ESPN report: Dillon Baxter admits he's not working hard enough at USC

For those of you who watched the CIF Division IV football championship at the end of last season, you'll remember (painfully, if you're a Valley Center fan) that Mission Bay's Dillon Baxter ran roughshod through the muddied Jaguar defense for upwards of 400 yards.

At the time, I remember thinking that this kid was a prodigious talent, but I couldn't help but notice that his attitude seemed...a bit off.

For example, before the game started, both teams were out on the field warming up, each team on its own half. Baxter managed to situate himself right at the 50 yard line, closer to the Valley Center sideline than his own, and lo and behold, ended up in a bit of a jawing match with some of the Jaguars.

During the game, despite the fact that he was running around the field like a grown-up on the playground field with a bunch of kids, Baxter's teammates all but ignored their star on the sideline. Perhaps he purposely stood by himself, perhaps his teammates just didn't want to talk to him, perhaps it was a little of both. But it was in sharp contrast to Valley Center's recently-graduated phenom, James Johnson, who was always pumping up his teammates with encouragement, cheering on the team during the brief moments when he wasn't in the game, and talking with coaches about the game plan. Baxter seemed like he was already finished with Mission Bay (a theory supported by the USC beanie he was wearing after the game, which I noticed only after he was the absolute last player to go through the line to shake hands with the Jaguars).

He was pretty highly touted coming out of high school, and USC landed him. But this week, after a few disappointing efforts, this report came out on ESPN.com about Baxter's lack of effort.

He may be superbly talented, but as Johnson has shown at the University of Washington (earning a starting WR spot as a true freshman, but having been slowed by an ankle injury in his sophomore year) that hard work is what separates the great from the pretty good.