It’s hard to look back at Justin Jefferson‘s second season and not think of the Los Angeles Chargers game. The Minnesota Vikings were coming off a loss to Cooper Rush on Sunday Night Football, and they had just blown a 14-point lead to the Baltimore Ravens on the road. Jefferson only had 21 yards against Dallas and 69 in Baltimore.
Not only would Jalen Ramsey be lining up opposite Jefferson in LA, but Keenan Allen was standing on the other sideline. Like many of us, Jefferson believes Ramsey is the best corner in football. He’s friends with Allen and has tried to emulate his game.
Early in the second quarter, the Vikings are facing third-and-15 with the game tied 3-3. Jefferson lines up wide to the left, with Ramsey bearing down on him. Jefferson blows past Ramsey, gets off his break quickly, and Ramsey gets caught holding him. No matter. Jefferson reels in an 18-yard pass from Kirk Cousins near the sideline and flips the ball to Allen.
“Okay, this kid’s got confidence oozing out of every pore in his body,” exclaims the Fox announcer after the play.
Jefferson has oozed confidence ever since Mike Zimmer finally let him loose in Week 3 of his rookie season. He recorded 175 yards in a 31-30 loss to the Tennessee Titans and set off a chain reaction with his Griddy dance in the end zone. Jefferson’s confidence comes from his sweat equity. The time he spends on the practice field and in the film room. Even when he says something somewhat egotistical, he delivers it modestly.
“I honestly think I am one of the tops,” Jefferson told Kevin Clark of The Ringer when he asked Jefferson where he ranks among the NFL’s top 10 receivers on a recent podcast.
“It’s kinda hard to just put me at the top, especially with all the things the other players have been doing before I even got into the league. Definitely, I feel like I’m one of the tops, especially after this season coming up, I feel like I’m gonna be the No. 1 receiver.”
That’s such a reasonable way to say, Yeah, there are a lot of great receivers in the league, but I’m gonna be better than all of them next year. And here’s the thing: He might end up being right. He’d later acknowledge that greatness is in the eye of the beholder, but it’s hard for anyone to watch Jefferson play and not see a game-breaker.
It’s fun for us to watch on television or in the stands, but imagine being an opposing corner. As The Athletic’s Robert Mays breaks down eloquently, Jefferson hoodwinks his opponents with subtle movements.
“I think that’s what makes it so difficult for guys to get a bead on him,” Patrick Peterson told Mays. “Because his body can lie to you.”
Jefferson may be the jet, but Peterson operates at cruising altitude. The Hall of Fame corner, who spent 10 years with the Arizona Cardinals before signing with the Vikings last year, doesn’t exaggerate much. Peterson, 31, is a team leader who says it as he sees it, and he can’t stop talking about Jefferson.
“He has route-running skills like Keenan Allen,” Peterson told Mays. “If you watch the two, they’re very, very similar. They’re able to sell certain things where they can be long one way and then come back the other way. They’re definitely using (their length) to their advantage.”
Jefferson is a fan of Allen’s, but he says he takes something from a lot of different receivers. However, his Big Four are Allen, Odell Beckham Jr., Davante Adams, and Randy Moss.
“Those four was really mixed into my game,” Jefferson told The Ringer NFL Show. “Really just getting different picks of everybody.
“I really didn’t focus on a few different players. I’m picking stuff from everybody. I’m a person who likes to learn, likes to find ways to better myself, better my game. If I like a move that I seen a little kid do that I feel like I’d be better at doing, it’s a good move for me, I’m gonna add it to my game.”
Jefferson got to see each receiver on his Mount Rushmore live last year.
Beckham was on the Cleveland Browns when Kevin Stefanski’s crew beat the Vikings in Week 4. Later, when Beckham wanted out of Northeast Ohio, he supported his fellow LSU alum by wearing a “Free Odell” T-shirt.
Jefferson got to see Adams twice a year before the Packers traded him to the Las Vegas Raiders. He and came to appreciate Adams’ game.
“Davante is just his ability to get off the line of scrimmage,” Jefferson told The Ringer. “His ability to make everything look the same and be twitchy and still make it look different somehow.
“[Adams’] route running is crazy. His ability to catch the ball and know no matter where it’s put, his catch frame is very, very wide. I loved him as a player, always watched him, and grew up on him, watching different film and stuff on him. I definitely watched him a lot.”
Moss broke the news to Jefferson that he would be heading to the Pro Bowl before the Monday Night Football game in Chicago. Jefferson was wearing a Moss Pro Bowl jersey at the time. He broke Moss’ franchise record for receiving yards as a rookie and came 16 yards short of the SuperFreak’s record last year.
And then he had that little flip to Allen in the Chargers game.
Jefferson doesn’t just study receivers, though. He locks in on opposing corners, especially shutdown guys Ramsey.
“I mean Jalen Ramsey, of course, is the top cornerback,” told The Ringer. “His ability to be long and to be fast and to be aggressive, I mean, that’s the three things that [makes it] so difficult to get by him.
“He’s also a smart player. He knows when some things are coming, or when the in-breaking or out-breaking routes are coming. So yeah, it’s definitely difficult to go against him. How long or how tall he is.”
Still, he says he won the matchup – in his patented way.
“I mean, it’s kinda hard to say I didn’t win it,” he told The Ringer. “I still finished the game with 100-plus yards.
There’s always ifs, ands, and buts about it. If I would have gotten the ball on that play…in the end zone, people would have looked at it different. It’s all about the plays that are left on the field, opportunities that are up for me to get.
Sometimes they’re there, sometimes they’re not. At the end of the day, it’s all about what people see on the TV. Us as coaches, us as players, we watch the film, we see the whole bird-eye. We see everything on the field. TV only sees where the ball is going.
It is what it is. I felt I did a good job going against him for my first time. He’s been in the league plenty of years, it was my second. I felt I did a good job.
Zimmer famously ended his Vikings career on his own terms, stubbornly playing his starters in a meaningless Week 18 game against the Chicago Bears. “I don’t care about records,” he said after the game when asked about Jefferson coming up 16 yards short. “I care about wins.”
Fortunately, the Vikings hired Kevin O’Connell, an offensive coach from the Sean McVay tree. He coached Beckham last year. Cooper Kupp became one of the league’s best receivers in the Los Angeles Rams’ offense. Now, he’s looking to unleash Jefferson to his fullest potential.
“I mean, pretty much where Cooper Kupp was, that’s where I’m at,” Jefferson told The Ringer.
But my ability to move in different positions is gonna be more. I’m able to go outside – you don’t really see Cooper Kupp lining up outside as many times as I would. Or me lining up in the backfield, or me lining up in different positions to get the ball.
We all know there’s gonna be some cloud coverage, some double-team coverage, so coach KO just putting me in different positions to get the ball. If it’s just a screen, if it’s a quick throw. Just trying to get that momentum going throughout the game.
We all love the offense so far. We all are killing it. We’re all just seeming to pick it up as easy, so just can’t wait to see until the season starts.
Again, a very Jefferson answer. Notice how he subtly says that he’s capable of doing more than Kupp, without directly insulting LA’s superstar receiver. Jefferson knows O’Connell is going to enable him, and he’s ready to take off.
Jefferson never over-extends himself. He’s got the IQ to pick up the best qualities in his contemporaries and outsmart opposing corners. But he also has the EQ to avoid being a diva. Flipping the ball to Allen was a perfect microcosm of the Jefferson experience. He just beat the best corner in football on third-and-long and wanted to let one of the best receivers in the league know it. He said a lot without saying much at all.
