How Jaylen Dixon brought the fun back to his game and what it means for the Utes offense

SALT LAKE CITY — Only one player that has previously entered his name into the transfer portal has been added back to the Utah football roster in Kyle Whittingham's nearly two decades as the program's head coach.

"That's a very unique situation and something that we don't — just our policy is if you go into portal, you're pretty much moving on," Whittingham said.

And the head coach has been a man of his word — not because he wants to cut off access to the players who once repped the university; it's more about keeping a standard level of buy-in for the program and the players that have stayed true to their commitment to the team.

The relationship almost always remains amicable, but to Whittingham you're either a part of the team or you're not; there's no fence sitters with the long-time coach — at least in the public world of the transfer portal where other programs can communicate openly with the player.

There has been one exception made, and that was for wide receiver Jaylon Dixon.

The speedster from Frisco, Texas, saw his involvement in the offense decline after a stellar redshirt-freshman season, where he recorded 589 receiving yards and two touchdowns. He also went through some personal issues ahead of the delayed and truncated 2020 season, so he entered his name into the transfer portal in October 2020 and even tweeted his departure in a since deleted post.

A few months later, at the beginning of 2021, Dixon hoped to return.

"I needed to hear that he was all in and that he had got himself together and was in a good place from a mental standpoint, and that it wasn't just by default that he had nothing else going," Whittingham said on Monday. "I needed to know that he was sincerely and genuinely wanting to be a part of this football team and be a guy that would come in and be a great teammate, do whatever is asked to do and play his role to the utmost of his ability, and that's what he expressed to me."

Coming back was almost as hard as leaving, especially after he turned his back on the program when he added his name to the portal. He remained enrolled at the university, but to walk back into the football facility with his peers and ask for them to take him back was a challenge.

The team welcomed him back with open arms — just like he never left. Instead, they were happy and ready to have him back out on the field as the one-time deep threat he was in the passing game. In his first season back, though, Dixon had a limited role on the offense and recorded only five catches for 76 yards and had two carries for 17 yards.

Dixon remained firm to his commitment and worked even harder in the offseason. His position coach, Chad Bumphis, now sees the senior as a new player and one that is a leader in the room.

"JD is a completely different person than he was last year," Bumphis said. "I've known JD since I was a (graduate assistant) here, so I saw him as a freshman come in. And this year, he's completely, I mean, he's more of a leader in the meeting room, his conversations are different. Everything you want from a senior is what we're getting from him and we're a better group because of it."

And the early results have paid off, too. While Dixon is still not a major focal point of the offense, he became a key figure to the offense on Saturday when Utah rolled to a 42-16 win over a visiting Oregon State team. Dixon had a 22-yard reception that went for a touchdown and a 19-yard rushing touchdown to lead the team with two scores.

And every time he scored, the sidelines erupted.

"Look at the sideline, right? Obviously, you're excited for your teammates to score, but when he scores it's like a whole different deal; it's like a party," Bumphis said. "Everybody knows what he's gone through, how much he's battled back to be where he is, and just the support from the whole team, it's fun to see; it's good to see."

"It felt fun, just being able to go out there and work with the plays that coach got me in on and doing the most with my chances," Dixon said. "I mean, I feel like that's been the biggest thing is not knowing how many chances that I will get, but being able to do the most with those chances, so it's good for me."

The sideline celebration and everything about Dixon is about having "fun." Instead of focusing on his role in the offense or what's happening off the field, Dixon said he has embraced "having fun with the game" again and tries to remember it's more about embracing the excitement that comes from playing the game.

"Shoot, I just like to have fun," Dixon said. "No matter what the play is, like no matter what's going on, I just want to go out there and have fun. It's really hard to do sometimes if stuffs going bad, you maybe just have certain mistakes, but just go out there and just try to have as much fun as possible, and that's what I've been trying to do."

His teammates have noticed and are ready to celebrate that love right there with him.

"Oh, to me, I'm like his biggest fan," fellow receiver Devaughn Vele said. "I'm like the first one that's always excited for him, because JD has been working his butt off. You see it at practice every day; he's always the first guy on run blocks, always running full speed, giving everything he's got.

"I even told him before the game, I'm like, 'This is your game, this is the opportunity to start making plays.' And he made the most of it, and I was so excited for him because he's been a part of this offense for a long time. He's actually one of the guys I look up to as a veteran leader. So seeing him get the publicity and the success that he's worked so hard for, it's a blessing to see it."

Dixon's role is expected to increase after star tight end Brant Kuithe had his season end prematurely with a knee injury sustained in the first quarter of the Arizona State game. Kuithe was the primary target to quarterback Cam Rising, so players like Dixon are expected to see an increased opportunity as a result of the injury.

And though the injury "definitely suck," Dixon said, it's a chance for him to, once again, establish himself as a reliable weapon on offense — in the deep-threat game, in the run game on jet sweeps, or in whatever capacity the coaching staff sees fit during the game.

"It's great to see it, and I know we're going to be giving him the rock more; he's going to be one of those guys we've got to depend on," Vele said. "We've got a lot riding on him, but it's just the offense as a whole — everybody's got to step up.

It's a little boost of confidence to his game to know that there's potential for him to get more targets as the team looks to defend its Pac-12 championship. But even if not much changes, he's happy to just be having fun again playing the sport he loves.

"I felt like definitely there's been certain things that may be seem worse than they really are, but I've just enjoyed being here," Dixon said. "I just enjoy being around these guys. And the day-to-day prep for the games, the grind in the summer, like the dog days of fall camp, it's all great to me. So just being able to be back with these guys and knowing that I'm having fun again, it's just the most important thing."

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