Baltimore Ravens quarterback Lamar Jackson has been the best offensive player in the NFL this season and will assuredly win his second MVP award when it is announced on February 10 in Las Vegas, the night before the Super Bowl is played in the glittery Nevada city.
Jackson, 27, the 2019 MVP, two-time First team All-Pro (2019, 2023) and 2016 Heisman Trophy winner, is aspiring to add the most meaningful accomplishment of his still budding yet already illustrious career: Super Bowl champion. The Ravens are the American Football Conference’s No. 1 seed after attaining the best regular season record in the entire league at 13-4.
However, they will have to get past a player who is similar to Jackson and is already being characterized as a superstar. Houston Texans quarterback Coleridge Bernard “CJ”’ Stroud IV., commonly known as CJ, has lifted a franchise that was in disarray just one season ago and propelled them into a legitimate championship contender.
The hiring of first-year head coach DeMeco Ryans and the drafting of Stroud with the No. 2 overall pick last April has been transformative for the Texans, who ended last season with the second worst record in the NFL at 3-13-1. Twelve months later, winners of the AFC South division title at 10-7, they improbably find themselves in a second round divisional playoff match up with the Ravens this Saturday (4:30 p.m., ESPN, ABC) in Baltimore.
The 22-year-old Stroud, a native of Rancho Cucamonga, California, who played 28 games with 25 starts in three seasons at Ohio State, has been sensational in his rookie campaign. In 15 games (he missed two due to concussion), the 6’3”, 220-pounder threw for 4,108 yards, 23 touchdowns and just five interceptions.
His backstory and how he has evolved into arguably the most promising young QB in the sport is remarkable. Stroud is the youngest of four children. When he was a 13-year-old middle school student, his father, Coleridge Bernard Stroud III, a former pastor for Life Application Christian Center in Rancho Cucamonga pled guilty to a slew of felonies and is serving a sentence of 38-years-to-life in prison under California’s three-strikes law for robbery, carjacking and kidnapping relating to his battle with drug addiction. He won’t be eligible for parole until he is 74.
Stroud, his mother Kimberly, and his older siblings battled adversity for many years following his father’s imprisonment but persevered. Today, CJ is a humble provider to those who helped him through immeasurable trials and tribulations.