TCU’s Scott has taken unique path from Mansfield Summit to the Green Bay Packers
Vernon Scott didn’t start playing football until his junior year at Mansfield Summit. He gravitated more toward basketball and track.
But, once Scott put on the pads, he fell in love with the game. He excelled at it too.
Scott was ranked as the No. 11 safety in Texas by the time he finished high school by 247Sports and jumped at an opportunity to play at nearby TCU.
With the Horned Frogs, Scott got on the field immediately as a special teams ace and played his way into a starting safety job last season. Now he’s headed to the Green Bay Packers, taken in the seventh round of last week’s NFL Draft.
“What we do is we have a system set up that you can develop guys that are like Vernon,” TCU coach Gary Patterson said. “He’d been a track guy and now he’s a guy whose best days are ahead of him. He’s only going on his sixth year of playing football, period.”
For Scott, that’s what excites him most about starting his professional career. He has seen himself develop tremendously from his high school days to his college days, and believes that will continue in the NFL.
“I’ve got a great ceiling,” Scott said. “I’ve had great coaches at TCU and I’m sure I’m only going to get better with NFL-caliber coaching.”
Scott finished last season with 44 tackles, two tackles for loss, seven pass breakups and one interception in 10 starts. He returned his lone interception 98 yards for a pick-six touchdown in TCU’s 28-24 loss at Oklahoma.
Scott knew he was on NFL radars throughout the pre-draft process, including a top 30 visit with the Packers. But that trip to Green Bay was canceled, as was TCU’s pro day, amid the coronavirus pandemic.
So that made for an interesting draft week. Scott felt like he would be drafted on Day 3 (Rounds 4-7) last Saturday, but kept seeing teams who he thought were interested passing on him.
Until the Packers took him with the 236th overall pick. There were 255 players drafted in total, including 21 safeties (although none were selected in the first round).
“It was a long day. It was a lot of frustration,” Scott said. “I knew I was a Day 3 guy, but it was frustrating Day 2 watching teams that said they were going to draft me draft a different safety or someone else in front of me. I had an interview with the Patriots, talked to some high up people there, but then they drafted a kicker in front of me so I got discouraged.”
It eventually got to the point where Scott left a little draft party at his aunt’s house in Dallas between Rounds 6 and 7 and headed back to his place in Fort Worth. He and his agent started discussing desirable destinations as an undrafted free agent.
“But my agent kept bringing up Green Bay, reminding me that they could draft me,” Scott said. “I didn’t really pay attention to that because I didn’t want to be let down. But, five minutes later, I got a call with a ‘920’ area code and it was the assistant DB coach [Ryan Downard] telling me they were drafting me.
“I started tearing up. I was emotional. But I’m excited to be in an organization like the Packers, they were the first team to believe in me giving me that top 30 visit.”
At Green Bay, Scott is reunited with former TCU teammate Ty Summers. The two have already spoken about the organization and environment, and Scott is ready to head north. He grew up as a Dallas Cowboys fan naturally (and also liked the Kansas City Chiefs, courtesy of Larry Johnson and Derrick Johnson), but is ready to experience a different part of the country.
“I’ve never been up north, but I don’t have a problem playing in the cold,” Scott said. “But at least they’re going to have heaters on the sideline. I’ll be sitting by those heaters.”
