For Ocean County's Ja'Sir Taylor, Brick Football Lessons Paved The Path To NFL

BRICK, NJ — Ja'Sir Taylor, a 2017 graduate of Brick Township High School, has made it to the National Football League, after he was named to the Los Angeles Chargers' 53-player roster for the start of the season.

Taylor, who was drafted by the Chargers in the sixth round in April, is listed as a defensive back. He is the third Brick Township player to reach the NFL, after Art Thoms, a 1965 Brick High graduate who played for the Oakland Raiders and Philadelphia Eagles, and Garrett Graham, a 2005 Brick Memorial graduate who played for the Houston Texans.

It is a moment he has worked hard to achieve for the past several years, hard work that stemmed from the discipline he says he learned playing for Brick Township High School.

"We had a great culture and standard at Brick," Taylor said in May, days before he headed to Los Angeles for the Chargers' rookie camp. "Learning that standard early on is something I’ll carry with me for the rest of my career."

Those standards included not only discipline, but responsibility and humility, Taylor said, lessons he carried with him to Wake Forest, where he played defensive back, after spending his years as a Dragon on offense, racking up yards and touchdowns as a wide receiver.

As he prepared to go to the Chargers' rookie camp, studying the playbook, taking part in Zoom meetings and working out daily to stay in top physical shape, Taylor said he was still trying to take in the fact that he'd been drafted.

"Right now it doesn’t really feel real," he said at the time. Taylor said he knew he wasn't going to be selected on the first two days of the NFL Draft — "I had to break it to my parents that I wasn’t going to be drafted the first two days; 'I know you want it but it’s not going to happen,' " he said — but it was still stress-inducing waiting on the third day.

"Teams that I thought would pick me didn’t and I started to get nervous," Taylor said. Then a couple of picks before the Los Angeles Chargers were due to announce, the phone rang.

"We're ready to turn in our pick and make you a Charger," the team told Taylor. "When I did get the call it was a relief." And it was a moment to celebrate with his parents, Aja Braxton and Johnnie Taylor, and his younger siblings, Aziz Taylor and Samaad Braxton. "There were tears and smiles," he said.

Taylor, who had 185 tackles, including 153 solo tackles, was a team captain at Wake Forest in 2020 and 2021. He had six interceptions and played on special teams, averaging 26.3 yards on kickoff returns in 2021. He went on to play in the East-West Shrine Game and caught the attention of the Chargers there and during Pro Day at Wake Forest, running the 40-yard dash in 4.39 seconds.

"I felt like each year I got better," Taylor said. "A lot of my success started happening in my later years in college and opportunities started opening up for me."

It wasn't just the improvements on the field that Taylor remembers; the community of the team, where older players mentored younger ones, was important, and something he experienced not only at Wake but during his days at Brick High School.

"A lot of the things and traditions we had at Wake were really aligned with the things I learned in high school," Taylor said. "Playing varsity as a freshman I remember those older guys brought me under their wing. The same thing happened at Wake."

As a team captain, "I made sure I did that for the younger guys – it helps you acclimate to the speed of the game," he said.

Next up for Taylor is the regular season schedule; the Chargers open at home against the Las Vegas Raiders on Sept. 11.

For now, his humility shines through. His only tweet about making the roster was a retweet of the Chargers' 53-player roster announcement.

In May, as he was taking in the knowledge that he'd taken another step toward making the NFL, Taylor had one piece of advice for players hoping to make that dream come true.

"It’s not where you start, it’s where you finish," Taylor said. "Keep working, keep a routine. Eventually it will pay off."