'Leap of faith' ... Why Florida State's CJ Campbell is betting on himself one more time

With a 4.6 grade-point average on his transcript and a life’s worth of obstacles in his past, CJ Campbell was one of the most coveted senior students in the Class of 2021.

He had more than $1 million in scholarship offers from universities around the country when he approached graduation from Panama City’s Bay High School. Numerous colleges wanted to reward his incredible academic success and provide an opportunity for a young man who came from the humblest of beginnings.

And everyone who encountered Campbell at Bay was cheering him on.

He came from a broken home, spent time in foster care, was forced to move again and again, and was at times separated from his siblings and parents. He often had to bum rides from friends just to get back and forth from school, and he even ended up living with his best friend’s family for parts of high school.

Yet through it all, he maintained a high-A average in advanced, college-level classes, while also starring on the football field.

“This kid is laser focused,” said Angel Forehand, whose family took Campbell in at times after he befriended her son Cason at school. “I mean laser focused on football, laser focused on school. Just absolutely the most self-disciplined child I have ever met.

“He’s an anomaly. He’s just a special, special kid. And he’s done all of it on his own.”

He’s done it with a mind of his own as well.

For all of his academic successes and individual achievements off the field, the only scholarship offer Campbell really coveted was the one he didn’t have.

He wanted to play college football.

He had been to games at nearby Florida State University and seen what the atmosphere looks like. The crowd. The pageantry. The competition.

And he was convinced he belonged on that field. He was worthy of carrying that football. And he believed it eventually would pave the way to a career in the National Football League.

He knew it as definitively as any of the material he digested in those advanced classes at Bay High.

“I feel like I can be one of the top backs in the nation, if given the opportunity,” Campbell said.

If given the opportunity.

‘He thinks he’s normal’

He doesn’t like getting into the specifics. And there’s no need to, really.

The trauma isn’t going to disappear from his memory by talking about it with a reporter. Reliving the details won’t make everything better.

And truth be told, Campbell doesn’t think it’s all that extraordinary anyway.

“I don’t think he realizes how special he is,” said Dan Cantrell, Angel’s brother and another mentor to Campbell. “He thinks he’s normal.”

While growing up in tiny Kaplan, La., a town of about 4,500 residents some 30 miles southwest of Lafayette, Campbell lived briefly with both of his parents. Then he was with his mother and grandmother. Then there was a brief, but miserable, stint in a Lafayette foster home when he was 6 years old.

In an upbringing filled with low points, this might have been the worst.

The state couldn’t place Campbell and his three young siblings in the same home, so he went to one, his sister went to another, and his two younger brothers went to another.

Isolated from his family and now living with foster parents who literally didn’t speak to him, Campbell remembers hatching a plan to run away by taking off on a go-kart in the yard.

“I was only 6, but I was smart for my age,” Campbell recalls. “I wouldn’t want any other kid to have to experience that. Some of those people take foster kids that they don’t really want. They just do it for the money.”

The go-kart escape plan never had to be executed.

Shortly before Campbell’s December birthday and Christmas, his father was able to regain custody and reunite him with family.

Another important new relationship would be formed in the coming months as well.

While his home life still wasn’t stable, it was at age 7 that Campbell found his first true love — the sport of football. He had played other sports before and after, but nothing gave him the same feeling as tucking that oddly shaped ball under his arm. And with his blazing speed, vision and balance, it didn’t take long to show his potential.

It wasn’t until he would make his final big move, however, that Campbell realized just how far football could take him.

After living primarily with his grandparents until he was 16, Campbell moved with his father and other family members to Panama City Beach in the Florida panhandle. It was the spring of 2019. And once he settled on attending Bay High, the first thing he did was check out a Tornadoes football practice.

The first person he met was Cason Forehand.

“Ever since then, he’s been my best friend,” Campbell said.

At the time, Campbell was just 5-foot-7 and 165 pounds, according to the Bay roster. But he was lightning quick, and he immediately caught the eyes of the coaching staff.

Intrigued by his potential and curious about his background, one of the coaches asked his wife, a Bay High guidance counselor, to pull up Campbell’s transcript and learn more about his story.

“She was blown away by his grades and the classes he was taking,” remembers Angel Forehand. “He was a brilliant child. Super smart. So she asked me if Cason could maybe keep an eye on him. Kind of take him under his wing and make sure he didn’t fall in with the wrong crowd.”

As it turned out, no supervision was needed.

What the Forehands — and everyone else around Bay High — soon learned was that CJ Campbell didn’t need direction or motivation. He has been driven to succeed for as long as he can remember.

The only thing he ever needed was a chance, and maybe a helping hand from time to time. And the Forehands could not have been happier to provide just that.

Cason would pick Campbell up from his father’s place and drive him back and forth to school. He spent countless nights at their house on weekends, and he even moved in for a few months during his senior year. It wasn’t long before he had keys to the house and use of a family car.

