INDIANAPOLIS — Jared Verse admits he really shouldn’t be here.
Go back five years, and he’s an undersized 215-pound defensive end, taking his only scholarship offer — from the University of Albany, where he’d redshirt his first year and play just four games his sophomore spring due to COVID-19.
Now, Verse might be the first defensive player taken in this year’s NFL Draft.
“At the end of the day, I was never supposed to be in this position,” he said, talking to reporters at the combine. “I wasn’t supposed to be at Florida State, was never supposed to be standing here in front of you today. If you asked anybody in high school, I’m not supposed to be here.”
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After two years at FSU, this second Verse is decidedly not the same as the first. He is now 6-foot-4, 250 pounds, with nine sacks in each of his two seasons with the Seminoles, a potential top-10 pick who enters the draft with a growing confidence.
“Albany helped me flourish, helped me grow, and going to Florida State is something that changed my life for the better,” Verse said. “Being in this position today, this is something I’ve dreamed of. I just have to stay focused.”
At Central Columbia High in Bloomsburg, Pennsylvania, Verse was tall and skinny, with more catches (15) as a tight end than tackles (14) as a senior. He played basketball, was athletic enough to run on a state champion 4×400-meter relay team. Verse said he “wasn’t a monstrous force” on the football field, but his coach, Scott Dennis, remembers a young player just finding himself and showing the promise of greatness.
“He was very special, ran like a stallion, worked hard, excessively hard,” Dennis said. “The thing that stuck out most for me about Jared, what I was most impressed with, was I’ve never had a player that refused to lose on any play. Every single snap, he’s 100 percent. I’ve never seen him take a play off. And for us, if he got beat on a play, look out for the next play, because he’s coming after you harder.”
Dennis tried to sell college recruiters on Verse being a fairly raw prospect, still learning the game and growing into his body, citing his motor and passion as qualities that wouldn’t change.
“Anything Jared’s ever gotten is because of his hard work,” said Dennis, noting that Verse’s younger sister, Miyah, was a prep All-American in basketball and is now a freshman at Georgia.
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Verse redshirted his first year at Albany, then saw his second season bumped to spring 2021 by COVID, giving him a year and half away from football to focus on getting bigger and stronger. He made a splash that first spring, getting four sacks in four games to earn conference Defensive Rookie of the Year honors, then had 9.5 sacks as a sophomore that fall.
He transferred to FSU and took his game to another level — 18 sacks in two years, earning All-America honors and high praise from Seminoles defensive coordinator Adam Fuller.
“He’s always been somebody who had good speed and power, but the more refined he got in his technique, physical development, Jared’s always been a very self-driven person,” Fuller said. “When he feels the need to improve, he can drastically do that as fast as anybody I’ve been around, because he’s intelligent and driven. Whether it was his footwork or his stance or get-off or leadership with teammates, whatever it was, he’s as good as I know in you giving him something and him applying it extremely quickly.”
Verse was one of several FSU players who opted out of the team’s bowl game after the undefeated Seminoles were left out of the College Football Playoff. Already without their starting quarterback due to injury, FSU lost 63-3 to Georgia in the Orange Bowl, and Verse expressed some regret Tuesday that he might have done things differently in retrospect.
“It was hard,” Verse said of watching the game. “I definitely, looking back on it, wish I had put myself in a different position, maybe went out there and had some of the other guys come out there with me. I feel like it would have been a different football game. But at the end of the day, that’s all ifs. I chose not to play in that game. I have to stand by my decision. Those guys went out and played with what they had. They did everything they could. It was definitely upsetting to watch them have to go through that.”
The transition from small-school football to the ACC was a challenge, but Verse thrived in the details of improvement, small things he’d never realized, from hand placement to observing opponent tendencies. He could have left for the draft a year ago, but he wanted more development against tougher competition, knowing it would better prepare him for the NFL.
Much of the focus at the top of this draft is on the offensive side — quarterbacks, receivers, tackles — so Verse could easily be not only the first pass-rusher but the first defensive player taken, perhaps at No. 8 to the Falcons. He helped take the Seminoles to an undefeated regular season, and his hope now is to do the same at the sport’s highest level.
“It would mean the world, to be that special piece that brings a team all the way together, to the playoffs and obviously everybody wants to win a Super Bowl,” he said. “Right now, my focus is to be the best me, to give everything I have to hopefully be that piece.”
Greg Auman is FOX Sports’ NFC South reporter, covering the Buccaneers, Falcons, Panthers and Saints. He is in his 10th season covering the Bucs and the NFL full-time, having spent time at the Tampa Bay Times and The Athletic. You can follow him on Twitter at @gregauman.
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