Jalon Daniels describes his preseason Big 12 recognition as recognition for KU football

ARLINGTON, Texas — The release of the preseason honors for Big 12 Conference football came with a lot of fanfare for the Kansas Jayhawks.
Four KU players were voted by the media to be on the preseason All-Big 12 team. That total tied Kansas with Kansas State for the second-most in the conference, behind Texas’ five. And one of those four, junior quarterback Jalon Daniels, was also named the league’s preseason offensive player of the year.
But this week, while Daniels was at Big 12 media days in Arlington, he routinely used questions about the honor as opportunities to talk about his team as a whole. The recognition was wonderful, he said, because it’s an example of the work during head coach Lance Leipold’s rebuild paying off. It’s another chance to see their momentum is moving in the right direction.
“I’m really just glad that Kansas football is finally getting its recognition and notoriety that we’ve been working for,” Daniels said. “When coach Leipold first got here, it’s something that it was rare to hear Kansas football unless it was about some type of joke or anything like that. So, the fact that this is real notoriety and real recognition for the program, it means a lot for us because it means that we’re taking those steps forward that need to be taken.”
That Daniels was voted as the preseason offensive player of the year, makes a lot of sense. Despite missing a significant amount of Big 12 play due to injury last year, he was voted by the conference's head coaches as a second team, all-league talent. He was in large part the face — at least when it came to the athletes — of why the Jayhawks were able to host ESPN’s “College GameDay” show in Lawrence in 2022 for the first time.
In the end, Daniels completed 66.1% of his passes in 2022 for 2,014 yards and 18 touchdowns while throwing four interceptions. On the ground, he rushed for 425 yards and seven touchdowns while averaging 5.5 yards a carry. Throughout the offseason, as the program has looked to capitalize on the momentum of making a bowl game for the first time in more than a decade, there’s been a concerted effort to make sure Daniels is in the best position possible to make it through 2023 healthy.
What Daniels’ upcoming campaign will look like, exactly, will be determined in time. But this is quite the start, with senior safety Kenny Logan Jr. alluding to what it means for their teammates to see one of the leaders on the team held in such high regard. And Leipold, who anticipates Kansas’ offense as a whole receiving a lot of attention from opponents, sees Daniels as someone who can make all the throws and be what the Jayhawks need Daniels to be.
“I think Jalon also knows that he has to go out and play each and every week and prove himself, and I think he embraces that,” said Leipold, who also praised Daniels’ charisma and leadership capabilities. “We have to make sure that we take care of him and keep him healthy.”