Jaylon Johnson: "I Want to Be Rookie Defensive Player of the Year"

Bears second-round draft pick has a chip on his shoulder about the draft and expects to prove he should have been taken higher

In 1996 the Chicago Bears drafted cornerback Walt Harris in the first round out of Mississippi State and a bold statement followed.

It wasn't by Harris.

His agent, Brian Levy, started passing out T-shirts with the quote on it: "Three-fifths of the world is covered by water. The rest is covered by Walt Harris."

Harris was soft-spoken player and not brash but one who was effective and had a nice NFL career with 35 interceptions, including 15 in Chicago.

Now they have another confident cornerback but he's not letting a T-shirt do the talking.

Cornerback Jaylon Johnson from Utah went on the Carmen & Jurko Show on ESPN's AM-1000 on Thursday morning and gave out his goals for the rookie season.

"Definitely become a starter. That's one. Two, I want to be rookie defensive player of the year, and then (deleted) win a Super Bowl."

Bears fans on social media loved the brashness.

Starter is to be expected, because his competition is from Artie Burns, Tre Roberson and Kevin Toliver II. Only Burns has any real NFL starting experience and he bombed out at the position in Pittsburgh after his second year. Toliver was an undrafted free agent and so was Roberson, who was actually a quarterback at Illinois State, went to the Vikings undrafted and became a cornerback and then was cut before winding up in the CFL.

Besides, Johnson is a cornerback who had a 54.9 passer rating against when targeted, with just 49% completions allowed and 28 total pass breakups according to Pro Football Focus stats. Those are good numbers no matter what conference and who the analytics people are figuring this out.

As for the other two goals, they're not so easy.

Winning rookie defensive player of the year as a cornerback is not an easy accomplishment. It's been awarded by the Associated Press since 1967 and there have only been eight cornerbacks who did it.

Since 1999 there have been only two cornerbacks win the award. In 2017, Saints rookie cornerback Marshon Lattimore won it and 2015 Chiefs cornerback Marcus Peters took it.

Even cornerback Deion Sanders failed to win this award.

The last Bears defensive player to win it is in the Pro Football Hall of Fame now. That was Brian Urlacher in 2000. 

The only other Bears players to take it were defensive tackle Wally Chambers in 1973 and safety Mark Carrier in 1990. When Carrier won he set a franchise record with 10 interceptions.

So Johnson has his work cut out, and whether he achieves the last goal will depend largely on the team as a whole.

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