Back home again in Baker County for football coach Jamie Rodgers

Second in a four-part series, Faces of Football 2026, featuring intriguing college and high school players and coaches.

GLEN ST. MARY — Like every kid in this community west of Jacksonville just off Interstate 10, the Friday night lights were special to Jamie Rodgers. It meant Baker County High School football at Downtown Memorial Stadium in Macclenny and rooting on the Wildcats with the hope of one day playing for them.

And it meant sirens loud enough you could hear from blocks away.

“(The team) gets a police escort for the two buses down (Highway) 90 and the traffic would stop and the lights were blocked and I remember as a kid, just hearing the sirens wailing,” Rodgers said.

Rodgers is about to hear the sirens wail again.

Twenty-nine years after

he graduated from Baker County, 20 years after he first joined the coaching staff as an assistant and eight years after he left as head coach, Rodgers is back leading the program.

And it feels totally right for the Wildcats to be coached by Rodgers, who has a career record of 120-50.

“I think it’s exciting for him,” offensive coordinator Tyler Stevens said. “Everything we’re out, everybody wants to stop and talk with him and see how the team is doing. I’m sure there’s pressure, but it’s also excitement.”

The Wildcats won their Week 0 game over Dunnellon, 10-6, on Aug. 14, and open the season at Clay on Aug. 21. Their home opener on Aug. 28 is against Bradford, the school Rodgers coached from 2022-25.

“Our staff talks a lot about what we want our mission statement to be,” Rodgers said. “It’s hard work and grit, which these kids have. These are hard-working kids. It probably takes a couple of years to get (the culture) where you want it, but we’re trying to fast-track that.”

Falling in love with coaching

Rodgers graduated from Baker County in 1997 and played baseball at Jacksonville University. After college, coaching wasn’t on the radar. He loved playing football and baseball in high school and baseball in college, but it was time to get on with a business career.

Around 2001 or ’02 (he isn’t quite sure) he was working on the management side of the Wal-Mart Distribution Center down the road from the high school when he attended his first Baker County football game in years.

Rodgers second-guessed a decision a “little loudly,” but was not “overly critical.” But to one woman, it was too loud and too critical.

“If you’re so good, why don’t you do it?” the woman said.

“Matter of fact, I will,” Rodgers replied.

It wasn’t until 2005 that Rodgers decided to reach out to Trinity Christian coach Verlon Dorminey through a mutual acquaintance about volunteering for the Conquerors’ program. That season, Rodgers would work his day job and attend every practice and every game.

Rodgers was hooked.

“Oh, yeah,” he said. “Once they take (playing) the game away from you, there is only one way to compete and that’s coaching. That’s what drew me in. I love it.”

By 2006, Rodgers was teaching/coaching full-time and joined Baker County coach Bobby Johns’ staff as defensive coordinator. After four years, he followed Johns to Milton, Fla., and then Alma, Ga., before he returned to the area for his first head-coaching job in 2012 with Suwannee in Live Oak.

Rodgers The Coach became Rodgers The Builder. His first team went 3-7, but followed with 7-3, 12-2 and 9-3 seasons, making the playoffs each year. He returned to Baker County as the head coach in December 2015 and inherited a team that went 6-5 the previous season.

The success was instant — 9-2 out of the gate, which set the foundation for the 2017 season. The Wildcats went 13-2 and lost 44-15 to Plantation American Heritage in the Class 5A state title game.

But what a season it was for the community.

“That was a state championship-caliber team and we ran into one of the best teams in Florida history,” Rodgers said. “My greatest football memory as a player or coach was when we came out to (Orlando’s) Camping World Stadium and there 4,000-5,000 Baker County fans on our side. It was like thunder when we ran out.”

After going 7-5 in 2018, Rodgers was on the move to Cook High School in Adel, Ga., about 145 miles northwest of Jacksonville.

“(Coaching in Georgia) was always something I wanted to try since I was a super young coach,” he said. “I loved it. It was exactly what I thought it would be. It’s the mecca of high school football, but I also learned there wasn’t a big difference between South Georgia and North Florida at a lot of schools.”

Cook went 4-8, 5-5 and 5-6, but losing his father during that span forced Rodgers to re-assess and created a desire to get back to Florida. In 2022, he was hired by Bradford High.

Over four years, Bradford went 46-7. Upon joining Bradford, Rodgers moved back to Baker County. He was basically home. There was just one more step to make and it happened in January. It was time to coach Baker County again.

“When I got the call and they said they were interested, it was pretty easy (to take the job),” he said. “The opportunity to come home was awesome.”

Identity of the Wildcats

The Baker County football tradition started in the 1950s and Rodgers still runs into players from some of those teams. From 2006-25, the Wildcats have had only two losing seasons, but a state championship has eluded the school. Stop anywhere around town, Rodgers said, and you’ll run into a Baker County alum. They love to watch and talk high school football.

“They may go off to college, but everybody kind of ends up back here at some point in business, teaching, the medical field,” he said. “People gravitate back because it’s so tight-knit and people look out for each other.”

And Rodgers has always been of them and has gravitated back to Baker County several times.

What is the Baker County identity for this football season, I asked Rodgers?

“I want the identity to be the same as our tradition,” he said. “Toughness, play with good character, play with good sportsmanship and above all else, when the other team wakes up on Saturday morning, we want them to be as sore as they’ve ever been from a football game.”

Buckle up, Baker County fans. The Rodgers Way is back.

Coming Thursday, Aug. 20: After three years at East Carolina, Jacksonville native/University Christian alum Desirrio Riles is back in the area to play tight end for Florida State.

Contact O’Halloran at [e-mail] or on X at @ryanohalloran. Listen to Ryan on 1010AM on Tuesdays (6:35 p.m. on “Into The Night"), Thursdays (1:15 on "XL Primetime") and Fridays (4-7 p.m.).

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Back home again in Baker County for football coach Jamie Rodgers