Greg Auman
NFC South Reporter
INDIANAPOLIS — Jared Verse admits he really shouldn’t be here.
Go back five years, and he’s an undersized 215-pound defensive end, taking his only scholarship offer — from the University of Albany, where he’d redshirt his first year and play just four games his sophomore spring due to COVID-19.
Now, Verse might be the first defensive player taken in this year’s NFL Draft.
“At the end of the day, I was never supposed to be in this position,” he said, talking to reporters at the combine. “I wasn’t supposed to be at Florida State, was never supposed to be standing here in front of you today. If you asked anybody in high school, I’m not supposed to be here.”
After two years at FSU, this second Verse is decidedly not the same as the first. He is now 6-foot-4, 250 pounds, with nine sacks in each of his two seasons with the Seminoles, a potential top-10 pick who enters the draft with a growing confidence.
“Albany helped me flourish, helped me grow, and going to Florida State is something that changed my life for the better,” Verse said. “Being in this position today, this is something I’ve dreamed of. I just have to stay focused.”
At Central Columbia High in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, Verse was tall and skinny, with more catches (15) as a tight end than tackles (14) as a senior. He played basketball, was athletic enough to run on a state champion 4×400-meter relay team. Verse said he “wasn’t a monstrous force” on the football field, but his coach, Scott Dennis, remembers a young player just finding himself and showing the promise of greatness.
“He was very special, ran like a stallion, worked hard, excessively hard,” Dennis said. “The thing that stuck out most for me about Jared, what I was most impressed with, was I’ve never had a player that refused to lose on any play. Every single snap, he’s 100 percent. I’ve never seen him take a play off. And for us, if he got beat on a play, look out…
Source link : https://www.foxsports.com/stories/nfl/florida-state-de-jared-verse-takes-unheralded-path-to-top-tier-of-nfl-draft
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Publish date : 2024-02-28 20:11:36
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