When Jamien Sherwood was drafted by the Jets in 2021, they told the Auburn safety that they were moving him to linebacker.
That meant bulking up … a lot.
Sherwood weighed 212 pounds when the Jets brought him in.
He is now at 234 pounds and is the projected starter at weakside linebacker.
To add the weight over time, Sherwood said he ate three to five meals a day, including plenty of carbohydrates and, sometimes, three chicken sandwiches in a sitting.
“Trying to eat those five meals a day, it was a job,” Sherwood said. “As you’re on that third sandwich, you’re like, ‘Agh.’ Then I would think about me trying to play and get in a game, I would force it down. It’s a job.”
Sherwood is unlikely to get much pity from those who struggle to keep their weight down, but he described the challenge of keeping his weight up. He said he sometimes loses six pounds at practice.
“I have a fast metabolism,” Sherwood said. “Going to sleep, I might wake up five pounds lighter.”
Sherwood said he would eat loads of rice, mashed potatoes and chicken.
A typical day would be breakfast, a pre-workout smoothie, another smoothie, lunch, two chicken sandwiches and mashed potatoes before an evening workout, dinner and protein shakes at night.
“It was just about the consistency and dedication about what I wanted to do for myself,” Sherwood said. “For me to get bigger, I was going to have to eat. You can lift all the weights in the world, but without the right nutrition, the right type of vitamins, you’ll never get to where you want to be.”
Sherwood said he now does not have to eat as much to maintain his weight, but noted it is still a fight.
The Jets are counting on Sherwood to take a starter’s role this season after he was a backup and special teams player in his first two years. The Jets have been wowed by Sherwood’s growth at the linebacker position.
“You talk about a guy that defines intent every day, he is so deliberate in all that he does,” defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich said. “He’s ready to take that step. Typically, in my experience, because this defense puts so much stress, especially from an athletic standpoint, on the linebackers, when you convert these guys from safeties, corners, nickels, whatever the case may be, typically takes a couple of years for them to really grasp playing linebacker. I really feel like he’s starting to feel like a real authentic linebacker out there, so I’m excited for this preseason, for him to really demonstrate that he’s taken that next step, and he’s become a real guy for us.”
The Jets did not bring back Kwon Alexander, their 2022 starter, because of their belief in Sherwood. He has not disappointed them in training camp and has shown his versatility, moving between the Mike and Will linebacker spots.
“I feel like I’ve come far,” Sherwood said. “I feel like I’ve made a great transition just from the standpoint of not knowing anything to feeling I know just about everything on the field.”
The coaches and players have praised Sherwood’s communication ability. He said he learned in college that he had to get louder.
“I used to be super quiet,” Sherwood said. “I was not getting the communications out loud enough, fast enough. I just wasn’t confident. I knew what I was doing, but I just wasn’t confident with my voice. My coach used to get on me, Kevin Steele. I appreciate to him to this day. Without him getting on me, I wouldn’t have understood how loud I needed to be.”
Read more
