Former roommates, life long friends celebrate Jerod Mayo's achievement

Friday morning during my appearance on 104.5 The Zone’s Ramon, Kayla and Will morning radio show, news broke of former Tennessee linebacker Jerod Mayo becoming the new head coach of the New England Patriots. 

For morning host, Ramon Foster the news was old because the former Steeler spoke with Mayo, his good friend, Thursday night. Mayo had to tell “his boys” the news first. 

Those boys were his college roommates, Foster, Inky Johnson, Robert Ayers and Sinclair Cannon. 

That’s a pretty successful house. 

Foster played 160 games in the NFL and is now a popular morning show host and sideline reporter for Titans radio. Ayers played 120 games in the NFL as a first-round draft pick and is now a defensive analyst at Tennessee. Cannon is back in South Carolina running his family business and coaching high school football. Johnson has overcome tragedy on the field to be a nationally recognized and successful motivational speaker.

And now Mayo is an NFL head coach, after a football career that saw him play 103 games with the Patriots and move into retirement as a successful business man in the health care world before getting into coaching. 

Thursday night, those housemates toasted their friend. And no one was shocked by the news.

“From Day 1 he was a guy who pushed it and knew there was more,” Foster said. “A leader at all times but never above his teammates. The need to press us to be better and win was all he wanted. He worked harder than most, planned for success often and always delivered.

“A great friend and human being above a lot of things. He told us all that he was doing 3 years and going first round. He did that and even pushed us as he left UT for the draft.”

Mayo always had a plan. He was driven by that plan. He grew through that plan overcoming being in the wrong place at the wrong time as a freshman. As a leader and as he matured, so did those around him. He became a pro in all that he did and he remained a friend especially to that football house just off campus.

“He’s one of the best humans I’ve ever been around,” Johnson said Friday after the news broke. “He the smartest football player I’ve ever played with. He’s a leader of men and someone that’s cares about the athletes and their development on and off the field. I spoke with him and he’s extremely grateful to have this opportunity and I have no doubt in my mind that he will give everything he has to the Patriots organization.”

Mayo gives all to anything he does. How successful he will be as the first former Vol to be an NFL head coach is unknown. Can’t win without a quarterback and no one knows that more than Mayo in living the Patriots decline daily. 

But as someone who covered Mayo daily, the Patriots will get his very best every day and that very best won’t just be X’s and O’s. It will be relationships. When people ask me about Jerod Mayo, I note he’s one of my favorite guys to cover. He was a great player and a better person. In June of 2007, I wrote a feature on Inky Johnson following his injury and where he was. It’s the only story I wrote, that made me smile, cry, and be in awe in assembling. I interviewed Johnson and those around him. Johnson spoke of how is roommates had helped him in every way imaginable from meal prep to rides to campus to even tying his shoes. Mayo did it out of love and respect.

“He is a real independent person,” Mayo said of Johnson nearly 17 years ago. “It was hard on him at first adjusting to everything. I don’t have to do a lot of things for him. I help him tie his shoes. I help him tie his do-rag up before he goes to sleep at night. He is like a brother to me. We both had similar goals in life and football. Knowing who he is and where he came from, he is going to be successful in anything he does.”

The same can be said for that entire house. A house that has seen success in all kinds of ways including now NFL head coach.