CALGARY – The details of the transgressions and the mistakes Willie Jefferson has made in his life are not difficult to find. Tap his name into the Google-machine and the stories – complete with the accompanying eye-popping headlines – jump out within a couple of clicks.
They include his days at Baylor University, where he was kicked off the team in 2010 after being arrested twice over a span of 11 days for marijuana possession. And again three years later as a member of the Houston Texans where he was one of three players cut for violating team rules – reportedly marijuana use – at a team hotel in Kansas City.
Here’s the thing about all that: the Winnipeg Blue Bombers dominant defensive end and finalist as the Canadian Football League’s Most Outstanding Defensive Player, which will be awarded Thursday night at the Scotiabank Saddledome, politely requests you not only read all those tales, but feel free to ask him anything about them as well.
“All that… it’s just life, man,” said Jefferson in a long chat with bluebombers.com this week. “You can say I’m one of those guys that has learned from my mistakes. I tell people now to live life, but to be smart about your decisions. Some people make mistakes but get second chances. I’m one of those who got second and third chances and was able to bounce back.
“I’m happy to be in the position I’m in right now and I’ll share my story with anybody that wants to listen.”
It should be said that in many aspects the story of the 2019 Blue Bombers – from front runners to third-place longshots, from suspensions to injuries, to starting three different quarterbacks, including one twice traded this season – and the tale of Jefferson’s life aren’t just similar, they are actually completely intertwined.
Every team has its share of scars. Every person has them, too. And when Bombers head coach Mike O’Shea said last week he wouldn’t change a thing about the 2019 season because all those failures, all those trials and tribulations have them here now in the 107th Grey Cup, it was a speech that truly resonated with Jefferson. You see, that’s also the life he’s lived not just over the last six-seven months with the Bombers, but in his 28 years on the planet.
“The people that know me, I tell them, ‘Go look back at my story,’” said Jefferson. “I want them to know the Willie Jefferson you see now – the husband, the father, the all-star – is not who I’ve been the whole time.”
“I haven’t been perfect. I’m not perfect. But I strive to be the best person I can be every day now. I’m trying to be the best person I can be outside of football. I want to be somebody that’s approachable, someone that you can feel comfortable enough with to walk up to and have a conversation with without feeling that I’m going to brush you off.
“But the man I am today compared to the man I was then… I’m just smarter now. I’ve learned to think about my decisions before just rushing to make them. I have a family to think about. I have a wife and a daughter that rely on me to take care of them.
“I have a big family with my family and my wife’s immediate family. We’re very close and there’s a lot of people looking at me to be a positive role model.”
It was back on January 31, 1991 – 67 days after the Bombers’ last Grey Cup victory, for what it’s worth – when Marion and Willie Jefferson, Jr. welcomed twin sons into this world. Willie the III, and Phillip, were born a minute apart – “I came first,” explains Willie with a grin – in Beaumont, Texas, 85 miles west of Houston in southeastern Texas. His father still works for the Port of Beaumont; his mother retired 10 years ago after two decades at Southwestern Bell.
The Jeffersons have a large family and it includes three boys – Gary, who is the manager of a casino-hotel in Cincinnati, Willie III and Phillip, who is a personal trainer, middle-school football coach and teacher.
The twin boys were exceptional athletes and the Jefferson parents were loving in their support, never missing a game as the boys opted to go to different high schools – Willie to Clifton J. Ozen High School, and Phillip to rival Central Medical Magnet High School.
“It was just something where my mom and dad didn’t want us to be stuck in a box… Willie and Phillip, Phillip and Willie,” said Jefferson of the decision to attend different schools. “They wanted each of us to be our own person. It helped. It allowed him to be in his environment and me in mine and grow as people. It was a good move.
“But he’s always my brother. Wherever he goes, I’ll always be with him and wherever I go, he’s with me. When he was at Central I would go and support him. Same with me at my school. When we played against each other it was like the whole city new about it. My brother was a star athlete at his high school and I was a star athlete at my high school. My mom and dad, they always wore those shirts that were half for my school and half for his school. I don’t remember a game I played in where at least one of them wasn’t there.”
“Back in high school my brother was faster than me, but I was always taller and stronger,” Jefferson added. “But when we did play together we were unstoppable. My brother and I knew each other’s moves. One thing about siblings… when you play with each other you play so much better together. But when you play against each other, y’all go at each other’s neck. That’s exactly how me and brother were because we were so competitive.”
