Why Washington Redskins wide receiver Jamison Crowder has been back at Duke for months
Three seasons into his NFL career, Jamison Crowder has played in just one playoff game.
Last February, he and the rest of his Washington Redskins teammates watched their NFC East rival, the Philadelphia Eagles, win a Super Bowl.
That experience is driving Crowder to have an even better season in 2018.
“Man. it’s rough, especially with a division rival winning it,” Crowder said. “But we’ve got to work this year. Hopefully we can get to that Super Bowl level. I think we have some really good guys coming back and I’m looking forward to starting a new year.”
Crowder returned to Duke, where he starred for the Blue Devils from 2011-14, for his offseason work. Duke’s football strength and conditioning coach Noel Durfey and his staff have worked with the Redskins’ starting slot receiver on increasing his explosiveness.
Crowder will be back with the Redskins later this month for voluntary offseason work ahead of the NFL Draft and the team’s two offseason minicamps in May and June.
“Personally, I still think there’s a lot that I can accomplish here. That’s why I’ve been here working, grinding with coach Durfey and the sprint staff. I’ve been working running routes, getting back into the groove of things before we start OTAs.”
A fourth-round pick by Washington in the 2015 NFL Draft, Crowder immediately became a productive player for the Redskins. He caught 59 passes for 604 yards with two touchdowns as a rookie in 2015 before achieving career highs in receptions (67), yards (847) and touchdowns (seven) in 2016.
Last season, Crowder caught 66 passes for 789 yards with three touchdowns.
All that production came with Kirk Cousins as Washington’s starting quarterback. Cousins threw 103 passes Crowder’s way last season alone.
But the Redskins allowed Cousins to leave as a free agent and he signed with Minnesota. Washington acquired Alex Smith from Kansas City to become its new starting quarterback.
“It’s a business,” Crowder said. “Me and Kirk Cousins had a really good connection. But at the same time, like I said, guys are going to come and go. So I’m really excited to play alongside Alex Smith.”
Crowder said he’s followed the 33-year-old Smith’s career for a long time. Growing up, Crowder was a 49ers fan. andSmith began his NFL career with San Francisco in 2005 when Crowder was 12 years old.
“I’ve seen him ever since I was a younger child, growing up a 49ers fan when he was in San Francisco,” said Crowder, who will turn 25 in June. “He’s a veteran. It’s always good to be with a guy that has put up numbers in the league. He’s been around the league for a while and has that knowledge of the game. I’m excited to play alongside him.”
This is an important season for Crowder. He signed a four-year, $2.8 million contract in May 2015 that will expire after the 2018 season. The deal stipulates his base salary jumps from $615,000 in 2017 to $1.9 million this season.
He’ll seek to produce catches and touchdowns to not only justify that salary, but make him an attractive target for either an extension with the Redskins or a lucrative free-agent deal elsewhere.
Returning to Duke to put in important work for that task allowed him to appreciate how far he and the Blue Devils program have come.
“He’s taken an interest in our players,” Duke coach David Cutcliffe said. “I see him talking to those receivers all the time. Coaching them. He’s gone into some of their meetings.”
When Crowder signed in 2011, Duke hadn’t played in a bowl game nor had a winning season since 1994.
After last season’s 7-6 record that included a 36-14 win over Northern Illinois in the Quick Lane Bowl in Detroit, the Blue Devils have posted four winning seasons and appeared in five bowl games in the last six years.
Crowder played in three bowl games, helping Duke to 19 wins during his junior and senior seasons in 2013 and 2014.
“It’s a great thing,” Crowder said. “You just look around the facilities, the changes. It’s been a great thing. I was a part of helping build this but there were a lot of guys that had a hand in building this. Just to come back and see things that the guys that are here now get to enjoy, it’s a blessing. I’m grateful that I came here and was a part of it. They have really good recruits coming in here, really good guys who are on the team now. It’s always good to have your alma mater be a team that can compete in the ACC.”
Soon Crowder will head back to Washington, where the Redskins want to compete with the Eagles to win the next Super Bowl.
This story was originally published April 4, 2018 at 2:59 PM with the headline "Why Washington Redskins wide receiver Jamison Crowder has been back at Duke for months."