Auburn DL Jayson Jones gives praise to freshman Keldric Faulk: 'He's doing an amazing job right now'
Auburn DL Jayson Jones has been around college football for quite some time now.
Jones, who began his career at Oregon, is entering his fourth season of college ball and will headline a strong group of leaders on Hugh Freeze's team this fall.
He was one of the more vocal guys during the spring according to Freeze, and now he's taking the charge during the offseason and summer workouts.
Zac Blackerby of the Locked On Auburn podcast brought Jones onto the show to talk about how the new players on the defensive line are performing thus far.
What is a player like Jones preaching to them?
"We have a lot of new guys, but whether that's transfers or whether that's freshmen, and I think the number one thing that we want to see is effort," Jones said. "It’s going to be hard. Like you're coming to a new environment, new conditioning program and everything like that, it's just, we want you to show effort. If you're not doing it right, Okay. You might not do it right. We'll coach you up on that, but we can't coach effort. We just want you to give effort."
Thankfully the Tigers' class isn't void of experience either, as about half of Auburn's defensive line commits come through the portal with decent college experience of their own.
Jones was straightforward in how he believes the mentality of the group should be.
"Don't complain, don't whine, because that's not attractive. That makes your teammates start turning on you, for real," Jones said. "Embrace it, we're getting better today and football is not easy. You're not always going to have the most fun. Losing's hard. Getting beat is hard, but how are you going to deal with it later on."
Blackerby asked Jones of the newcomers which ones are standing out the most.
Four-star Darron Reed and Keldric Faulk, Auburn's highest-rated recruit of the 2023 class, were his answers.
"I know Darren Reed's doing a good job of adapting, but I think the biggest one for me, I know he came in and came in January, but it's Keldric Faulk and I feel like he's came on a lot," Jones said. "Finally, I think he's understanding and it's really good that he's understanding now rather than later how to be a pro, about stuff like taking care of your body, eating right and working out and conditioning and stuff like that."
Faulk, a massive addition to the line at 6-foot-5, 270-pounds, has the ability to blossom into one of the better linemen Auburn has seen come through the program as of late - and that's saying something considering how solid the Tigers' d-line has been in recent history.
Could Faulk be yet another Tiger to make it to the NFL one day?
"The only person that's going to waste that opportunity is him. If you know what I mean. The only person that can screw that up is him. I think he understands that. And I think he's doing an amazing job right now."
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