Jamison Crowder Is Much More Than Just an Undersized Overachiever

Let's rewind four weeks to Nov. 24. It's Thanksgiving, which means the nation's casual sports fans are watching NFL football. The Dallas Cowboys are hosting the Washington Redskins in a crucial, highly rated NFC East tilt. 

Many of those casual fans haven't watched a Redskins game this season. They're familiar with quarterback Kirk Cousins and veteran wide receivers DeSean Jackson and Pierre Garcon, maybe even star left tackle Trent Williams. That might be it. 

It's late in the first quarter. Another guy—not Jackson, not Garcon—sprints at roadrunner speed from the right slot, past a blitzing defensive back and two linebackers on a crossing pattern. Despite starting his route flat-footed and making contact with two separate defenders, the anonymous receiver runs approximately 28 yards in three seconds before hauling in a pass from Cousins. He makes the catch at the 50-yard line, finds another gear and is taken down only four seconds later at the Dallas 27. 

I get a text from one of those casual fans, a guy who's just now been focusing on a Redskins game for the first time all year. 

"This little James Crowter kid is pretty good!"

Of course, he was referring to Jamison—although to my clueless friend's lucky credit, Jamison's father is named James—Crowder. I didn't respond immediately, but he probably had the name down after Crowder caught two more passes in the second quarter and four in the second half. 

What my buddy didn't realize is that Jamison Crowder—albeit somewhat quietly—led all Redskins receivers in targets, receptions, receiving yards and touchdowns (in the latter category, he still does). The 23-year-old has seven touchdown receptions, which ranks tied for ninth in the NFL. 

That message was, however, right about one thing: Crowder is little. In fact, few productive professional football players are littler. 

According to Pro Football Reference, 1,935 men have played in the NFL this season. Only nine of them are shorter than Crowder—although he takes some exception to that. 

"They got me at 5-foot-8," he told me, "but I think I'm 5-foot-9."

When I first pursued Crowder for a story, I wanted to know how in the world he became a successful wide receiver in the National Football League despite that vertical challenge. But after doing a little research, I was almost embarrassed to ask Crowder about overcoming his height. 

Don't get me wrong; the Duke product and Monroe, North Carolina, native deserves a lot of credit for refusing to let his size prevent him from achieving his dream, especially because he was also the smallest kid on the court or field in grade school, high school and college. But Crowder can still dunk a basketball flat-footed, and it's pretty clear he plays bigger than he is. 

But he tells me his height is "just one of the things that has always motivated me to become a better player."

Just one of the things.

What else motivates Jamison Crowder? What else has he been forced to overcome, aside from the height he inherited from James and his mother, Brenda? To find out, we'll have to travel back to that April weekend in 2015, when he was passed up 104 times in the NFL draft, despite the expectation he'd be taken earlier. 

We'd have to stop at Lake Tillery, 50 miles outside of Charlotte, on the Fourth of July, 2012, when Crowder and close friend and Duke teammate Blair Holliday were messing around on jet skis, doing what 19-year-old college students do. That is until an accident sent Holliday into a coma and ended his football career in a split second. 

And we'd have to go back to Monroe, on Dec. 7, 2002, the day a nine-year-old Jamison Crowder had to grasp the idea that his newborn baby brother had come into this world with nonverbal Down syndrome. 

For Jamaris

James and Brenda Crowder knew their second son might be born with a birth defect, and they did their best to prepare young Jamison for that, but there's only so much you can do to make a third-grader comprehend the limitations associated with disabilities. 

Jamison had to understand that his younger brother Jamaris likely would lack the ability to do a lot of the things younger brothers do. But at the age of nine, he embraced the first major challenge of his life. 

"He got a lot out of Jamaris that we didn't get out of him initially, and we could just see the love, even with Jamaris' limitations," Brenda Crowder said. "With Jamison around, Jamaris would be a whole different [kid]. Jamison will get him to laugh, and you'd feel that brotherly connection that the two of them have."

The two used sports to forge a relationship as kids, and Jamaris joined James and Brenda at all of Jamison's basketball and football games. Jamaris is 14 now, and he and his parents make the eight-hour trek to Washington for every Redskins home game while also attending every road game within driving distance.  

And while Jamaris learned a lot—including how to dribble a basketball—by watching his big bro, Jamison has also benefited greatly from their relationship. 

"At first I didn't really understand what Down syndrome was," Jamison said, "but as I've gotten older, I've seen the challenges that he's been through and we've been through as a family. It definitely made me a better and more patient person. I had to be there to help out, and that helped me mature and grow up faster."

To boot, Jamison was—and continues to be—inspired by the fact Jamaris is incapable of pursuing the types of dreams Jamison has chased. 

"Every time I take the field," he said, "I think about my brother and use that as motivation."

"I know in his mind and in his heart, he doesn't just do this for himself," added Brenda. "I think he feels that he's doing something that his little brother isn't able to do."