“They took me in like one of their own,” Campbell said. “They always made sure that I was good with whatever I needed — emotional, financial, anything I needed. They made sure I didn’t go without.”

Angel and Chris Forehand have five biological children. Angel’s brother, Dan Cantrell, has three. Their two other sisters have three apiece, and they all live in Panama City. That’s 14 cousins who are all part of the same tight-knit extended family, and CJ makes it 15 in total.

“He’s one of our kids,” Angel Forehand said. “He’s family.”

Support and Success

More than four years after he moved to Panama City, CJ Campbell still believes it was one of the greatest single events of his life.

He not only met the Forehands and their extended family, but countless other people who looked out for him. Teachers and friends. And the parents of those friends.

After 16 years of moving and adjusting, constantly meeting new people and enrolling in new schools, he finally had a sense of stability.

“They’re just really good people,” Campbell said of the entire Panama City community. “They just want to see you succeed in any way. No matter if it benefits them or not.”

One shining example was Janarius Robinson, a former Bay High star who was a Florida State defensive end at the time (he now plays for the NFL’s Las Vegas Raiders). Robinson had come back to visit his alma mater, and Campbell approached him for a favor.

Campbell had fallen in love with FSU after visiting for a game, and he desperately wanted to play college football. But after racking up 2,200 all-purpose yards and 25 touchdowns in only eight games during a COVID-shortened 2020 season, the only football offer he had was to Davidson College, an FCS school in North Carolina.

“He wasn’t recruited the way he really should have been recruited,” Angel Forehand said. “He had moved around so much, and then there was the COVID season. These college coaches had never seen him.”

Campbell gave Robinson a copy of his Bay highlights and asked if there was any way he could share them with the Florida State coaching staff.

Robinson did just that, and sooner than he ever imagined, Campbell got a call from Carlos Locklyn, who was the Seminoles’ director of high school relations at the time. Locklyn explained that Florida State didn’t have an open scholarship available, but as long as he could get accepted to the school, he could be a preferred walk-on with the football team.

In an instant, those million-plus dollars of academic scholarships might as well have been thrown into the nearby Gulf of Mexico.

Campbell saw an opportunity to play big-time college football — to star in front of huge crowds in Doak Campbell Stadium — and his decision was already made. He was going to be a Seminole.

And just like he attacked his school work and practices and games at Bay, Campbell soon would be laser focused on preparing for college ball. He got the newcomer workout plan from Florida State’s strength and conditioning staff and followed every last detail. The same with the nutritional guidelines.

Although Forehand said that was the easy part.

“CJ won’t put anything in his body that is not fuel for his health,” she said. “He doesn’t drink soda, he doesn’t drink alcohol. He’s straight as an arrow.”

By the time Campbell arrived at Florida State in the summer of 2021, he had packed on about 20 pounds of muscle and was ready to go (he now checks in at closer to 5-foot-10 and 200 pounds). Campbell admits the initial workouts under strength coach Josh Storms’ staff were more challenging than he imagined, and he says the speed of the game took a little getting used to.

But it wasn’t long before he was turning heads.

That first fall in Tallahassee, he performed so well against the first-team defense that he was named Scout Team Offensive Player of the Year.

Then in the spring and summer of 2022, he was making a case for legitimate playing time in the Florida State backfield — apparently moving ahead of scholarship players despite being a redshirt freshman — when adversity struck. He went down with a broken ankle during a preseason scrimmage.

At the time, team doctors told him it would be a season-ending injury.

“That was a dark time for me because I felt I was doing so good,” he said. “Then right before the season came, I felt like it was all stripped away from me.”

Refusing to see all of his hard work go to waste, Campbell went even harder in his rehabilitation. He visited the Florida State training room three times a day, every day, getting in as much treatment and exercise as his body could handle. All with the idea that he might be able to return to practice at some point late in the season.

That finally happened about nine weeks after the injury. With his ankle at about 85 percent of full strength and with doctors clearing him for contact, Campbell stunned teammates and coaches by returning to practice in late October. And head coach Mike Norvell rewarded his effort by putting him in the Seminoles’ game that week against Georgia Tech.

His first carry against the Yellow Jackets went for 11 yards. His second went for five. Then on a second-and-goal from the 7-yard line, Campbell found a hole at the line of scrimmage and sprinted into the end zone for his first college touchdown.

As soon as the play ended, he was surrounded by teammates and lifted into the air by an offensive lineman. Swarms of players left the sideline to greet Campbell as he came off the field. There were smiles everywhere.

“I love those guys so much,” Campbell said.

Meanwhile, thousands of fans cheered from the stands.

It was exactly as Campbell envisioned when he first visited Doak as a high school student.

CJ CAMPBELL INTO THE ENDZONE!

