Jackson’s Landon Duckworth outgrows the Superman cleats to become one of the nation’s top prep quarterbacks

 

 

 

By JIMMY WIGFIELD

JACKSON — Landon Duckworth did not emerge from the shadows as a reluctant kid dragged into the sunlight, uncertain if football, with its pageantry and lore, its savagery and gore, was right for him.

At the age of 6, he showed up at a Jackson park for his first organized football game with red, blue and yellow Superman cleats laced to his feet.

Faster than a speeding bullet? More powerful than a locomotive? Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound? It all seemed inconceivable but was not totally baseless bombast, for he had been installed as his team’s quarterback in tryouts because, as his coach put it, “we lined everybody up and raced and he won by a mile.”

The amused coach, Torrez Andrews, asked Duckworth: “Where are you going with those cleats?” and received no answer, just a smile.

“I was so happy my mom bought me those cleats,” Duckworth recalled — and happier still when they touched the end zone eight times that day, evidence he was a much better athlete than those around him.

“He showed me why he wore those cleats,” Andrews said. “Anytime we needed a touchdown, pretty much anytime he ran the ball, he scored.” And not just in that game.

Later that season, out of fairness to the other players, the coaches made Duckworth hand the ball off more.

“He got mad,” Andrews said, “and made that pooch face and stuck his lip out. It just showed how competitive he is.”

Duckworth admitted to youthful selfishness typical of that age but he and his ability quickly grew.

“You like the hype when you’re shining like that,” he said. “But I’m a team player. You do good things together, we should win the state title.”

That’s the predominant feeling around Jackson and even statewide, especially since Duckworth — now one of the nation’s top quarterbacks in the 2026 class — shares the ball with fellow college prospects in what should be one of the most prolific high school offenses in Alabama for the next couple of seasons.

Still, Duckworth is the tallest tree in the forest, the touchstone, the one who is learning to be The Man, even at 16.

“He’s big and he can fly,” said QB Country founder David Morris, who has worked with Duckworth since his elementary school years and coached many of the nation’s best quarterbacks. “He can outrun the corners and safeties. He’s the real deal. His upside is enormous. He can really run it and can throw it a mile.”

 

Explosive talent

 

On an old, unmown softball field littered with remnants of gunpowder and wrappings from the town’s Fourth of July fireworks extravaganza, Jackson High School’s football team was going through a brief workout in shorts and one couldn’t help but notice a 6-foot-4 teenager sprouting up from the ankle-deep grass like a summer cornstalk stretching to the sky, wearing phosphorescent lime-green cleats and grinning while waiting for a football to be shoveled to him. It was his to do with as he pleased.

Then Duckworth threw the ball, if you can call what he did merely throwing it. The ball sprang off his right hand like an ignited Roman candle but as effortlessly as flicking a pesky ant off his index finger, except no ant would ever have flown so far and so precisely in perfectly geometrical, elegant flight.

He followed by throwing a dig route into no window over the middle. At least a covey of quail will react to getting shot at and scatter but Duckworth’s ball arrived so suddenly the defenders looked astonished and perhaps wondered if he had thrown it at all. By then, the receiver went out the other side of the swarm with it, showing even perfect defense might be defenseless.

“With his arm strength, he can throw any balls he wants,” Jackson coach Cody Flournoy said.

Were the shards of expended ordnance scattered about the ground evidence of Duckworth hurling a ball into the stratosphere? Had he knocked Superman from the sky? Holy Hercules, all Supes was doing was flying in to see the lime-green cleats and order some for himself.

 

More polished, patient

 

The luminescent cleats were a gift from Duckworth’s predecessor at Jackson, Walter Taylor III, who is left-handed, an inch taller, about 45 pounds heavier and proof that Flournoy is an astute sculptor of quarterbacks, all of whom must come from a factory hidden among the local mills and sloughs of the Tombigbee River.

Taylor, who is now with Deion Sanders at Colorado, passed for two miles and 40 touchdowns as a senior in 2021 and was selected as the Class 4A Back of the Year.

He handed over the reins, and later the shoes, to Duckworth, who undertook his first starting season as a 15-year-old sophomore in 2023, showing he could drive a team if not yet a car.

Flournoy said Duckworth and Taylor are similar, although he feels Duckworth has advanced more rapidly.

“This year, we expect Landon to be along the lines as Walter was his senior year and get to a point where he’ll make a mark that will be hard to surpass,” Flournoy said.

Duckworth threw for 1,971 yards and 27 TDs last season, completed 60.2% of his passes, had only four interceptions and added 371 yards rushing and 5 TDs.

And he wasn’t nearly as polished and patient as he is now.

