He had stayed through three head coaches and four defensive coordinators, so his mom thought he was going to stay one more time.

He was angry after his final home game, a 27-24 loss to Alabama in the Iron Bowl. He was in the endzone helplessly as Isaiah Bond caught the game-winning touchdown and Jaylin Simpson slammed the ground on the sidelines when the clock hit zero as an impending defining upset descended into heartbreak.

He was angry at the way that November night in Jordan-Hare Stadium ended. So his mom, Thaquanna Cannon, thought he was going to stay. Simpson intended to play in Auburn’s bowl game after all.

Those who know Simpson best are quick to talk about his love for Auburn. Simpson wasn’t looking for his way out. But his coaches told him it was time.

“Mom, I went in and talked to Coach Zac (Etheridge) and he was like, my draft stock is too high,” Cannon said Simpson told her. “I’m gonna go ahead and go.”

“You’re gonna go?” Cannon responded.

“Yeah, I’m gonna go,” Simpson said.

Simpson had a breakout season in his fifth collegiate year. He started all 12 regular season games for Auburn. He had four interceptions on his way to a first-team All-SEC season.

His agent, Lindsay Crook, said teams are looking at Simpson as a good enough talent where going back to college would have more risk than benefit. Simpson may have been iffy, Cannon said, on leaving the program just a few credits shy of graduation, but the time was now. What was the point in staying, Crook said.

“I told him, ‘I don’t think you can duplicate it,” Simpson’s former coach and mentor Alex Mathis — current assistant director of player personnel at UCF — said.

Simpson accepted a Senior Bowl invitation on Dec. 6, but didn’t officially declare for the NFL Draft until early January, just after Auburn’s appearance in the Music City Bowl. Simpson originally expected to play in the game and traveled with the team to Nashville for practice. But he was a last-minute opt-out due to a hamstring injury he didn’t want to risk with the NFL on the horizon. Crook said Simpson’s body had taken a beating throughout the 2023 season, and needed the rest. So Simpson watched from the sidelines at Nissan Stadium wearing chains for all of his teammates.

A decision made and a season behind him, Simpson’s next task was to coax his mom on a flight to Ft. Lauderdale.

***

Sports are full of clichés. So there’s often a lot of how much a player loves where they are.

Yet with Simpson, that’s genuine. The proof is in his actions.

Simpson committed to Auburn head coach Gus Malzahn. He played two seasons for him before Malzahn was fired and Auburn hired Bryan Harsin. Simpson stayed. Malzahn was fired in December 2020 and hired by UCF in February 2021. Simpson could have followed him. He stayed.

He played two years for Harsin, seeing significant increases in his playing time and production. Then Harsin was fired after the 2022 season. And Simpson stayed again to play under Hugh Freeze — his third coach at Auburn.

When they say Simpson loves Auburn, they mean it. In this modern age of transfer portal freedom, Simpson is the antithesis.

In his time here, Simpson became a fan favorite for his laid-back attitude, high energy on the field and how simply obvious it is that he just likes to have fun.

There was his creation of the “turnover seatbelt” and his now famous press conference quips. Maybe none more so than his “Plankton Mentality.”

“Since I’ve been knowing Plankton, dude just got one goal, man: get that Krabby Patty formula,” Simpson said in October. “He don’t stop, no matter what. Every episode, he on it. We got to get that Plankton mentality every game. We got to get that formula every game.”

He’s referring to the character Plankton from the TV show SpongeBob SquarePants. He’s the little green villain always trying to steal the recipe for the Krabby Patty at the Krusty Krab restaurant. And he always fails in some way or another. But he always had another evil plot ready to go next.

Funny, but it’s truly got quite a bit of depth to it. Cannon said her son isn’t often one to talk a lot. That he’ll answer as concisely as possible. It’s a more quiet personality sometimes hidden by teaching Freeze how to dance on the sideline.

“Just keep going, having that Plankton mentality,” Simpson said. “Just keep going. Whatever. Doesn’t matter. Just don’t quit. So I think everybody’s just — things aren’t going our way, but we’re just, we’re going to keep going.”

Plankton mentality transformed into a full-on bit. Someone photoshopped Plankton wearing an Auburn hat onto a sign and gave it to Simpson to hold at a basketball game.

That will be part of his legacy here.

He wants to be remembered for what he’ll pass down, too.

“Especially in our room, man, we tried to drop some gems on them,” Simpson said of young defensive backs. “Pregame, any chance we could so we could just leave that room better than we found it.”

***

Simpson essentially had to force his mother onto the plane. She offered to drive the six hours to Ft. Lauderdale to meet with Crook for the first time. She had never flown before. It scared her. But the pitch to Cannon was relatively simple.

“Momma, if I get drafted, you’re gonna have to get on a plane and come,” Cannon recalled Simpson telling her.

The point of the trip was to introduce Simpson’s family to the NFL Draft process. It’s long, complicated, intense and overwhelming. There is no training for this. There’s excitement to be on the forefront of achieving a long-set goal, and uncertainty about where that will happen. In a way, it’s not too dissimilar to any other college student leaving school and looking for a first job. But the prospect of the NFL adds a different kind of scrutiny and financial stake.

When Simpson’s name is called this weekend, his entire life — his family’s entire life — is going to permanently change. It’s not quite as simple as putting on a new hat. It’s a dream job, but still real life.