For Blair

Jamison Crowder and Blair Holliday were pals before the two suited up together as freshman wide receivers at Duke in 2011. The 3-star recruits made their official visits to the school on the same weekend, and they hung out in each other's dorm rooms throughout that 2011-12 school year.

Both saw limited action on offense that year, with Crowder catching 14 passes and Holliday just three. But there were strong indications they'd continue to gain playing time together as sophomores in 2012. 

That summer, they spent July 4th with about a dozen friends at a teammate's family cottage. The group was wrapping up a long afternoon on the water when Holliday asked Crowder if he wanted to take the jet skis out for one more ride. 

That ride changed both of their lives. 

At one point, Holliday stopped. Crowder didn't notice, and his jet ski smashed into Holliday's, striking the 19-year-old in the head. Crowder kept Holliday from drowning and pulled him back to shore, where he was revived by a bystander with medical training before being airlifted to the UNC Trauma Center in Chapel Hill. 

Holliday didn't regain consciousness for five days. He nearly lost his life. His career was over before it started. And Crowder had to carry that burden, without Holliday by his side in the Duke receiving corps, for the next three years.

Five years later, he still carries it, but he and those who love him didn't let it ruin him.

"Sometimes tragedy or a real difficult situation can help to bring out the best in people, and I know that helped Jamison to grow as a person," Brenda Crowder said, noting that things could have played out differently if not for the support her son received from friends, family, teammates, coaches, residents of their tight-knit hometown and even the Holliday family. Blair's mom, Leslie, reached out to Jamison and invited him to visit her son in the hospital. She refused to let the accident ruin another young man's life.

"Without that, I'd hate to think of what could have happened, but Jamison knows that he has a lot of people in his corner," Brenda added. "That helped keep him going."

"We talked him through those situations, reminding him that it was going to be OK," said Johnny Sowell, Crowder's football coach at Monroe High. "And overcoming what he did probably made him a better football player."

Meanwhile, thanks to what the Crowders and Hollidays consider to be a miracle, Blair Holliday slowly recovered. He eventually returned to Duke to earn his degree in psychology. He's engaged now, living in Atlanta and working in production for Fox Sports Southeast. He works out three days a week and hasn't stopped loving sports. 

Holliday insists he's never held ill will toward Crowder, and the two remain friends. He says he "couldn't be more proud" of his former teammate and plans to remain in touch. 

Beautifully, he's found the silver lining in his fiancee's eyes, noting that he'd never have met his soon-to-be-wife if life hadn't dealt him that card in 2012. 

"I'm loving where I'm at right now," Holliday told me. "Football doesn't last a lifetime, but now I've found something that will last a lifetime. So there's no animosity whatsoever."

Crowder says the entire experience opened his eyes, reminding him never to take anything for granted.

"It was an unfortunate day, but make sure that each and every day you're doing whatever you can to become a better person," he said. "Because you never know what's going to happen."

For himself

Moms are supposed to think this way, but Brenda Crowder believes her oldest son was destined to become a sports star, with or without the sport that eventually made him one.

"You try not to think about the possibilities of what could happen," Brenda said of the injury risks associated with football, "but that's definitely a factor in why we really preferred him to play basketball. And I think he liked basketball more than he did football, so if he had a choice, he would have played basketball." 

For a while, it looked like he would have that choice. 

"Everybody thought that basketball might have been the route for him," Sowell said. "Because he took us to a state championship in basketball the same year the football team was undefeated."

Naturally a point guard, Crowder led the Monroe Redhawks to a 32-1 record in his junior season, their only loss coming by two points. "And if Jamison had an extra 10 or 15 seconds on the clock," Brenda said, "that team would not have beat him"—she stops herself—"beat them."

Innocent Freudian slip, but an indication as to how special Jamison was.

In fact, he was first spotted by a Duke recruiter during a basketball game. He wound up, however, with a scholarship offer to play football there. He picked Duke over several other major schools in the region, causing Brenda to hold out hope that he'd end up playing for Mike Krzyzewski on the hardwood. 

She recalled a time the family made an informal campus visit prior to Jamison's first year, when they ran into then-Blue Devils basketball star Mason Plumlee outside Cameron Indoor Stadium.

Jamison introduced himself and mentioned he played basketball in addition to football. Plumlee invited him to play a pickup game that afternoon. Crowder initially declined because he didn't have his regular shoes and gear, but Plumlee insisted they'd provide that. He reluctantly took part in four casual games with and against several Duke basketball players, and sure enough, his team won all four.

Running point for the opposing squad was Kyrie Irving, the top pick of the 2011 NBA draft. 

After hearing this story from Brenda, I called Jamison to ask him about it, and I could feel him shaking his head through the phone. 

"She gets a little excited when she tells that story," he told me. "She loves that story. It was just a basic pickup game. At Duke, my main focus was football the whole time. I think my mom got inspired—and I guess I got inspired a little bit—but it never really crossed my mind that I could go play basketball at Duke."