“Now if he throws a bad ball, we fuss more,” Flournoy said. “This year, we’re going to see a lot better product from him overall. We did things before to try and protect him. … He’s gone from, ‘Hey, I’m playing football’ to ‘This is my team.’”

 

Can’t wait for each new day

 

Offensive coordinator Chris Moore wastes little time getting out of bed in the morning when a day of Duckworth development is on the calendar.

“He started taking football seriously a year ago,” Moore said. “It’s fun to show up to work every day. He’s still real raw but has a high ceiling.”

Sort of like the high ceiling Michelangelo had to craft his masterwork in the Sistine Chapel, which took four years, the same amount of eligibility Duckworth has. (In a more fanciful version of the fresco, God is infusing Duckworth’s arm with prodigious powers and pointing where to throw a post pattern.)

“We saw the arm when he was about 9,” Andrews said. “He had a cannon. He’d rip it. He’d overthrow people because he couldn’t control it.”

That’s no longer the case.

“It’s night and day from last fall mechanically,” Moore said of Duckworth. “He’s now picking which side to play based on leverage. He’s getting the ball out early. He’s not going for 40 (yards) every time. He’s gotten better in the short game.”

Not that Moore wants to see Duckworth always dumping the ball off or throwing wicked outs over the linebackers and into the barrel, something most high school quarterbacks dare not dream of.

“He throws a great deep ball, outside and away,” Moore said.

He’s already gone deep into the national recruiting consciousness. Duckworth, who will be 17 in November, is ranked the No. 13 quarterback nationally in the 2026 class according to On3’s composite and has been offered by Florida, Texas A&M, Ole Miss, Oregon, Mississippi State, Vanderbilt, Arkansas, TCU, Nebraska, Maryland, Central Florida and South Carolina, from which he recently decommitted.

Neither Alabama nor Auburn have made an offer, which doesn’t seem to perturb Duckworth.

“It would be nice if it happened but if not, it’s what it is,” he said.

Duckworth is the No. 1 dual-threat quarterback in the nation in ESPN 300’s junior rankings. He’s also a dual-championship athlete, winning a Blue Map in basketball and one with fellow football stars E.J. Crowell, Keeyun Chapman and Keegan Chapman in the 4×100 outdoor relay.

 

‘Not backing down’

 

With state championships in basketball and track — and with a good chance of winning one in football this season — Duckworth has shown no tolerance for losing, even in informal settings. His hands are as soft as satin but provocations and confrontations are not his kryptonite; that is when he is the Man of Steel.

A recent example came after the Aggies had ended a workout and assistant coach Jimmy Martin saw Duckworth and some of his teammates gathered at a gas station down the street. Martin was curious, sensing something unusual was afoot.

“They don’t get into trouble but I didn’t know what was going on,” Martin said. “You could see it in their faces. I asked them what they were doing and they said some of the Thomasville players had been picking on them, saying they could beat them.”

Duckworth was eager to see proof.

“We were in a group chat and they were talking crazy, so we said, ‘When do you want to play?’” Duckworth said.

An impromptu 7-on-7 was arranged. But what if somebody had gotten hurt?

“We didn’t play that hard,” Duckworth replied. “But we’re not backing down from anybody.”

Flournoy, who didn’t know about the pickup game until later, had one question.

“I just wanted to know if we won,” he said.

He liked the answer he got.

“Our guys love football,” Flournoy said. “Sometimes, I’ll come up here randomly and they’ll be out there playing on their own.”

In official games, one might almost be bummed to see Duckworth hand off but for the fact he’ll be giving the ball to Crowell, who ran for 1,700 yards, 25 touchdowns and averaged 10½ yards per carry as a freshman, causing a long line of Power 5 schools to chase his contrails, including Alabama and Auburn.

When Duckworth throws, it’ll be to Crowell, Keeyun Chapman, who has committed to Central Florida and has several SEC offers, and Jamarrion Gordon, who has committed to Alabama as a defensive back.

“Landon and that group have been good for a while,” Flournoy said. “They came through the rec league. A couple of coaches who are now on our staff hyped them up and showed us video. When you see what a kid does when he is 12 years old, sometimes they don’t mature and get better. But not Landon.”

Still, Duckworth was not brought along as incrementally as Flournoy had hoped for. The game was too fast for him as a freshman but he gained valuable exposure.

“The original plan was not to start him as a freshman but he ended up being thrust into the position and we took our lumps,” Flournoy said.

Now it’s the opposition’s turn.

“I ran into a lady at Walmart and she said, ‘With all these recruits, you shouldn’t lose a game,’” Flournoy said. “But you have to remember these are 15-, 16-, 17-year-old kids.”

