Jaren Jackson Jr. played one season for Tom Izzo’s Michigan State program before leaving for the NBA. However, the reigning Defensive Player of the Year recently revealed he almost came back for a sophomore season with the Spartans.

During a recent appearance on The Podcast P with Paul George, Jackson was asked about his time playing for Izzo and the Spartan family in the NBA. Jackson spoke glowingly about Izzo’s time and care for his players before revealing it was a phone call from Draymond Green that helped him make the decision to go pro.

According to Jackson, it was Izzo that encouraged Green to give Jackson the call during his preparations for another school year at Michigan State:

“Everybody tight, it’s a family. I didn’t meet Draymond for real until I left. He would come and play pick up with us, come and talk shit about his rings, stuff like that. When I was about to leave school — I didn’t read draft boards, just because it kind of through me off and I honestly really didn’t look. I was going to come back to school and I was signing up for classes, everything the next year,” said Jackson. “And then Izzo had (Draymond) call me. I had never met this dude and he’s like ‘Yo, what the hell are you doing? What is wrong with you? How high do you want to go?'”

Ultimately, everything worked out with Jackson going No. 4 overall to the Memphis Grizzlies in the 2018 NBA Draft.

Jaren Jackson Jr.’s career accomplishments

During his lone season at Michigan State, Jackson was the B1G’s Defensive Player of the Year, a B1G All-Freshman selection and the B1G’s Rookie of the Year. He averaged 3 blocks per game as a freshman to go with 10.9 points, 5.8 rebounds and 1.1 assists while shooting 51% from the field and 40% from 3-point range.

With the Memphis Grizzlies, Jackson has developed into an NBA All-Star and a game-changing defender as the league’s Defensive Player of the Year. In 5 seasons, he has a career average of 2.1 blocks per game and set a career-high with 3 blocks per game during the 2022-23 season.

Here’s the full clip of Jackson’s appearance on Paul George’s podcast: