Offensive tackle looks to season

D’Brickashaw Ferguson is in his ninth season as a member of the New York Jets, which opens their regular National Football League schedule on Sunday, Sept. 7.

An offensive player, but not one at the skill positions, he is the son of Ed Ferguson, a native of the Bahamas. The Jets are once again counting heavily on their starters, especially those returning from last year’s team, including Ferguson.

The Fergusons moved to Freeport, Long Island, where D’Brickashaw is a native, grew up and shined on its gridiron team. He really blossom both in high school and at the University of Virginia where he impressed the coaches of the National Football League.

After a very successful career on the gridiron as a collegian, he is now trying to help the New York Jets.

He thinks that this current National Football League franchise will do very well, and qualify for the playoffs after signing 12 free agents during the off season. This figure includes Michael Vick who could battle out Geno Smith for the starting quarterback job. Ferguson will be the leader on the offensive line at left tackle.

“We have a lot of young guys and a couple of acquisitions (including Vick),” said Brickashaw. “It definitely adds to our team. “There’s no secret to the things that he can do. I think he’s a great addition to the things that we can get accomplished. I hope that he and Geno are part of this team.”

In addition to Vick, Ferguson is also impressed with the play of running back Chris Ivory before he got hurt in the recent game at Met Life Stadium.

“I don’t know exactly what happened with Chris and I hope that everything is okay,” Ferguson said. “He’s an excellent back for us. I think that he’s done some really great things on the ground. He’s a very talented runner and I think that he can add to this team.

“We’re excited about going into next season and we have a lot of expectations.”

“We can do a lot of nice things this year if we can continue to practice hard and work toward our goals,” the 31-year-old Fergurson added. “Our goal is to continue to improve and take it game by game and become a team we know that we can be.”

Ferguson thinks that this Jet team is just great organization.

“We’ve come close to be in the AFC (American Football Conference) championship game two times while I’ve been here,” he went on. “I think we’re just hungry to get back to the things that we’ve been. With hard work and dedication we were able to achieve a lot of our goals. We have a very talented team.”

During the off season he and his wife Kristen Speller traveled to St. Lucia.

“St. Lucia is a destination that we wanted to attend,” he said. “It was very nice. We stayed near the mountains and it is very scenic. I would recommend it for anybody.”