Jakobi Meyers on playing with Julian Edelman: ‘There’s only one Julian Edelman’

Meyers shared his thoughts on the Patriots wide receiver on Tuesday.

Jakobi Meyers talked about how influential teammate Julian Edelman is to him. Maddie Meyer/Getty Images

August 18, 2020

2 minutes to read

Jakobi Meyers said he’s learned a thing or two playing alongside Patriots wide receiver Julian Edelman. To get more specific, he’s learning how to approach the game at a highly competitive level.

“Just watching him day in, day out, the way he works, the way he attacks the game, the way he attacks other players on the other team,” Meyers said on Tuesday via a conference call. “It’s a guy you love to play with, but hate to play against. Just watching the way he goes about it, even little route cues, I try to pay attention to him because he’s been doing it for a long time. I’d be blessed to be in the situation that he’s in.”

Meyers, who was an undrafted free agent, looks up to Edelman’s game and work ethic. Edelman himself was drafted in the seventh-round of the 2009 NFL Draft, and worked to become a Super Bowl MVP and three-time Super Bowl champion.

Meyers made it clear there’s no replicating Edelman, but has tried to incorporate parts of his game into his own.

“There’s only one Julian Edelman,” Meyers said. “I’m not going to be able to say that I do exactly what he does, but I have tried to take little route cues and little things that he just instills in all the younger guys. Just how he works and little details that he puts into the game every day. We just try to pick up on those and use them in our daily lives.”

With that, he’s been trying to work on his own game, admitting that he feels like he needs to improve as a receiver. Meyers — who caught 26 passes for 359 yards last season — has been in the gym, trying to up his weight and stay in shape.

“Last year, I definitely used as a base line just how I want to move forward. I just feel like I need to be an overall better receiver,” he said. “There’s nothing specific I can say that I just worked on because I would be telling the defense what to look for. I tried to get better mentally, my footwork. I went and worked with different trainers. We had a long time to lift and rest.

I did gain a little weight, did stay in the gym a little bit. I just want to be a better overall receiver coming in because I knew that it would only have to get better from last year. That was just a stepping stone and I would have to propel myself into a better situation.”

As he approaches his second season, Meyers is focused on staying consistent.

“That’s probably one of the most important things about playing this game,” he added. “They don’t want guys who can just come in here and do it one day or have one good practice. They want a guy who can practice good all year. That’s something I’m definitely trying to work on this year – being more consistent, finishing out the year strong and being here every day. Not a guy they just count on to make one play and then he’s done.”