Keyshawn Johnson - "Dynamic Duo" - Sports - http://maxpages.com/supremesports/Keyshawn

Growing up in South-Central Los Angeles wasn't easy for Keyshawn, who was later tagged with the nickname "7-Eleven" (because he's always open) when he caught the attention of the football world in college. There were days when he ate only one meal and nights when he slept in an old blue Chevy. In fact, he even spent his 11th birthday at a homeless shelter. Keyshawn and his siblings persevered through the tough times, however, thanks to the love and support of their mother, Vivian Jessie, who raised six children on her own. How did she keep her head up and carry on with the hand that had been dealt to her? With the entertainment of her youngest son Keyshawn, who offered his viewpoint on practically everything and always seemed to think that he was full of the right answers.
"It was something he could do in my home, because you had your right to your opinion," Jessie explained to the Daily News in July of 1999. "Keyshawn had a chance to talk. Then, I was the final judge."

Keyshawn used USC football to keep himself out of trouble in South-Central, a neighborhood characterized by poverty, illiteracy and crime. In fact, he was on the sidelines playing catch with officials on January 1, 1985, when USC defeated Ohio State 20-17 in the Rose Bowl. From the ages of 7 to 14, Johnson was a regular on the USC campus. Keyshawn's single mother frequently moved the family around, trying to improve the environment for her children, but Keyshawn always found the bus route back to USC. He was a ball boy, a go-fer and an eager volunteer in the sports information office stuffing envelopes with press releases. He even had the opportunity to develop his gift of gab at 'SC, selling programs at basketball and baseball games.

"Keyshawn was a charming little guy," recalled associate sports information director Nancy Mazmanian, who used to give Johnson rides home after dark. "I could see him being a politician more than an athlete."

Players such as Ronnie Lott, Charlie White, Tim McDonald, Marcus Allen and Scott Tinsley looked out for the youngster. Keyshawn would even eat pizza with them and spend nights at their apartments. Johnson wasn't the only kid from the neighborhood who hung around the USC players, but he seemed to be their favorite.

"I think it was the way he made us feel," explained Tinsley, who quarterbacked USC in the early 1980s. "We liked him. You do like (the kids hanging around), but you kind of take it with a grain of salt. But it wasn't like that with him. He was somebody who we took an interest in," Tinsley insisted to USA Today in 1996.

On game days, Keyshawn would wait at the players' entrance and score free tickets.

"He was the same con man then he is now," a smiling John Robinson said. "All the players knew him. Ten years old and he'd hang out at their house," the former USC football coach explained. Robinson would call the players and they'd tell him, "Keyshawn's here, eating all our food."

The refuge of the USC campus allowed Keyshawn to avoid the temptations that existed in the inner city of Los Angeles.

"Inner city of Los Angeles is very different," Keyshawn explained. "Who you run with (determines) what you do in Los Angeles. Being an adolescent means you have to get control of yourself. And at times, kids get away."

"There are only three ways to leave the neighborhood," Johnson once said during his later playing days at USC. "There is jail, or there is death or there is achievement. If you don't want to do something with your life, the other two are your options ... I guess I'm lucky I can do the things I do."

The last time Keyshawn saw his old friend Dwayne, for instance, he was being chased down the street with around a half-million dollars in each hand. The money bags, stolen at gunpoint from an armored bank truck, were eventually recovered alongside Dwayne's lifeless, bullet-riddled body on a neighbor's lawn.

Johnson also cites the example of another football friend, Cliff, who ventured into a house, tied up the inhabitants and seized their wallets. Unbeknownst to Cliff, however, two children were still upstairs, calling police, and he was later convicted of kidnapping and sentenced to 12 years in jail.

"I got smart," says Keyshawn, "and I got a sense of direction."

Expectations for Keyshawn were high in 1994 when he finally embarked on a college football career on the Division I level, where he deserved to be. Although USC was still commonly referred to as "Tailback U," Johnson was joining a program that had just produced NFL first-round draft selections in wide receivers Curtis Conway and Johnnie Morton in 1993 and 1994, respectively. Morton had just graduated from the prestigious university with a banner year in which he had broken the school's single-season records for catches, yards receiving, and touchdown passes caught.
"Keyshawn is a phenomenal talent," West L.A. head coach Rob Hager said to the Los Angeles Times before Keyshawn played his first game for the Trojans. "He's tall, strong and fast and he's got a great eye for the ball. And he likes to compete. It's very reasonable to think he can succeed Morton [Johnnie, an NCAA consensus All-American in 1993 with 88 catches, 1,520 yards and 14 touchdowns in just 13 games]. He's got that kind of talent, and Keyshawn won't settle for anything less than that."