 

Turning it loose

 

They are also kids who extracted maturity from their lone loss last year — a 20-17 upset to Booker T. Washington on the last play which ended Jackson’s undefeated season in the third round of the Class 4A playoffs. A few months later, Duckworth, Chapman and fellow football player Isaiah Gladney helped the Aggies win the basketball Blue Map.

The loss to Booker T. Washington and a win over Andalusia the week before were easily Duckworth’s worst games of the season and the 17 points were a season low for an offense which averaged 40. Those were the only two games Duckworth didn’t throw for a touchdown and he managed a cumulative 12-of-25 passing for 127 yards — numbers he can typically reach by halftime in one game.

Flournoy and Duckworth said the slump was a learning experience.

“I think he’s a teenager,” Flournoy said. “Basketball won the state championship and we had three starters on that team who experienced that loss to Booker T. They learned from that.”

Duckworth said Jackson underestimated the Golden Eagles.

“We didn’t come in locked in,” he said. “We learned we have to take a game at a time. You can’t get too happy and think you’ve made it until you get to the state championship game.”

Flournoy said Duckworth is learning to accept the weight of responsibility.

“There’s a lot riding on his shoulders,” he said. “Quarterbacks get too much blame and too glory and that’s something he’s got to handle. We’ve invested a lot of time on the intangibles. I don’t see the game getting too big for him. I think he will turn the corner and be able to put the team on his back. No matter who we played this summer in 7-on-7, he just attacked them.”

Flournoy said the lockup that sometimes occurs when a player gets bogged too much in thought is going away.

“That’s where Landon and coach Moore are at,” Flournoy said. “They’re speaking some kind of hieroglyphics. We’ve got eight returners and they’re all speaking that language. Landon gets it now. Instead of seeing it and doing it, he can verbalize it. You’ll see teens take ownership of that and Landon has already taken that step.”

Another major step remains.

“If we want to go to the state championship, I’ve got to lead,” said Duckworth, who added the season will be a disappointment if the Aggies don’t win a Blue Map.

Andrews, who recently joined Flournoy’s staff, also expects a breakout year.

“This year will be the year we see him turn it loose,” he said. “He’s throwing it through windows now, throwing receivers open, throwing with anticipation.”

 

Imagine what’s coming

 

It was obvious from an early age that Duckworth had uncommon skills but Morris said an alarm went off about three years ago, when Duckworth was in the eighth grade.

“One offseason, it just clicked,” Morris said. “All of a sudden, it all came together and he started getting fluid. You saw the progress from a long, rangy, tall kid to a refined technician.”

The branches on the tree got stronger and began to fill out when Duckworth began learning when to throw and when to run.

“My freshman year, I’d get out of the pocket but the more I watched film and the more I trusted my offensive line, you know you’ve got a couple more seconds to throw it,” Duckworth said.

Flournoy said there have been times when Duckworth stayed in the pocket too long, feeling his superior arm would rescue a play which had broken down.

“Part of his growth is knowing when to run,” Flournoy said. “He went to throw first and the play broke down and he’s still looking downfield. … He’s started two years now and he didn’t call his protections. Now he sets his protections.”

Duckworth acknowledged many improvements remain.

“I think my decision making needs to get better,” he said. “And getting set. And throwing while rolling out.”

The excitement in Flournoy’s tone is obvious when he speaks of Duckworth’s future.

“Landon still hasn’t physically matured,” he said. “He’s still got to gain 20 pounds of man muscle.”

But Duckworth is still a teenager and can still have fun while toiling to reach his potential. At a recent workout, he suddenly interrupted a weightlifting set when he heard music he liked, then danced around his station before resuming. He enjoys four-wheelers and being with his friends, his personality belying his status as one of the nation’s foremost high school quarterbacks and college prospects.

“He hasn’t let all of it go to his head or change him as a person,” Flournoy said.

Duckworth thinks of playing quarterback in more personal terms, as more than someone who just puts touchdowns in the books.

“It fits me physically and mentally,” he said. “It helps when you get put under pressure. I like throwing the ball and running it and leading the team. It’s a position that helps you more in life and makes you a better person.”

That attitude shows Duckworth wants to enjoy the sport, not treat it as a life-or-death burden.

“He’s a typical teen,” Andrews said. “He’s not the kind who goes into a game with his game face on. He does what he does happily. You couldn’t tell he’s the No. 1 dual-threat kid now.”

Andrews — who dated Duckworth’s mother, Tiffany Campbell, during his formative years and has maintained a close relationship with him — said he cannot imagine how good the young man who has outgrown the Superman cleats will be.

“Deep down in my heart, I honestly believe we haven’t seen the real Landon Duckworth yet,” Andrews said. “He’s still a kid at heart. I honestly don’t think even he knows what he has yet.”