Jefferson drew attention from university basketball coaches when he first started high school, but as he got bigger and stronger he switched to football, as a receiver, before being named a Texas 4A All-State Second-Team All Star as a senior. Interest then grew from a number of universities, including Texas, LSU, Arizona State, Houston, Purdue and Baylor. He settled on Baylor and after a year at receiver there – and the trouble he got into – Jefferson moved to Stephen F. Austin, switched to defensive end, and was the 2011 Southland Conference Newcomer of the Year as a junior after leading the conference with 16 sacks.
He wasn’t drafted, but got his first crack at the National Football League in 2013 with the Houston Texans before trouble found him again. Released by the Texans seven weeks into his pro career and following a look-see by the Buffalo Bills, he began to think about a career north of the 49th parallel in Canada, making inquiries with Josh Bell, the current defensive back coach with the Calgary Stampeders and a Baylor product he first met as a freshman.
He spent 2014-15 with the Edmonton Eskimos, winning a Grey Cup in 2015 at IG Field and then had his second crack at the NFL with the Washington Redskins in 2016. But Washington’s depth chart was stacked at Jefferson’s position then, with Pro Bowler Ryan Kerrigan, Trent Murphy and Preston Smith.
Following his release by Washington, Jefferson rejoined head coach Chris Jones – the former Eskimos coach who had let his freakish-athlete skills shine in his defence – with the Saskatchewan Roughriders with six games remaining in 2016. It was a wise move, as Jefferson was a CFL All-Star in both 2017 and 2018 and was the Riders’ Most Outstanding Player and Most Outstanding Defensive Player last season.
Jones then left for the Cleveland Browns this offseason and with the Riders then pursuing Bo Levi Mitchell in free agency and Jefferson feeling he was low-balled in their contract offer, he looked east to the Bombers, signing with Winnipeg in one of the many splashy additions across the CFL this past winter.
It’s been a good fit with the Bombers, too. The organization knew they were getting a defensive game-changer when Jefferson arrived and the reports from Edmonton and Saskatchewan were all positive. What surprised many right from the first few days of training camp was the pure joy he brought to work every day and his unselfishness as a player. He embraced his new home, too, quickly endearing himself to fans with his play on the field and engaging personality off it.
He served up his ‘How ’bout that smoke? C’mon down to Winnipeg!’ quote when TSN cameras caught him on the sidelines near the end of a win in Ottawa in July – it wasn’t long after that expression was on T-shirts in the Bomber Store – and the more plays he made, the more his No. 5 jersey began appearing in the stands.
Settled into Winnipeg, his comfort level seemed to grow exponentially when his wife Holly and 19-month-old daughter Kelley joined him in the summer. Jefferson first met Holly at a party during his days at Baylor – “We locked eyes and just connected from there” – with the two reconnecting in Winnipeg in 2015 when he invited her north for the Grey Cup. The two will celebrate their second anniversary in May.
“Being a husband and a father, it changes you,” said Jefferson. “It’s really slowed me down and made me think about every decision. And my daughter… she’s amazing. Every day I can’t wait to get home to see the two of them.”
Should he be fortunate enough to have his name heard when the Most Outstanding Defensive Player Award is announced tonight, Jefferson has a long list of people he would like to thank for their role in his success. In no particular order, he listed God, his wife, his friends, “the city of Beaumont for its loyalty through my ups and downs.” There are his parents, of course, as “we were blessed growing up having the things we had and we didn’t have to want for anything.”
He said he also hoped to mention the Eskimos and the Riders, Coach Jones, Baylor and Stephen F. Austin, and of course, the Bombers and the CFL. Opportunity can mean everything, after all, especially when a player is trying to shed baggage and find a place that will give him a fresh start.
“This is an amazing organization and an amazing league,” said Jefferson. “The CFL has allowed players like me to be ourselves. That means a lot to me.”
There’s also this: as Jefferson looks back at the life he’s lived, he’s thankful for his journey and everything that’s happened – all the good and the bad – along the way.
It’s been perfect because it has him here in Calgary. And it’s perfect because his story so closely parallels that of his team.
“You know, not everybody has an easy road in life,” he said, pausing for a moment to find the right words. “Some people say the road less travelled is the best road. And I can definitely say that.”