One might assume that Keyshawn didn't appreciate having to live up to such lofty expectations, but he embraced the challenge immediately. Johnson joined the highly acclaimed college football program intent on achieving the level of success of his best friend Karim Abdul-Jabbar (formerly Sharmon Shah), who left cross-town rival UCLA with the school's single-season mark for rushing yards (1419).

"When he (Keyshawn) came in, he told everybody he wanted to break all the USC records," DelVaughn Alexander reported to the Daily News. "He always needed to know what was going on, how he could affect the play. He learned the quarterback signals. He always had extra time for things like that. It wasn't a job for him. He didn't clock in, clock out," Keyshawn's former teammate at junior college and USC (and current UNLV assistant coach) recalled. "And after a game, he'd say, 'Did you see me block out there? Did you see me?' I can still hear it today. 'Did you see me?' "

Keyshawn also left a lasting impression on Shelley Smith, who was working on a Sports Illustrated article on Dorsey High School, Johnson's alma mater, after the Los Angeles riots in 1992 when she met Johnson.

"He kept telling me how good he was and that he was going to be a big star. I thought he was just talking big," Smith said to the L.A. Times. "We became friends and he would call me and ask for work or ask me when I was going to write about him."

When Smith returned to South-Central Los Angeles to do a documentary on inner-city basketball, she did hire Keyshawn, who eventually graduated with a degree in history. For $50 a day, he was a tour guide/security guard to the sports reporter and her crew as they meandered around the meanest streets of Los Angeles.

Smith became so impressed with Keyshawn and his character that she also entrusted him to be a part-time baby-sitter for her young daughter, Dylann. "I would let him drive my car when I was out of town in return," explained Smith.

It didn't take long for Keyshawn to prove to Smith and the rest of the sports world that a career on the football field was in his future rather than a baby-sitting business. He quickly made a name for himself in 1994, his first season at 'SC, garnering 66 receptions (56 for first downs) for 1362 yards with nine TDs, all team highs. He did all this despite being hampered in the Washington opener (he didn't start and had just one catch) with a bruised left thigh and sitting out the Penn State game with a bruised right thigh. Keyshawn became just the third Trojan with 1,000 receiving yards in a season, and his 66 catches tied him with Gary Wellman for third on the USC single season list. He finished first in the Pac-10 in receiving yards with 123.8 a game, a total good enough for second in the nation. Not too shabby for a player in his first season In Division I.

"I always expected my baby-sitter to be a candidate for prom queen, but never the Heisman Trophy," an overwhelmed Shelley Smith stated.

Showing everyone the caliber of player he was, Keyshawn elevated his game to an even higher level in the big games of 1994. Against USC's bitter rival, the cross-town Bruins, Johnson collected 175 yards on 11 catches, earning the nickname "7-Eleven" by ABC-TV announcers Marc Jones and Tim Bryant (because "he's always open"). Keyshawn also had 114 yards on six receptions against Notre Dame, and had an amazing performance in USC's 55-14 victory against Texas Tech, as well, recording a personal-best and Cotton Bowl record 222 yards on eight catches with 3 touchdowns.

A few days before the bowl game, a Texas Tech player had said that if Johnson intended to strike an end zone Heisman pose, he had best do it before the game.

"Well, when he said that and I read it in the paper," Johnson said to the Los Angeles Times, "I said to myself: 'OK, I accept that, him saying that.' But I took it as a challenge."

Keyshawn exhibited this same determination in preparing for the following season at USC. Instead of resting on his laurels, the nation's No. 1 receiver by The Sporting News and College & Pro Football Newsweekly going into 1995 decided to work even harder on developing his game. After burning up his thigh muscles during his first experience with two-a-day workouts in 1994 and catching only one pass in the first two contests, Johnson joined several other players in the late summer of 1995 to train with conditioning coach Jim Strom.