7 yard rushing score with 1:09 left in the game to make it 41-10 FSU

🎥: @theACCDN pic.twitter.com/j2KiiqxnhM

— Warchant.com (@Warchant) October 29, 2022

His Toughest Run Yet

That touchdown against Georgia Tech wasn’t CJ Campbell’s last big play at Florida State. Not by a long shot.

One week later against rival Miami, he broke off a 15-yard run and scored on a three-yard touchdown.

Then this season, he scampered for a 19-yard pickup on his lone carry against Syracuse and scored on a 70-yard touchdown run against North Alabama. For the season, he has seven carries for 117 yards and a touchdown.

Campbell also plays just about everywhere on special teams — he’s on kickoff returns and kick coverage, punt returns and punt coverage. And last week, in the ACC Championship Game against Louisville, he actually was in the starting lineup for the first time in his college career.

Campbell also is one of the most popular players in the Florida State locker room. Whenever the Seminoles get a couple of days off for a free weekend or semester break, Angel Forehand knows Campbell will be coming home with one, two or 10 of his closest friends on the team.

“They all love CJ,” Forehand said.

For most walk-on college football players, it would all be a dream come true.

He is getting to suit up for one of the top teams in the country. He goes to school with his best friend, Cason, and two of the Forehands’ other children. (Angel laughs about how that counselor once asked her kids to look after Campbell, when he’s more like a “caretaker” for them now.)

He adores his teammates and coaches. He cherishes the fans and the university community. He’s on track to get a degree in finance with a 3.2 grade-point average, and he gets 100 percent of his school paid for by the Bright Futures Scholarship Program.

“I love the people here,” Campbell said. “I love the fans. I love everybody associated with this university. Because no matter what, they always support you.”

But on Monday morning, one day after Florida State learned it would not be invited to the College Football Playoff, Campbell turned in his paperwork to enter the NCAA transfer portal. He plans to leave the Seminoles and play his final two seasons elsewhere.

It was an incredibly difficult decision, and one he had been contemplating for weeks, if not longer. But as he looked around the Florida State running back room — at all the talented players on scholarship, and with a new one coming on board in four-star Kam Davis — Campbell just didn’t see where his opportunities are going to come in the future.

“Our room is stacked,” Campbell said. “It’s one of the best rooms in the country. And I’m not saying some of the guys ahead of me aren’t better than me, but I feel like we can all play at that level. Everybody in there is good. But the game has really slowed down for me now, and I believe in what I can do.”

Angel Forehand, Dan Cantrell and some of Campbell’s other supporters aren’t necessarily thrilled with the decision. They know how much he has loved his time at Florida State, and they realize there’s no guarantee he’s going to be quite as happy at some other school.

They are going to support him, like always. But they’re also going to worry.

And they’re not alone. A few days before Campbell turned in his paperwork, the redshirt sophomore running back admitted he was a little nervous too.

“You never know what’s going to happen. You never know if schools are going to want you or they’re not going to want you,” he said. “So you have to take a leap of faith. But I just know that no matter who picks me up, I’m just going to continue to be me.”

Shortly after Campbell’s name popped into the NCAA database Monday and he announced his decision on Twitter, the feelers started coming in from college coaches.

In the first few days, he received scholarship offers from FAU, FAMU, Arkansas State, UMass, Samford and Valdosta State. Power 5 schools like Boston College and Missouri have been in contact as well, along with several Group of 5 programs.

It’s not entirely surprising, considering what he has done in limited opportunities, the fact that he is one of the faster players on the team (he’s been clocked at over 21 mph), that he plays extensively on special teams, that he’s an excellent student, and that he is highly respected within the Florida State program.

“Absolutely incredible young man,” is what Norvell posted on social media after Campbell made his announcement.

Absolutely incredible young man an honor to coach you CJ! Wonderful future ahead! #KeepCLIMBing https://t.co/9TToUc01gs

— Mike Norvell (@Coach_Norvell) December 4, 2023

Campbell is expected to visit FAU today, and he’ll likely be checking out other schools as well.

He doesn’t know where he’ll land, and he knows there are no guarantees he’ll be given a starting job or a starring role. But he believes he owes it to himself to find out.

CJ Campbell has grown in so many ways during his three years at Florida State. He’s bigger, stronger, faster, more mature. He knows infinitely more about the game of football, having studied every aspect of Norvell’s offense.

But in some ways, he’s still the same young person who nearly made a run for it when he was 6 years old because he wanted a better life. The one who tossed aside all those academic scholarships because he was convinced he could play college football.

CJ Campbell doesn’t know what the future holds. But he absolutely knows who he is.

“I really loved my three years here — I can’t even believe it’s been three years,” Campbell said. “It’s gone by so fast. And I have loved everything about it. It’s hard to leave great people.

“But I bet on myself coming out of high school, too. So why would I stop now, when I’m so much closer to my goal?”

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