"Tarvaris Jackson made a good first impression, saying the right things about joining the Seahawks, citing the great opportunity ahead and the benefits of learning from those things in the past.

He's a better person and quarterback for having gone through his experience in five seasons in Minnesota, he said. As for Seattle, well, he's all about competing and being part of a team.

For greater depth about him is best supplied by others, by those who can provide an idea of just who is this Tarvaris Fox Jackson III who takes over the Seahawks' offense tonight in the first exhibition game at San Diego.

Reggie Barlow, who had an eight-year NFL career and subsequent coaching positions at Alabama State, preceded Jackson through the Ridgecrest neighborhood in West Montgomery, Ala., and Sidney Lanier High School.

While he was off in the NFL, Barlow began hearing from old friends in Montgomery about a junior high kid named Tarvaris Jackson. "He is the absolute truth," he was told.

Barlow said Ridgecrest was a neighborhood with challenges, but Jackson developed the straight and strong character of his mother, Sanque, who worked at a Montgomery car factory.

"She's a very, very strong person, and his personality is definitely from her," Barlow said. "She's athletic, too; he got that competitive mentality from her."

Seahawks receiver Ben Obomanu experienced Jackson's early physical skills firsthand. The Sidney Lanier Poets were rivals of Obomanu's Selma High. And while Lanier's nickname (after the ill-fated Reconstruction poet) did not inspire much fear, the team's strong-armed quarterback did."