Bama Coach Explains How Packers DB Domani Jackson Handled Tumultuous Career

GREEN BAY – Alabama co-defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach Maurice Linguist will always have a special place in his heart for Domani Jackson, the cornerback the Green Bay Packers drafted in the sixth round.

“He’s a really good human. He’s a really good spirit, a really good person, cares for other people,” Linguist told Packers On SI on Tuesday. “This time last summer, I’m on the road recruiting, and he texted me and he had a picture of my kids. I got three small kids. Well, he picked up two of my kids, my 9-year-old and my 6-year-old, and him and his girlfriend took them to the movies.

“That’ll tell you what kind of guy he is. He’s got a really good heart. He’s a really good dude. My son’s 6, he plays flag football and he would come out to his games. Just had a really good connection with him and he had a great connection with our family.”

Linguist and Jackson spent the last two seasons together. There were great expectations. Jackson met them at times and fell short at others.

“He’s been through some of the full experiences of college football,” Linguist said, “where he’s highly recruited – No. 1 guy, five-star and all those things – went to USC and maybe in the national perspective underwhelmed there. And then he came to Alabama with a renewed mindset, a renewed spirit and wanted to go prove some things.

“He came off of a really great junior year for us and then kind of went back and had some early adversity again this past year. So, he’s a guy that’s shown great personal resiliency, great mental toughness, because he could have easily gone off into the deep end, for lack of a better term, but he always stayed steady, always stayed positive. He’s a good teammate, a good person. People like being around him, his teammates respected him.”

Lost Starting Job But Responded

As a junior in 2024, Jackson started every game. He had two interceptions, nine passes defensed and allowed a catch rate of 48 percent, according to Sports Info Solutions. In 2025, with the possibility of emerging as a first-round pick, Jackson wound up being replaced in the starting lineup for five games.

“Here’s what I would say big picture-wise,” Linguist said of the demotion. “I think any player when things are always going good, that’s not really what you want it to be and that’s not really what’s going to give you the best, accurate depiction of who they are. I think when things don’t go quite the way you thought they were going to go, your response after that, that shows a lot about the personal character and the football character of a guy.

“And so the thing that gives me confidence is that he had two rough years at Southern Cal and then had a really good junior year for us. And so that showed me that this is not a guy that, when things get tough, he kind of shrinks up. (Instead), he kind of rises up. And he kind of went through the exact same thing this year, and the microcosm of his career was kind of in this past season for us where we did have to put him on the bench some.”

At powerhouse schools like Alabama, if a four- or five-star recruit isn’t playing up to expectations, there’s another four- or five-star recruit waiting in the wings. So, Jackson was pulled out of the starting lineup.

Alabama defensive back Domani Jackson (DB16) speaks to members of the media during the NFL Combine. | Jacob Musselman-Imagn Images

Jackson responded, though, and started the final three games. For the last regular-season game against Oklahoma, Pro Football Focus charged him with 9 receiving yards allowed. In the SEC Championship Game against Georgia, he allowed minus-2 yards.

Linguist called it “one of his strongest games of his career here at Alabama. He came out and he was focused and he played with a purpose.”

In the playoff loss to Indiana, Alabama was blown out but Jackson did not allow a catch. So, while the final numbers for the season were poor with a 73 percent catch rate and just one pass breakup, he finished exactly how Linguist had hoped.

“I just think for every guy,” Linguist said, “there’s the career inside of the career, like the game inside of the game, so to speak, and it’s how do you respond from adversity? Who are you when things get difficult? Domani’s a guy that’s shown when things get difficult, he’ll rise up. He’s a guy that doesn’t shrink up. He rises up. …

“When we needed him down the stretch in those three important games at the end of the season, he was ready to go and play his best football for us.”

Battle-Tested for NFL

Getting back on the field – and getting back to a high level of play – required Jackson to perform at a higher level on the practice field. It also required the Alabama staff, including Linguist and former Packers safety and current Crimson Tide director of player development HaHa Clinton-Dix, to offer encouragement and support.

“At the core of players that play well, there’s a trust, a confidence and a belief in themselves,” Linguist said. “Confidence and belief in yourself is going to get tested. And then when it gets tested and things don’t go your way, you got to stay steady and you go right back to, ‘What are the things that made me successful?’ If you know what made you successful and if you know why you weren’t successful, that’s going to give you the opportunity to repeat success.

“And so those are some of the things that we reminded Domani of when he wasn’t out there the way that he wanted to be. ‘Nobody’s given up on you. Nobody has given up on your ability to do it. Show it to me.’ So, we kind of went right back to the basics of practice reps and really touching the standard every day in practice.”

Packers general manager Brian Gutekunst values high-end talent. At 6-foot 3/4 with 4.41 speed in the 40, Jackson has a high-end skill-set. At times throughout his four college seasons, he has delivered high-end performance.

But Gutekunst also values players who have overcome adversity. What Jackson faced on the field “drew us to him,” he said after the draft.

That’s exactly why Linguist, who was on the Dallas Cowboys’ staff during Trevon Diggs’ rookie season, believes Jackson is going to have a successful career.

“He’s going to make a career out of it because he’s going to maximize all the lessons that he’s learned from his collegiate career,” Linguist said. “He’s prepared for the adversity of the NFL and he’s prepared to go out there and beat those challenges and go perform at a high level. I think for him, I like a guy that’s been through something and then moving on to another challenge.

“Sometimes, the opportunity to meet a lot of real adversity of maybe being benched or some of those things, the first time it happens to them is maybe in the NFL and you don’t know how they’re going to respond. But one thing that Domani has shown is that he can play at a high level. He’s extremely intelligent, extremely smart, and he can make plays. He went out there and covered the best of the best in the SEC.

“But I love the character that he has to be able to go through adversity and navigate all the waters you’ve got to battle to get over adversity and still stay mentally strong, stay steady, stay in a good place and be able to still be a guy that you can count on and be reliable and dependable when it’s needed.”

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