Jaycee Horn Playing with Freedom & Urgency During OTAs

Carolina's lockdown corner is in a great space mentally and physically.

Jaycee Horn /

We won't run through the numbers for a hundredth time. You already know them. Jaycee Horn has missed a ton of games over the course of his short career in the NFL. What doesn't get talked about nearly as much and probably should, is the mental toll it can take on a player when he's constantly had to battle through some type of injury and carry this label around that he's injury prone.

Despite all the adversity the former first-round pick has gone through, he remains in a good place mentally. As a matter of fact, this is the best he's been according to defensive pass game coordinator Jonathan Cooley.

"I think he's been the clearest mentally this season that he's been. He seems free. He seems excited to perform and he's focused on getting better each day. That's all you can from a great player. He comes to work with urgency and he tries to get better at something. He's been in a fantastic mindset. Just last year, the pressure of the newness. Like, I was a new coach. Ejiro (Evero) was a new defensive coordinator. Totally new defense and getting adapted. Now he's comfortable and he understands what we're going to ask of him. For me, he just seems free-er. Beforehand, I can't necessarily comment, but where he's at right now, I love it."

A couple of weeks ago, Horn told reporters of how he tweaked his offseason regimen to hopefully turn his fortunes around and stay on the field for an entire 17-game season.

"Through my program this offseason I did more weightlifting. Trying to kind of get back to the college program to where I'm just lifting heavy and build my body back up and reset everything, so we'll see how it goes. Just trying different things. Obviously what I did in the years before didn't work, but it could be some unluckyness. Just trying to switch something up and start from ground zero and build my body back up."

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