Jets player reveals Week 13 win was 'personal' after cold shoulder from Falcons

Some take a common route to the NFL, and some take the road less traveled. Qwan'tez Stiggers, a second-year cornerback for the New York Jets, certainly took the latter. Instead of the more natural college-football-to-NFL pipeline, Stiggers veered off in a few unique directions.

Stiggers has overcome significant tragedy throughout his young life. His brother was paralyzed from a spinal cord injury while playing football when Stiggers was younger. In 2020, his father died in a car accident. Understandably, this triggered a depression that led to him leaving Lane College and his football scholarship.

Fast forward to 2022, and he was playing for Fan Controlled Football (FCF), a live-streaming league where fans vote on plays. From there, he landed in the Canadian Football League (CFL), playing for the Toronto Argonauts and winning the league's Most Outstanding Rookie award.

In 2024, the Jets drafted Stiggers with the 176th overall pick, cementing a comeback story for the ages. You don't beat those odds without defying naysayers along the way. And Sunday, he got even with one of them.

Sometimes the little things have the biggest impact

When you're a five-star recruit, it's easy to become complacent. What do you care what someone thinks about you? An NFL team is going to give you a bag of money and a contract anyway. When you're on a full scholarship and know that at worst you'll get a practice squad shot someday, it's easy to shake off the doubters.

When you're the product of what most considered a "gimmick" league, with seemingly fractional hope to ever see a pro field, everything must really bug you. When you're fighting a Rudy-esque fight to the top, you don't forget those who scoffed at your rise.

Fact or fiction, imagined or accurate, if you ask Stiggers, the Falcons gave him the "cold shoulder" at a college all-star game. This is completely unsubstantiated and comes from a single comment by the young defensive back. Whether Atlanta truly did so is irrelevant. What matters is that Stiggers believes they did.

If you're Patrick Surtain II, you might not even remember this happened. And again, maybe it didn't happen.

If you're Qwan'tez Stiggers, it certainly happened. And it claws at you and your psyche every second of every day until you finally have a chance to deliver payback against that detractor.

This is the mentality that can take an athlete from the very bottom of the mountain to its peak. It's also exactly the mentality Aaron Glenn should want from his players.

The Jets have been, for essentially my entire life, the butt of the joke. They're much closer to America's collective punching bag than a relevant NFL franchise. If hell freezes over and the Jets one day figure it out, they'll start as underdogs. No one will take them seriously until they prove it.

If the Jets are to reverse course under Glenn and finally bring New York a team it can be proud of, they'll have to maintain a "you're with us or against us" mentality. Even if it's not the world's biggest slight, any disrespect has to be met with vengeance. This is the mentality that, in part, made Michael Jordan... Michael Jordan.

In just two appearances, Stiggers has been on the field for 52 total snaps, the vast majority coming in Sunday's win over Atlanta. Thus far, he's generated a Pro Football Focus coverage grade of 62.9 without a single interception or tackle.

Yes, he recovered a muffed punt in the first quarter. But I'm not saying he's a world beater, and I'm not saying he's the answer for the Jets' secondary either.

But I am saying that the Jets should follow his lead. His mentality is what everyone must have if this franchise is ever to rise from its own ashes.