The top 100 FSU football players: No. 83—offensive guard Tre Jackson

I don’t think anyone expected Tre Jackson to have the kind of career that he had at Florida State. An unheralded recruit from Jesup, Georgia by way of Wayne County High School; Jackson chose FSU after de-committing from Georgia Tech right before National Signing Day 2011.

He was supposed to redshirt because freshman offensive lineman are not supposed to be physically ready for high-level college football but terrible injury luck had other plans. A ridiculous amount of injuries to FSU’s offensive line cause Tre to burn his redshirt. He ended up on spot duty throughout 2011 until the Champs Sports Bowl where he started every single snap in a victory over Notre Dame and the rest is history.

Tre Jackson would proceed to start his next 42 games at Florida State helping to pave the way for three straight ACC titles, a national championship, and the highest scoring team in college football history. He did the dirty work up front for multiple players that you will see later in this countdown including FSU’s all-time leading rusher, a current pro-bowler for the Atlanta Falcons, a Heisman trophy winner, and FSU’s all-time leading wide receiver. Jackson got it done for all of them and while most offensive lineman never get the public recognition that they deserve the media took notice of what Tre Jackson accomplished.

In 2014 he was arguably the best guard in America & became one of only 35 players in FSU history to be named a consensus All-American. Take a look at this list of accolades from that season:

• Unanimous All-American
• All-ACC First Team (Media/Coaches)
• AFCA All-America First Team
• Associated Press All-America First Team
• Sporting News All-America First Team
• Walter Camp All-America First Team
• Sports Illustrated All-America First Team
• CBSSports.com All-America First Team
• USA Today All-America First Team
• SBNation.com All-America First Team
• Scout.com All-America First Team

After 2014 he was drafted by the New England Patriots in the fourth round of the 2015 NFL Draft. He spent two years with the Patriots before being released in 2016 because of a knee injury that never got quite back to 100 percent.

To put it simply Tre Jackson’s 2014 season was one of the best seasons an offensive lineman has ever had in Florida State history and that’s why he’s No. 83 in the countdown of top-100 players of all-time.

Not bad for a three-star recruit from Georgia that many thought would be a better defensive tackle than guard.