It's in Jack Simmons' blood

Christmas Day, 2007. One by one, the presents around the Simmons' tree were distributed. Mom, Dad, brothers, sister. Then there was only one left.

Jack Simmons walked over, picked it up, carried it to his dad, Terry.

Terry Simmons opened the box. Inside was a University of Minnesota football jersey with Simmons stitched on the back above the No. 15.

Terry Simmons wore No. 15 punting and playing special teams for the Gophers back in the late 1970s. Jack, a tight end on the current team, wore No. 80.

Not anymore. Wanting to honor his dad, Jack went to Gophers coach Tim Brewster asking if he could wear his father's number on Senior Day. Brewster said, why not wear it all year?

To appreciate the significance of the jersey, it is necessary to understand the past. Terry's dad, Jack, played pro football for nine seasons.

"How many gifts can you get like that?" Terry Simmons said by phone from his home in Libertyville, Ill. Then he paused, cleared his throat. For five seconds, silence.

"I'm getting a little emotional here,'' he said. "I'm living a dream. My son is a starter for the Gophers. He'll have his master's when he finishes up next spring. He loves being there, it's my alma mater. I have that jersey in my bedroom, I look at it every day."

Lost season

Jack Simmons is hoping that just about everybody else will be seeing a lot of the No. 15 this season. Especially after the way last season went.

It was Sept. 1, the first game of the Gophers' season, the first game of the Brewster era, against Bowling Green at the Metrodome. It was the first time Simmons was lining up as the go-to tight end.

Second quarter, third-and-2. Quarterback Adam Weber dropped back to pass. Simmons ran a short route, turned, caught the ball, then turned upfield. A Falcons safety grabbed hold of Simmons' right foot, twisted, and ...

Pop.

"The guy cranked on my foot and I felt it go," Simmons said. "I tried to play in two more plays and I couldn't move."

Goodbye quickness.

Simmons had finished the 2006 season with a strong performance in place of injured Matt Spaeth at the Insight Bowl against Texas Tech: seven receptions for 134 yards and a touchdown. The following August, with Spaeth gone to the NFL, Simmons showed up in Gophers camp and started tearing up the artificial turf at the practice facility. Being a pass-catching tight end in a newly installed spread offense is a very good thing, and Simmons was determined to take advantage.

He was catching balls and creating chemistry with Weber. Only one problem. That Texas Tech game? Simmons suffered a turf toe injury. It stuck with him going into camp last year. It wasn't a big deal -- until his whole right foot started to swell. And then, against Bowling Green ...

Compensating for the turf toe had created a stress reaction. That tackle in the opener pretty much completed the process. Simmons missed two games, then came back with a brace made for him by a guy at Duke University.

In pain, Simmons played. "I had a 'Why me?' moment when it first happened," he said. "But then it just became something you dealt with."

It's amazing what you can play through with a good dose of gameday adrenaline. But getting off the line? Ouch. Turning on a dime? Try a silver dollar.

"Drive blocking was just brutal," Simmons said.

Simmons, 22, was talking after practice this week and he was smiling. He had surgery in December. He spent spring practice easing himself back up to full speed, gaining confidence that the foot would hold up. During captains' practice in the summer?

"It was so exciting to go out and just run," he said. "Just run and be carefree. Just play football again."

Football bloodlines

Jack Simmons is named after his grandfather, John Charles (Jack) Simmons, who played nine years of pro football as a center, linebacker and occasional punter. He played for the original Baltimore Colts in the All-America Football Conference in 1948, then moved to the NFL, where he played two years with the Detroit Lions and six with the Chicago Cardinals.

The eldest Simmons died before his namesake was born, but Terry Simmons had a highlight reel of his dad's career to remember him by, and he had it converted to DVD. There are times, when Terry watches his dad play, walk, run or just stand on the sidelines, that the two Jacks look like identical twins. It was Terry's mom, Rosemary, who noticed it first.

"It's in the way they walk, the way they hold their hands on their hips," Terry said.

It was the elder Jack Simmons who started the family tradition of playing football. Terry was a wide receiver and punter -- "My dad taught me both to punt and to long snap," he recalled, "but you can't do both" -- in suburban Detroit. As a senior, Terry was recruited by the Gophers, Indiana and Michigan State.

One by one, each coach came to visit: Cal Stoll for the Gophers, Lee Corso from Indiana, Darryl Rogers from Michigan State. Terry's dad took each out for a beer and a talk. According to Terry, Stoll was the only coach who promised nothing but an opportunity to play and a good education; he can remember his dad and Stoll walking into the room together, with Jack's arm around Stoll's back.

Minnesota it was. "I fell in love during my recruiting trip," said Terry, who lettered for the Gophers from 1977 to '79 and now is a vice president for a health care firm.

Move forward a generation. Jack Simmons was an all-everything player at Carmel (Ill.) High School, with six Big Ten schools calling. Terry didn't want to push his son. All he said was make a list, check the pros and cons and think about it. Then, early one Saturday morning, Terry was on the porch reading the newspaper when Jack walked out.

"He said, 'I'm going to be a Gopher, Dad,' " Terry said.

Unbeknownst even to his father, Jack had always wanted to be a Gopher.

Healthy again

Terry Simmons said he never knew just how badly his son was hurting in 2007. Jack played in 10 of the 12 games, catching 20 passes for 202 yards.

"Jack didn't talk about how bad he felt," Terry said. "I'm not sure I knew how bad it was. He's a strong competitor. Give him the credit for giving it a try."

Jack Simmons has spent the first weeks of his senior camp making the point that he's healthy. And it has not gone unnoticed.

"I tell you what, Jack Simmons is really looking good," Brewster said. "This camp he looks excellent. He's running pain-free. To have him in the middle of the field is going to be a tremendous plus for us."

At his best, Simmons can be a force over the middle, a big (6-4, 250 pounds) target that is easy for Weber to find, one that makes it hard for defenses to focus on wide receiver Eric Decker.

This is Simmons' final chance to take the next step. The NFL is something he refuses to think about much right now. But playing there is something he has thought about his whole life.

"It's been a dream of mine," Simmons said. "It always has been, since I was a little kid. But I'm more worried now about how we develop as a football team. And I'm really excited about what I think we can do. The level we're at right now compared to last year is mind-boggling."

If the offense works as well as he thinks it can, the rest of it -- his future in the game -- will take care of itself.

As a child, Simmons had one of his grandfather's old contracts with the Lions framed and on his wall. It's still there, visible from his bed in his parents' house.

"I think the main thing is to concentrate on having a great year, playing football and having fun," he said. "If the NFL becomes an opportunity, I'll be excited."

In the meantime, he's just having fun, feeling no pain, working at the family business -- football. When he was in grade school, he wrote an essay about his future, writing that he expected to be playing at the University of Minnesota, like his dad, wearing that No. 15.

''It's funny how things worked out," he said.