During the 2021 season, the Jacksonville Jaguars didn’t give fans a lot to smile about as the Urban Meyer era went terribly. It was so bad to the point that the first-year head coach was fired before the season could end in December as the team didn’t look much better than the group from 2020 that won only one game.
To make matters worse, the 2021 rookie class was mismanaged, and even Trevor Lawrence, who started in every game, had an uneventful rookie campaign. Of course, some of that was due to the struggles that come with the game for a rookie quarterback, but he also wasn’t given a lot to work with.
However, there was one rookie from the class who flashed a bit more than Lawrence — and that was second-round cornerback Tyson Campbell. The young rookie from the University of Georgia was thrust into a starting role after the Jags traded C.J. Henderson to Carolina before the trade deadline, and he ultimately registered 14 starts in the process.
Like Lawrence, there were some growing pains for Campbell when he first saw the field, but after the bye week, he turned it up a notch. It was then that he registered five performances with grades higher than 70.9 according to Pro Football Focus and even snagged his first two career picks.
Campbell’s improvement led to teams also respecting him more and resulted in him garnering a high ranking in one key category for rookie corners. That key category was forced incompletions, where he ranked second with 11. That only ranked him below Patrick Surtain II and Eric Stokes, who were tied with 13 and tied him with Asante Samuel Jr.
The 2021 CB class has a BRIGHT future ⭐️ pic.twitter.com/wpf0MFiYNa
— PFF (@PFF) February 20, 2022
Campbell will be an exciting player to watch this upcoming season with new defensive coordinator Mike Caldwell working with him. Caldwell will be coming from a Tampa Bay Bucs organization that had one of the better young secondaries in the NFL, so taking another step shouldn’t be hard for the former UGA Bulldog to achieve.
Additionally, Campbell will have a positions coach in former Pittsburgh Steelers cornerback Deshea Townsend, who was coached by the legendary Dick Lebeau and has undoubtedly learned some things.
The Jags put themselves in a tough predicament when they traded former cornerback Jalen Ramsey, who is now viewed as the league’s top shutdown corner by many. And while Campbell will have an extremely difficult time matching his level of play, at least he’s a player fans can look at as a potential long-term option for the defense, but he must continue to make strides as he did in his rookie campaign.