Cannon didn’t know how the draft worked. So when she got to Crook’s office she sat in a room with Simpson and several others from the agency who broke down the steps of this process — from Simpson’s training in Ft. Myers to an appearance at the Senior Bowl then the NFL Combine and Auburn’s Pro Day all before the big week finally arrived.

And after getting picked, Simpson and Cannon then began to learn about what happens in the first year of a contract, then a second year and so on until a player might be getting ready for the bigger paycheck that comes with a second contract should they be successful in the league.

“Basically, just so that when they do go in the NFL, not to buy stuff that they don’t need,” Cannon said. “’Oh, can I afford a Maserati? Yeah, I probably can. But do I need to buy one right now?’ No. Don’t go over your head.”

With the type of money that could be coming in the NFL, Cannon said Simpson’s goal is just to be comfortable. She said that since middle school, Simpson told her he wanted to buy her a house when he made it to the NFL. Mathis said buying a house for his mother was the first thing Simpson told Crook he wanted to do with his NFL paycheck.

Crook helps him prepare for interviews with scouts, an arduous session with significant depth. At the Senior Bowl, Simpson was in interviews on several days until close to midnight. NFL scouts somehow know everything, even about a night out at the bars years ago, Cannon said, or asking which of the Auburn defensive backs would be selected first. It was stressful for Simpson, Cannon said, and questions he didn’t necessarily want to answer.

And Crook guided Simpson on what he’d need to work on to endear himself to scouts. Largely, that was his weight, at least according to some teams. Crook said feedback was confusing. Some teams want Simpson to stay as is, as they liked his film in college at safety. Some suggested changing his position. Others emphasized his need to bulk up. It became difficult to prep with different teams wanting to see different things from Simpson.

Simpson no longer had classes to attend — but does plan to finish his degree eventually — so his entire job became football. Mathis said Simpson got up to 183 pounds from his 178 listing on the Auburn roster this season. It’s all up from his 162-pound listing as a freshman.

“A lot of them didn’t want me to be in the 170s,” Simpson said. “That just needs to go out the window. I got it fixed. It’s a pain in the behind, it’s hard gaining weight cause I have a fast metabolism. It’s really hard to just eat a bunch of meals.”

That gain in preparation for the draft comes as a combination of high-calorie intake and weight training programs. Former teammate DJ James said he did a similar program by loading up on pasta meals. Mathis said Simpson was never a heavy eater growing up. Now he has to eat so he can play.

“I have not asked him what he’s eating,” Mathis joked. “As long as he’s eating, then I don’t really care.”

The balance is still difficult, as Simpson didn’t want to gain weight that could slow him down in the 40-yard dash. He didn’t feel worried about that. It’s not exactly a simple, let alone normal, job interview.

***

For a man so laid back, this amount of anxious excitement is like whiplash.

It was the day before he’d go through on-field drills at the NFL Combine and Simpson had already laid out his workout clothes on the floor of his hotel room.

“Like it’s the first day of school tomorrow,” Simpson said.

Simpson came to Indianapolis without much of an entourage. This Georgia family passionates hate cold weather, they joke, and it was so cold in Indianapolis that Cannon didn’t go, she joked. Simpson got off the plane and quickly went on a hunt for allergy medicine.

Ahead of what could be described as a most important job interview, Simpson was ultra-prepared. He could hardly wait any longer to start.

But maybe this moment was when the reality of how far this football dream had taken him, and how the reality of it all was unfolding in front of him.

“I still can’t believe I’m here,” Simpson said. “It’s crazy, man. I never thought, I just never thought.”

He answered a few more questions at the interview podium, and as he left, the kid still realizing how far he’d come picked up his NFL Combine branded name card and called out a question.

“Can I keep this,” Simpson said.

He got his souvenir.

With so many differing views of him, Simpson had goals for himself at the Combine. So did Crook. So did Mathis. None wanted to share them. That was personal. Simpson felt he had something to show.

Simpson’s performance was among the best all-around for safeties in Indianapolis. If the point was to show off his athleticism: point proven.

His 4.45-second 40-yard dash was fifth among safeties. His 39.5-inch vertical jump was third among safeties. His 11-foot-1-inch broad jump was second among safeties.

“Really good,” Crook said in a text. “Good day all round.”

The 39.5-inch broad jump wasn’t enough, turns out. Simpson wanted an even 40. He got there at Auburn’s Pro Day.

But back in Indianapolis, he ran down the field after going last in the last drill and flipped into the endzone, and did the same dance he’d taught Freeze back at Auburn. Standing in the middle of the circle of all the other defensive backs in his group, there was Simpson, smiling as ever.

He belonged.

There’s uncertainty entering the Draft now, beginning Thursday night. He’ll watch at home in Georgia, hosting a party on St. Simon’s Island just across the causeway from Brunswick.

“Getting nervous,” Cannon said in an April text message. “But all is well.”

Crook said he thinks Simpson could be picked as high as the second or third round. But more realistically he’ll go on the third day. That’s the day his party is set for anyway.

Simpson doesn’t really care where he ends up. He just sees another goal.

The Krabby Patty secret formula is still out there.

Matt Cohen covers Auburn sports for AL.com. You can follow him on X at @Matt_Cohen_ or email him at [email protected]