"It was miserable, exhausting. I couldn't even keep food down at first. It was the hardest thing I've ever done. I was even getting dizzy spells. But it paid off," Keyshawn insisted to the L.A. Times in August of 1995.

It definitely paid dividends, as Keyshawn rewrote the record books at USC with 102 receptions and 1,434 yards in his final season. His efforts enabled the Trojans to post an 8-2-1 record and a 41-32 victory in the Rose Bowl over Northwestern after Keyshawn appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated's pre season college football preview. With 12 catches (all for first downs) for a Rose Bowl record 216 yards (his 17th 100-yard outing in his two-year tenure at USC and his eighth of 1995), Keyshawn was named the Rose Bowl MVP. He was carried off the field as a true hero should be, and was later chosen with the first overall pick in the 1996 NFL draft, which featured outstanding wide receivers in Terry Glenn, Marvin Harrison and Eric Moulds.

Keyshawn's Captivating Career
1999
Despite the Jets losing starting QB Vinny Testaverde to a season-ending injury in Week 1, Keyshawn reached a personal-high for catches when he finished the season with 89 catches, 1170 yards receiving and 8 TDs. He fell four catches shy of tying Al Toon’s club record of 93 in 1988. Johnson's stats ranked him fourth in the AFC and sixth in the NFL in catches, fourth in the AFC and 11th in the NFL in yards gained and tied for fourth in the AFC and 10th in the NFL in TD catches.

Posted his best performance of the year in the season opener, catching eight balls for 194 yards against the New England Patriots. His 65-yard catch in the game was the longest of his career.

Recorded 11 receptions for 144 yards in a 28-20 victory over the Miami Dolphins December 12. The performance came against Sam Madison, whose seven interceptions led the league at the time. The effort enable Johnson to post his second straight 1,000-yard season. Before Keyshawn did it, the last Jets receivers with consecutive 1,000-yard seasons were Don Maynard and George Sauer in 1967 and '68, respectively.

Voted to the Pro Bowl for the second straight year after posting spectacular statistics despite playing with three different quarterbacks.

1998

Led the Jets receiving corps with nine receptions for 126 yards and two TDs in the season opener at San Francisco.

Did an outstanding job of blocking for the run attack as the Jets tallied 302 yards on the ground in game 3 vs. Indianapolis.

Notched his second 1,000-yard receiving season after catching 10 tosses for 112-yards and one TD in game 11 at Tennessee.

Had the first rushing attempt of his pro career when he went 35 yards on an end-a-round for a touchdown in game 12 vs. Carolina.

Led the team with nine receptions for 114-yards and one TD against Seattle in game 13.

His first reception of the day in game 15 against Buffalo was a 16-yarder that put him over the 1,000-yard receiving mark for the first time in his career.

Collected nine receptions for 121 yards in the final regular season game.

Dominated in his first career playoff game, the AFC Divisional Playoff matchup vs. Jacksonville. Keyshawn caught a touchdown pass, rushed for a touchdown, and intercepted a pass to seal the Jets' first postseason victory since 1986. The reception came on New York's opening drive to give the Jets the momentum from the onset. Johnson's 10-yard reverse run with 33 seconds left in the half gave New York a 17-0 lead against Jacksonville and the confidence that the team needed. Keyshawn's interception came on a Hail Mary pass by Jaguars QB Mark Brunell in the waning moments of the game. Keyshawn finished the day with nine receptions for 121 yards.

1997

Started and played in all 16 games and posted some impressive numbers in his sophomore season by reeling in 70 passes for 963 yards and five touchdowns. Keyshawn tied for 10th in the AFC and 18th in the NFL in receptions, and also ranked 10th in the AFC and 21st in the NFL in yards gained.

Tied Wayne Chrebet for a team-high six receptions for 62 yards in game 3 at New England. Keyshawn recorded his first TD reception of the season on a dramatic 24-yard score late in the 4th quarter to tie the game.

Had the biggest reception of the day for the Jets in game 9 vs. the Ravens, hauling in a 21-yard pass from Glenn Foley on a crossing pattern that put the Jets at the Baltimore 35 yard-line and set up John Hall's 37 yard field goal to win the game.

Managed nine receptions for 104 yards in game 12 win vs. Minnesota.

1996

Selected with the top pick overall in the 1996 NFL Draft by the New York Jets.

