Detroit Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn is proud of his prized rookie, cornerback Jerry Jacobs. The undrafted free agent has proven himself a worthy starter at outside corner and continues to play well the more he plays. But Glenn doesn’t want Jacobs to get too full of himself.
Glenn won’t let that happen, and he said so in his weekly press conference.
“First off, that’s you guys (the media) giving him all this praise. Now, he’s thinking he’s the next Deion Sanders. The thing that we have to do is make sure we just keep that down and allow him to grow,” Glenn said.
Glenn did bring up one play from Sunday’s win over Minnesota to remind Jacobs of where he can grow. In the third quarter of the Week 13 win, Jacobs got beat by Vikings star wide receiver Justin Jefferson for a long gain. Jacobs failed to recognize the ball was in the air, and Glenn used it as a teaching experience.
“The receiver is going to tell you the story,” Glenn said Thursday. “And if you look at the receiver, the receiver’s turning back, knew the ball was underthrown. So, at that point he (Jacobs) needs to turn back and look for the ball. He was so afraid of getting a PI (penalty) because that’s what this league does to defensive backs. Makes them afraid to make plays because he’s been hit on that before. I tell those guys, listen, you better always be aggressive, always stay aggressive. He understands that.”
Glenn also talked about how the Lions found Jacobs and what appealed to the team,
“You’ve got to give credit to our scouting department of bringing a guy like that in,” Glenn stated. “That was a guy that we looked at together as a player that we wanted. I mean, you never know. I mean, we all know, I don’t care if it’s a first-round pick to a seventh-round pick to a free agent, you never what you’re going to get until you get the guy in. We knew that we had something. We didn’t know he was going to be who he is right now, but again, there is a long way for that player to go. So, you’ve got to be excited to have a player like that, that’s playing as well as he is. He’s still young and he has a lot more to learn. We’re excited about that player.”
