ATLANTA - Edwin Jackson, 26, an Atlanta native and Colts player was laid to rest on Monday, February 12, 2018.
Jackson's godmother said that "he was always driven" and he "loved, loved, loved his family and his God".
"We will never forget Edwin Joseph Brown Jackson."
Jackson's former Colts football coach, Chuck Pagano, spoke of how Jackson came to be affectionately called 'Poundcake' by his teammates during the service,
"Poundcake. I'll never forget the first time he came to West 56th. He sat down and I said, 'I just have to know, where you got the nickname, Poundcake, can you explain to me please?' I know that Arizona picked up, Cardinals picked up Edwin in 2015 as a free agent and I know that circumstances had it where I think he might have missed his first flight and was a little bit tardy. He was never tardy with us at the Colts, I can tell you that. So I guess mom made some pound cake to take back with him, just to get in the good graces of Coach Arians and the rest of the Cardinals organization. It must have been some good pound cake."
Many teammates, former teammates, coaches and friends were in attendance to pay their respects to Jackson.
Colts General Manager Chris Ballard had positive things to say about the player despite only knowing him for one year,
“So I learned a long time ago not to question why God does what he does. He brought us together with the Jackson family and he brought me and Edwin together. I probably known Edwin the least here, a year. But about my third day on the job was a young man who comes up with a big, bright smile and introduces himself. And everyday, he introduced himself to make sure he knew that I knew who he was. One day he came down to my office and we had a long talk about, you know, where are we going? What are we doing? You know, football’s not going to last forever. It doesn’t. It ends for all, whether it’s in junior high, high school, college or the NFL. Then I started to ask him, ‘Where are we going? What’s our next step?’ And, he got a big, bright smile on his face and we talked about school and how we were going to finish. But he thought he had more to do. He had more to do than leave. He had a platform. He had a platform to serve others. And he was tremendous in that way. He was one of our more active guys when it came to serving our community.
"(The Jackson family) You inspired me to treat people differently because tomorrow is not promised to any of us. He was a special young man and was very fortunate to have gotten to know him. But he’s not gone. He’s not gone. The impact he made on our organization, on our players, on our coaches, on our scouts is tremendous and that will live on. It will live on and he will always be a Colt."
Photo: Family photos of Edwin Jackson
Jackson was killed on Sunday, February 4, 2018, by an alleged drunk driver. The driver was identified as 37-year-old Manuel Orrego-Savala who is a citizen of Guatemala.
Jackson's funeral was held at the Big Bethel African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church located on 220 Auburn Ave. NE in Atlanta.
