Nick Piccone
DeSean Jackson was one of many Chip Kelly cast-offs that many Eagles fans would’ve loved to share this Super Bowl win with. Jackson has a lot of friends on this Eagles team and was no doubt pulling for them to win the Super Bowl last weekend.
He said as much during an appearance on FS1’s Undisputed on Friday morning. Yeah, yeah, Skip Bayless jokes. Anyway, Jackson is a guy whose feelings towards this game and his former team I’d still like to know, given how his exit from the Eagles played out. Being a blind Chip follower who thought he would reinvent offense in the NFL, I actually made myself like all of his moves.
But it was clear those moves set the franchise back, setting up Howie Roseman for a historic rebuild in record time. Jackson talked about the Eagles’ Super Bowl win, his thoughts on Kelly and more.
“I was excited for them, honestly. It was a long time coming. 1960 since they won the Super Bowl, or championship, we ain’t even gonna say it was a Super Bowl because back then it wasn’t the Super Bowl. I was rooting or them. When I was there, a lot of guys came in like Fletcher Cox and Brandon Graham, so I was definitely happy for them. I wanted to see somebody else win it besides the Patriots. We all know they, you know Tom Brady is the greatest of all time in my eyes, so I was ready for someone else to win that. I was happy for them dudes.”
Bayless quickly moved the conversation to how things in Philly ended for Jackson after Chip Kelly released him and a few stories popped up about his “gang ties.” Jackson didn’t seem to pull any punches talking about his former coach, much like other NFLers haven’t.
“I think everyone close to me knows how I feel about Chip Kelly. I don’t respect the way he did things. As a person, I don’t really like him, but he had to do what he had to do. That was his job. Moving forward in my life and my career, I just have a bad taste in my mouth towards him. I like what he did on the field as far as in 2013 his style of play and how he had us moving around, running fast and all that. Once the end of the season came and the way he did things, I don’t feel that as a man he was real with me. He didn’t tell me like, this is what it was or this is what we’re going to do moving forward. You know, it was just, I looked up and I was cut.”
On the gang ties story:
“When you’re figuring out a way to get rid of one of your best deep threats on the team, I mean, you have to kind of make up a story. It can’t just be we’re releasing our best receiver for no reason. I felt like them digging a story up, I mean the story happened four years ago, and it was a close friend I grew up with had some issues. But, you know, it’s a guy that I grew up with that had an issue. I’m not supposed to turn my back on him. You know, he ended up beating the case and everything. So it was just a lot of nonsense thrown around. I’ve never been in trouble, never been a felon, so all the stuff you’re making up, I mean, the way I grew up, you’re gonna fault me for the way I grew up?”
You can watch the entire segment below.
You can follow Nick Piccone on Twitter (@nickpiccone) and e-mail him at [email protected]. Subscribe to The Straight Shooters Podcast (@ShootersRadio) on iTunes here and listen every Friday afternoon at 2:00 P.M. on Wildfire Radio. Click here to read his pro wrestling articles on PhillyVoice.
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