Taylor’s Mischief Confined to Field

He wasn’t a bad kid, dealing in serious crime. Far from it.

He didn’t abuse women. He didn’t do drugs or drink too much. He didn’t get into bar fights.

He even had four gold teeth removed so that he wouldn’t look, he said, like a “gangster, rapper, thug.”

Yet in his own way, Fred Taylor was just as irresponsible as those he didn’t want to look like. As a result, he almost threw himself for the biggest loss of his career.

Just as that career was getting started.

Taylor is the high-profile running back of the Jacksonville Jaguars. Last week, he had an electrifying 90-yard scoring run through the Miami Dolphins, the longest postseason run in NFL history. He will be facing the Tennessee Titans in Sunday’s AFC title game at Alltell Stadium.

But back when he was nothing more than a kid out of Glades Central High School in Belle Glade, Fla., trying to crack the University of Florida lineup, Taylor was involved in a series of incidents that resulted in his suspension for the season opener in both his sophomore and junior seasons.

There was the time he and some friends tried to impress some freshman players by buying them pizza. And paid for it with a stolen credit card. There was the time he hid a book bag stolen by someone else. And the time he got caught throwing eggs on Halloween.

“People are looking at you like you’re an idiot,” Taylor said.

School officials might have looked at him as if he wasn’t worth the trouble, and the Jaguars and the rest of the pro football world might never have heard of him.

If not for Steve Spurrier.

The Florida coach kept saving his trouble-prone back, getting him out the administration office and back onto the field.

“He was never in any serious trouble,” Spurrier said. “It was nothing bad at all. He did what a lot of kids do. Tossing eggs on Halloween? I have to admit I threw a few myself when I was that age.

“And then there was what we call ‘Pizzagate.’ But he’s a good person. He was a good young man.”

Of course it didn’t hurt Taylor’s standing with Spurrier that he was also a heck of a running back. He wound up fourth on the school’s all-time rushing list with 3,075 yards, scoring 31 touchdowns and averaging 5.7 yards a carry.

Taylor knows the debt he owes Spurrier.

“I consider him not just a coach, but a friend,” Taylor said. “He was always there for me. He would go with me [to disciplinary hearings], which he didn’t always do for others. He believed in me. He went to bat for me.”

All of which puts Spurrier on Taylor’s list of favorite people, perhaps behind only Rosetta.

Nobody, but nobody, can ever rank ahead of Rosetta Lusane in Taylor’s eyes. She is his grandmother, the woman who raised him in Belle Grade, a poverty-ridden sugar town in the Everglades. Taylor’s mother was only 15 when she gave birth to him and was unable to properly care for him.

So Lusane stepped in.

“She did a real good job,” Taylor said. “Everything I have, everything I am, I know I owe all to her.”

When Taylor would get into trouble as a youngster, he knew what Lusane would say: “Go get me a switch off the tree.”

And Taylor would soon feel it on his rear end.

When Taylor got into trouble at Florida, Lusane told him, “You’ve got to stop trying to be sneaky. The things you got away with in high school, you can’t get away with now. You are in a different light.”

A light that grew brighter as Taylor’s football career progressed. He wasn’t even a running back until his junior year in high school. Then they gave him the ball on two running plays and he scored twice, from 60 and 70 yards out.

He hasn’t stopped running since.

His first season under Spurrier, Taylor used his blinding speed and flashy moves.

“He was doing too much shaking,” Spurrier said. “We had to teach him to get his shoulder pads down.”

So, Taylor learned to become a power runner.

By his final season at Florida, however, he was tired of banging helmets.

“I wasn’t breaking any big runs,” he said. “I felt that I had to be smart, to go back to what I used to do, cutting back and going against the grain.”

Spurrier didn’t object. Not when Taylor was able to amass impressive numbers. In his final game for Florida, he rushed for 234 yards against Penn State in the Citrus Bowl.

When Taylor joined the Jaguars, as a first-round draft choice in 1998, Jacksonville Coach Tom Coughlin was not concerned about Taylor’s troubles in college.

“I never talked to a guy who was more forthright and honest,” Coughlin said. “He was very humble. I have to give the credit to his grandmother. He never forgets his roots.”

Not even when he led NFL rookies in 1998 with 1,223 yards rushing, had six 100-yard games and tied for second in the league with 17 touchdowns.

“He has God-given ability but he is humble,” said Jacksonville offensive tackle Leon Searcy. “Any time you are humble and thank God for what you have, you are going to keep getting blessed. Nobody [else] has that kind of speed and that kind of power and that kind of elusive game-breaking ability. He can take a five-yard run and turn it into a touchdown.”

Added Zach Wiegert, another offensive lineman, “If you just give him a seam, he’s gone out the gate.”

Taylor has had trouble getting out of the gate this season. A nagging hamstring injury cost him six games and limited him to 159 rushes in the regular season. But he still managed to gain 732 yards, average 4.6 yards and score six touchdowns.

And he seems to be peaking at just the right time.

Who could blame him if he got a little arrogant now? Instead, he still flashes that wide-eyed look over his accomplishments.

Like his 90-yard run.

“I was like, ‘Man, did I do that? Did I just run 90 yards?’ ” Taylor said. “I haven’t run that far since high school, I was shocked to see that many guys missing me. I’m still surprising myself. I’ve still got it.”

But he knows that he might never have had it without Lusane’s influence.

And without Spurrier, who jumped in when he saw a talented kid about to fumble away a career for a couple of eggs and a pizza.

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Sporty Jag

A look at Jacksonville running back Fred Taylor:

1999 STATISTICS

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Games Att. Yds. Avg. TDs 10 159 732 4.6 6

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1998 STATISTICS

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15 264 1,223 4.6 14

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PROFILE

* Age: 23

* College: Florida

* 1999 highlights: Despite hamstring injury, still averaged 4.6 yards a carry . . . 90-yard scoring run against Miami last weekend was the longest postseason run in NFL history.

* 1998 highlights: Led NFL rookies in rushing yards and total yards despite having fewer than seven carries in a game five times. . . . His 17 touchdowns tied for third most by a rookie in NFL history. . . . Set 29 Jaguar records.