming up on her first birthday.
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