Lamar Jackson

Lamar Demeatrice Jackson Jr. was born January 7, 1997, in Pompano Beach, Florida, and his story has been inseparable from his family from the start. He lost his father in a motorcycle accident when he was eight years old — the same day his grandmother also died — and was raised primarily by his mother Felicia Jones, who took him to the local park to run routes and footwork drills before school from an early age. Felicia has served as his de facto agent throughout his career, an unusual arrangement in the NFL that Jackson has defended as the relationship he most trusts.

Jackson attended Boynton Beach Community High School in Florida, where he became a dual-threat phenomenon and drew national recruiting attention despite being lightly used as a passer in high school schemes. He chose Louisville, and by his sophomore season he had become the youngest Heisman Trophy winner in history at age 19, beating out a field that included Baker Mayfield and Deshaun Watson. His 2016 season featured more than 5,100 combined passing and rushing yards — a level of dual production rarely approached before or since.

The Baltimore Ravens traded back into the first round to select Jackson with the final pick (32nd overall) of the 2018 NFL Draft, a slide that had as much to do with pre-draft positional questions as with his actual talent. By his second season he had silenced those questions entirely, leading the Ravens to a 14-2 record in 2019 and becoming the second unanimous NFL MVP in history while setting the single-season rushing record for a quarterback with 1,206 yards.

Jackson's career has since included a second NFL MVP award in 2023, multiple Pro Bowl selections, and a string of seasons in which he has led one of the league's most efficient and identity-defining offenses. His combination of top-flight speed, improving pocket passing, and the ability to demoralize defenses with designed and scrambling runs has made him the central figure in Baltimore's post-Joe Flacco era under head coach John Harbaugh and offensive coordinator Todd Monken.

Jackson has built a deliberately private life outside of football, keeping his personal relationships and family details largely out of the public eye — a contrast with many of his quarterback peers. He founded the Lamar Jackson Foundation, which supports youth programs in his native South Florida and Baltimore, and he has been a visible supporter of youth football camps and community events in both regions. His off-season workouts, often held at 7v7 events and youth camps, have become minor social-media phenomena.

On the business side, Jackson's decision to represent himself in contract negotiations — with his mother advising — culminated in a record-setting extension with the Ravens that briefly made him the highest-paid player in NFL history. He holds endorsements with Nike's Jordan Brand, Oakley, and others, and has used his platform to advocate for greater Black quarterback representation and for young passers who take non-traditional paths to stardom. With a Super Bowl still outstanding as the defining missing line on his résumé, Jackson enters the back half of his prime as one of the most accomplished dual-threat quarterbacks the NFL has ever seen.