Played in 14 games (12 starts) and posted 63 receptions for 844 yards and 8 touchdowns in his rookie season, finishing second among all rookies in TDs behind Eddie Kennison of the Rams, who had nine.

Caught four balls for 77 yards in game 15 vs. Philadelphia, including a 46-yard TD.

Had a team-high seven receptions for 91 yards and one TD in game 14 at New England.

Led the team with eight receptions for 94 yards and two TDs in game 8 vs. Buffalo after missing two games due to a knee injury that required arthroscopic surgery.

Caught his first NFL TD pass in game 2 vs. the Colts on an 11-yard pass from Neil O'Donnell.

Caught a 50-yard bomb in the season-opener at Denver.

1995

Was a finalist for the Fred Biletnikoff Award, given to the nation's premier receiver, and was The Football News' Offensive Player of the Year as a senior at USC. Keyshawn caught 66 balls for 1362 yards and nine touchdowns in just 11 games to earn Pacific-10 Conference Player of the Year honors. His efforts enabled the Trojans to post an 8-2-1 record and a 41-32 victory in the Rose Bowl over Northwestern after Keyshawn appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated's pre season college football preview.

Recorded eight catches for 124 yards against San Jose State in the season opener September 9.

Caught eight balls for 176 yards and two touchdowns against Houston in USC's second game.

Collected nine receptions for 112 yards at Arizona.Snared the national spotlight with 13 catches for 171 yards against vs. Arizona State in a 31-0 victory at the Coliseum September 30.

Accumulated six receptions for 122 yards against traditional powerhouse Notre Dame in South Bend.

Had eight catches for 111 yards against Washington October 28.

Stepped up against UCLA, grabbing 12 tosses for 116 yards in the final game of the regular season.

With 12 catches (all for first downs) for a Rose Bowl record 216 yards (his 17th 100-yard outing in his two-year tenure at USC and his eighth of 1995), Keyshawn was named the Rose Bowl MVP after USC's 41-32 victory over Northwestern January 1.

1994

Earned 1994 All-Pac-10 first team, UPI All-American second team and AP All-American third team honors as he had 66 catches for 1362 yards with nine TDs, all team highs. Keyshawn became just the third Trojan with 1000 receiving yards in a season, and his 66 catches tied him with Gary Wellman for third on the USC single season list. He finished first in the Pac-10 in receiving yards with 123.8 a game, a total good enough for second in the nation.

In his first performance as a Trojan at full strength September 24 (he didn't start in the season opener due to a bruised left thigh and sat out the following game against Penn State with a bruised right thigh), Keyshawn caught four passes for 105 yards against Baylor.

Caught six balls for 139 yards October 8 at Oregon State.

Collected seven receptions for 146 yards October 15 at Stanford.

Had four catches for 110 yards October 22 against California.

Reeled in eight receptions for 145 yards November 5 at Washington State. He also had three TDs, including a 64-yarder, to tie a USC single game TD reception record held by five others.

Collected five receptions for 109 yards against Arizona November 12.

Managed six receptions for 114 yards against Notre Dame.

Earned the eternal support of faithful USC fans with an outstanding performance against cross-town rival UCLA, garnering 11 receptions for 175 yards. ABC-TV announcers Marc Jones and Tim Bryant nicknamed Keyshawn "7-Eleven" during the game because "he's always open."

Keyshawn elevated his game to another level with his outing against Texas Tech, recording eight catches overall for a Cotton Bowl-record 222 yards (just seven shy of the Trojan single game record) in USC's 55-14 victory. His three touchdown catches also set a Cotton Bowl record and equaled a Trojan mark. Keyshawn's performance was remarkable to say the least, considering Texas Tech entered the game third nationally in pass efficiency defense (88.6), 10th in scoring defense (17.4) and 22nd in total defense (311.0).

1993

Earned J.C. Grid-Wire All-American first team, Super Prep Juco 100, Cal-Hi Sports Top 50, J.C. Athletic Bureau All-State Region III first team and All-Western State Conference first team as a sophomore at West Los Angeles Community College in 9 games. He caught 55 passes for 1245 yards and 12 TDs and ranked third in the state in 1993 in all-purpose yards with 1706.

1990

Was Cal-Hi Sports All-State second team, All-L.A. City 4-A first team, Los Angeles Times All-Central City first team and All-Pacific League first team as a senior at Dorsey.

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