Top 20 NFL Sooners, No. 14: Tony Jefferson

Jefferson has endured draft rumors, free agency and now an ACL injury, but he's been productive as one of the NFL's premier run-stopping safeties

In the past 20 years, the Oklahoma Sooners have experienced arguably their most productive era ever in the NFL Draft.

From the 2000 to 2019 drafts — the entirety of the Bob Stoops and Lincoln Riley years — OU has had 95 players drafted.

Using today’s 7-round comparison, that’s more than any other two-decade era in school history. In the 1970s and ‘80s, OU had 131 players drafted, but only 88 were selected in the first seven rounds.

In the last 20 years, the Sooners have produced some historically good players. Every day leading up to this year’s NFL Draft (April 23-25), SI Sooners presents the Top 20 NFL Sooners of the last 20 years.

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No. 14: Tony Jefferson

Tony Jefferson will stand as an example for how not to evaluate football players.

Tony Jefferson in Baltimore

One could hardly hold it against any of the 32 NFL teams that declined to draft Jefferson in 2013. He was a shade under 5-foot-11. He was the 17th slowest of the 18 safeties to run the 40 at the NFL Combine. By whatever measurables are available to NFL personnel, Jefferson was unimpressive.

But then anyone who watches him play sees a different perspective.

Brent Venables watched him play when he recruited Jefferson as one of OU's famed “Cali Trio” in 2009-2010. Jefferson’s productivity and steadiness outshined whatever physical limitations he might have had, and Venables knew it.

In three years at OU — two under Venables, one under Mike Stoops — Jefferson made 258 tackles, 18 tackles for loss, seven quarterback sacks, eight interceptions and two fumbles. In 2012, he led the Sooners with 119 tackles (33 more than that year's runner-up).

Yet, after Jefferson declared early for the NFL Draft in 2013, he somehow went untouched. Some blamed a draft website that claimed Jefferson had poor practice and workout habits and didn’t get along with Stoops. But even as Jefferson tweeted “coaches hate me man,” others spoke up on Jefferson’s behalf and the website later retracted the report. Over the years, Jefferson has been outspoken about Mike Stoops.

It turned out OK for Jefferson, as he signed an undrafted free agent contract with Arizona, then spent four highly productive seasons with the Cardinals, 79, 78 and 96 tackles and starting 29 games over his last three seasons in the desert.

He emerged as one of the NFL’s better safeties around the line of scrimmage in run support and the short passing game. After getting $1.67 million in his final season with the Cardinals, Baltimore signed Jefferson as a free agent in 2017 — a four-year, $34 million deal with a $10 million signing bonus and a $5 million restructure bonus in 2018.

Jefferson earned his money in Baltimore with 78 tackles among his career-high 1,085 snaps in 2017, and 74 stops in 864 snaps in 2018.

Tony Jefferson in Arizona

Last season Jefferson played in five games before tearing his ACL. He’s reportedly on track in the rehab process to return this fall, but in February was cut by the Ravens and hasn’t signed with a new team yet.

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Our Top 20 list was chosen by five voters: SI Sooners publisher John Hoover, deputy editor Parker Thune, long-time OU fan and amateur Sooner historian Anthony Jumper, OU school of journalism student Caroline Grace, and OU history and stats expert Steven Smith (aka Blinkin Riley).

The criteria was simple: former Sooners who played at OU during the last 20 years and went on to an NFL career. The rest, i.e, their NFL career, was purely subjective. Players received 20 points for a first-place vote, 19 for second, etc., down to 1 point for 20th. A total of 28 players received votes.

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