QB fighting to stay in pocket

of casting him aside and out of the sport’s most lucrative position.

Jackson is losing money every time another NFL team says he’s a wide receiver and not a QB.

Good for him, then, for explaining why he has a lawyer and his mom as his manager, but no agent.

“I know coming in as a rookie, agents don’t negotiate really,” Jackson said. “You’re gonna get the salary you’re gonna get or whatever. And I decided I don’t need him. He’s gonna be taking a big cut of my paycheck anyways, and I feel I deserve it right now. Yes sir.”

Jackson isn’t running the 40yard dash here in Indianapolis. He’s not bench-pressing even though he grabbed his biceps, smiled and assured, “I’ve been working out, 216 (pounds), you know?”

You can hear the gasps, can’t you? That’s not what we do in the NFL. When you’re a rookie draft prospect you hire an agent, when you come to the combine you participate, and when you get drafted you play whatever position you’re told, because you’re a player and not a coach.

Yeah? Does the same go for Eli Manning, who forced his way to New York in a 2004 draft day trade? Who refused to play at all in Week 13 last season when Ben McAdoo told him Geno Smith would replace him at halftime, which led to a fan revolt and McAdoo’s and Jerry Reese’s firings?

There is undoubtedly a racial element to this as black quarterbacks have a long history of being perceived as lacking the intellect to run an offense and the grit to be leaders, an offensive and inaccurate stereotype that festered for decades, and still does. The easy comeback to teams asking Jackson to try out at receiver is: Why aren’t teams asking Wyoming quarterback Josh Allen, a 6-5, 233-pound quarterback with upside but holes in his game, to try out at tight end?

Jackson, perhaps innocently, dismissed that race was behind intentions to line him up out wide.

“I’m a quarterback,” he said. “I don’t know anything about no racial slurs.”

The wiry 6-3, 200-pounder claimed “no teams have asked me” to try out at wide receiver, as the original NFL Network report had suggested. But “no sir,” he wouldn’t do it if they did ask.

Jackson is well aware that his passing accuracy, impacted by footwork, is “why they’re doubting me right now.” And that’s why Jackson is focused solely on throwing well Saturday morning inside Lucas Oil Stadium.

“I’m mobile, I can hit any target on the field. I love the game with a passion. I can lead my team. I feel like I’m a field general when I’m out there,” Jackson said. “I love to score. I love to put the ball in other receivers’ hands.”

Jackson, a fast and slippery scrambler, chuckled when asked how he handles pocket pressure.

“I think I sense pressure very well,” Jackson said, with a smirk that said, ‘What, you’ve never seen me play?’

Asked which two NFL quarterbacks were most similar to Jackson, he said, “Cam Newton and Tom Brady. Yes sir. Super heroes.”

But the NFL team that drafts him isn’t getting the next Newton or Brady. They are getting Lamar Jackson.

And he will be playing quarterback. Or he won’t be playing for them at all.