Countdown to Kickoff – Best of the Last 20 Years: #93 Jaylen Pickle
Jaylen Pickle
Bio
Career: 2018 – 2022
Position: Defensive Tackle / Defensive End
Height: 6’5”
Weight: 310
Hometown: Cimarron, Kansas
High School: Cimmaron High School
Career Stats
Games Played: 36
Games Started: 7
Tackles: 42
Tackles For Loss: 3.5
Sacks: 1.5
Interceptions: 1
Passes Defended: 5
Notes
High School
- Honorable Mention All-State as a Junior and Senior
- Four-Year Letter Winner – Football
- Four-Year All League – Football
- Four-Year Letter Winner – Basketball
- All League and All State – Basketball
- Three-Year Letter winner – Track and Field
- Golf Letter Winner
Kansas State
- 2018: Redshirt
- 2019: Played in 1 game
- 2020
- Played in 8 games with 2 starts
- 4 Tackles, 1 Interception in win over Oklahoma
- 2021: Played in 13 games with 5 starts
- 2022
- Played in 14 games
- Set career record with 5 tackles vs Oklahoma
K-State Career Awards
2021: First Team Academic All-Big 12
Highlights
Bring on the Cats Staff
Drew:
Number 93 wasn’t loaded with all conference players, but one of my favorite players to write about wore number 93, giving me another chance to write about Jaylen Pickle.
First off, check the high school resume. This is an old-school, “I’m the best athlete at school with 282 students” type of resume. I miss the days before every athlete had to declare their sp0rt shortly after getting slapped on the rear end by the doctor and join a travel team before leaving the hospital. This dude showed up for the love the game, and it didn’t matter which game. I respect the hell out of that (Oddly enough, this is Cimarron High Schools second appearance on this countdown, as Ian Campbell also represented the Blue Jays at #98).
Pickle’s exploits on the hardwood paid dividends during his time in Manhattan. While he was a solid, space eating defensive tackle, who held his own against Big 12 competition, his elite skill was swatting down passes at the line of scrimmage with his massive paws. One swat in particular earned him a spot on this countdown.
It was 2020, everything was strange, there were cardboard cutouts in the stands, and I, for one, was in desperate need of a distraction from the goings on of the real world. The Covid season wasn’t great for Coach Klieman and the Wildcats; they finished 4-6 while mixing and matching lineups all year. There was, however, one bright spot. It came September 26th, when the Wildcats knocked off the Sooners in Norman.
On the first drive of the game, Spencer Rattler (lol) and the Sooners took, the opening kick and had the ball at the Kansas State 39 in five plays. It looked like the Lincoln Riley (lol again) and his reality star freshman quarterback were about to put the world on notice when Rattler tried to throw a ball over the 6’5” Pickles head. Jaylen timed it perfectly, swatted it straight up in the air, and Elijah Sullivan picked it off, ended Oklahoma’s bid for points on the opening possession and setting the tone for the rest of the game.
The Wildcats won the contest 38-35 and for a brief moment, everything felt OK. If Jaylen doesn’t knock down that pass in the air, maybe we’re talking about the National Championship run of Spencer Rattler and Lincoln Riley in Norman. If Oklahoma knocks off K-State, I suspect they don’t lay an egg on the road against Iowa State the following week. Oklahoma won the Big 12 Championship in 2020. Undefeated Oklahoma, at worst, has a spot in the playoffs, and then who knows what may have happened.
Maybe there is a timeline where Rattler has a statue outside Gaylord Family – Oklahoma Memorial Stadium and Riley is the most powerful man in the state of Oklahoma, but thanks in part to Jaylen Pickle, I’m not forced to endure the indignity of that life.
from https://ift.tt/sdIR0Ta
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