Sticking to football paid off. After playing sparingly as a freshman and having his heart broken by the incident with Holliday the following summer, Crowder became one of the most prolific receivers in the ACC for three consecutive seasons. He finished his college career in 2014 with a conference-record-tying 283 receptions for 3,641 yards to go along with 24 offensive touchdowns. He also scored on five punt returns in 2013 and 2014 and threw a touchdown pass as a senior. 

But he wasn't happy with his performance at the scouting combine, and questions regarding his size continued to impact his stock leading up to the 2015 draft. An NFL.com scouting report addressed his weaknesses, stating that he "lacks desired NFL size" and possessed "below-average length and hands," which meant he offered "a small target radius for quarterbacks."

Still, Crowder hoped and expected to be drafted in the first three rounds. 

No dice.  

"We were sitting in front of the TV, and Thursday night passed, and Friday night passed. And because I'm his mom, I could tell he was getting a little discouraged and disappointed that his name had not been called," said Brenda, who reminded her son to keep the faith. 

The fourth round started at noon on Saturday, and at about 12:05 p.m., Jamison got the call from the Redskins, despite the fact they hadn't shown much interest in him during the predraft process. He was relieved of his misery within minutes, the sixth pick on Day 3 of the draft.

Fourteen wide receivers were selected ahead of him. 

"I feel like if I was 6-foot-2 or 6-foot-3, I probably would have went first round," Crowder said. "Just looking at my body of work from Duke, holding the all-time ACC record for receptions, going over 1,000 yards three years in a row. So if I was taller I could have gone first round or a higher round, but the height thing has always been a knock on me. I guess I don't pass the eyeball test."  

"We knew that the height would be a factor, even though that shouldn't be the case," Sowell said. "But when you're dealing with a lot of money, people look at that. We knew he had the quickness to get done what needed to get done; it was just a matter of finding the right organization to believe in what he had." 

Clearly, Washington was the right organization.

The Redskins have a deep receiving corps featuring household names Jackson and Garcon, and they used their top pick in 2016 on TCU wide receiver Josh Doctson, but Jackson has dealt with several injuries, and Doctson hardly played as a rookie before suffering a season-ending Achilles injury.

Crowder has remained healthy and productive, which is why he's been rewarded with consistent snaps on offense since the third week of his rookie campaign. He's caught 71.5 percent of the passes thrown his way, dropping only six in 30 games, and 38 percent of his receptions have come in the fourth quarter or overtime. 

Three quarters of his snaps have come in the slot, but he's been given more opportunities to line up out wide. 

Of the 14 receivers drafted ahead of Crowder, only Amari Cooper of the Oakland Raiders has more catches, yards and touchdowns. But Crowder also sports the second-highest qualified punt return average in the league this year, and he scored on an 85-yard return in a six-point victory over the Baltimore Ravens in Week 5. 

"I came in not really knowing what to expect," Crowder said. "I was just trying to get my feet wet. I didn't want to waste a year, but I wanted to focus on the experience and see how the NFL game was. And it took me a whole season just to kind of get used to NFL speed and the game.

"In the offseason I really tried to take a look back and be critical of the mistakes I made and what I'd have to improve on. I tried to work on being a step faster as far as seeing the development of a defense or where I need to be on certain routes and concepts. And I think that's really paying off for me."

It's all part of the process as Crowder overcomes the obstacle that was the 2015 draft, which continues to be buried by his success. 

Height doesn't measure heart, among other things

Again, this was supposed to be about Jamison Crowder's height, or lack thereof. And then I typed his name into Google, and I spoke to the man, spoke to his mom, spoke to his friend Blair Holliday and his high school coach, Johnny Sowell. And it became apparent Crowder's story goes well beyond whatever scouts and general managers and coaches want to make of his 68- or 69-inch (depending on who you ask) frame. 

He's always played bigger than he is, but give him an invisible inch or two for the growing up he did while taking care of his younger brother and a couple more for what he learned from the tragedy on Lake Tillery. Add an extra inch or two for what he dealt with leading up to the draft. He also faced character questions shortly after it when photos were posted on Instagram of a woman with bruised arms and a cut lip, along with allegations that the injuries were caused by Crowder. 

"Someone was jealous and trying to give me a bad image," Crowder said of those allegations, which were not supplemented with a police report. "It was tough to come into the league and then be falsely accused of stuff like that, but I was able to speak with the league and get that cleared up."

Crowder has cast aside those who doubted him because of his height as well as those who may hate him because of his success. He's overcome those obstacles to master his craft, and he's done so at least partly to honor two young men who were robbed of that ability. 

Accounting for intangibles, Crowder's gotta be well over 6'0". 

He's turned tragedy into fuel, and there's really no telling how far that might get him. But if his production in Washington is any indication, you'd better get his name right. 

He's Jamison Crowder, big brother to Jamaris Crowder, unforgettable friend of Blair Holliday. Two inches shorter than the average American male, NFL drafterthought and superstar receiver in the making.

Brad Gagnon has covered the NFL for Bleacher Report since 2012.

Follow @Brad_Gagnon