There are so many boys, girls, men and women with the name Rex living in Southern California that they could form their own football team.
“We have like 28 cousins,” said San Clemente High strong safety/receiver Jaxson Rex.
Every Christmas, the Rex adults and their children, ranging in age from 4 to 28, come together but the family football games have been put on hold.
“We don’t play football anymore because everyone will get hurt and the dads try too hard,” Jaxson said.
There were eight Rex siblings who grew up first in Hawaii, then Bellflower. All are married. The most famous is Bryon, who was an All-American tight end at Brigham Young and is Jaxson’s uncle. Byron’s son, Isaac, played tight end at San Clemente and BYU, and another son, Preston, is a senior running back at BYU.
Jaxson will follow the family tradition of playing at Brigham Young, committing during the summer despite a strong bid by UCLA’s new coaching staff to pull him away. “I loved how UCLA’s new coaching staff is,” he said.
Jaxson is so talented there isn’t a position he can’t play in emergency except on the line. The 6-foot-1, 200-pound senior was recruited by several schools to be a receiver but sees himself as a strong safety.
“What I’ve enjoyed is the physicality in football,” he said. “I grew up playing basketball and football and realized I wasn’t going to be 7-foot tall, so I tried to focus on football once I hit eighth grade.”
A motivational moment came when he was in sixth grade and moved from Long Beach to San Clemente. He ended up playing against seventh- and eight-graders, which meant he hardly played.
“I never want to be not on the field,” he told himself.
Jaxson doesn’t leave the field for San Clemente (2-0), returning punts and kickoffs besides catching passes and making tackles and interceptions on defense. If you like someone who creates turnovers, that’s Jaxson. He’s always trying to take the ball away from running backs, quarterbacks and receivers.
Last season he had five interceptions, two returned for touchdowns, and 68 tackles. He also caught 10 touchdown passes. He averaged close to 30 yards on kickoff returns. He had 12 solo tackles in the Southern Section Division 2 final loss to Los Alamitos.
“He does everything and then some,” coach Jaime Ortiz said. “He has a high football IQ. He’s tenacious.”
Former NFL tight end Dennis Pitta, an assistant coach with the Tritons, said, “He’s as hard of a worker and as good as an athlete you could ask for.”
Jaxson calls living in San Clemente “paradise.”
“We always have an ocean breeze, not too hot, not too cold,” he said. “I can always work out any time of the day.”
The end of the summer practices for San Clemente involves jogging from campus 1.8 miles to the San Clemente Pier.
“Everyone is honking their horn while we’re going,” Jaxson said.
Imagine if 28 Rex cousins were participating. The noise would be so loud the town might think a parade was taking place.
Jaxson has an 11-year-old brother learning to play safety.
As long as players named Rex keep coming through San Clemente, the football team will be more than fine.
