The NFL has busted R. Jay Soward again, and so it's pretty clear now that he is what he is: a mess.

Coaches from Florida to Southern California have tried, and academic advisors have tried, and Keyshawn Johnson has tried, and a father has tried, but R. Jay Soward is not the least bit interested in anyone's help. He has one foot in the league, and one foot in the gutter, and what he needs is two feet in rehab.

Anyone who has met him has been charmed by him, and anyone who has been charmed by him has been betrayed by him. To say people saw this coming is an understatement, but to be 24 years old and to be able to run a 4.2 forty and to be virtually out of the league now -- it's almost self-mutilation.

You'd have to have been around him to understand it. You'd have to have seen him play at USC. The first ball he caught in college was a 97-yard touchdown pass. One of the first kickoffs he returned was a 98-yard score.

But one of the first weights he ever lifted was in his senior year.

This was never a dedicated athlete. There are reasons why he rebelled, and there are reasons why he still rebels, but the truth is he has finally walked in his father's footsteps. And it's a damn shame.

R. Jay's father, Rodney Sr., was once one of the greatest athletes in San Bernardino history. But he couldn't assimilate with his teammates well enough, and he swung a bat one day at a teammate's head. He was kicked off his high school team, and the Oakland A's -- who had been scouting him -- stopped coming around.

So that was it. His best sport, baseball, was over with. He ended up playing football for Cal Poly Pomona, but he'd just had his third child by a third different woman -- a child he named R. Jay -- and he had to quit football to make some cash.

So he bought a gun. And he sold drugs.

"I got arrested once for having a loaded weapon," Rodney Sr. told me when I did a story on R. Jay two years ago for ESPN The Magazine. "The charges were dropped, and I was never convicted, but I'd lost a handle on things. I'd had plans for my life. And now I was a mess."

And so that's how sports ended for Rodney Soward Sr. And it's the reason why he went and became a born-again Christian. And it's the reason he over-protected his young son, R. Jay.

So here we are, 20-odd years later, and R. Jay Soward is still paying his father back. Paying his father back for holding on too tight, for grabbing his facemask at Pee Wee football games. Paying his father back for giving him 11 p.m curfews in high school. Paying him back for beating him after he skipped a chemistry class. Paying him back for kicking him out of the house at the age of 17.

The rebellion of R. Jay Soward all started then, and, apparently, it's too late now to cure it.

Over the years, there were so many signs of trouble. Like the time his academic advisor at USC, Janice Henry, kicked him once and for all out of her office.

"Well," R. Jay once told me, "Janice and I feuded all the time. Because she wanted me to go to class all the time. Because she acted the way my father acted. Because she was my father in a shorter lady's body. She was my father!"

Or there was the time a coed in his dorm accused him of threatening to kill her. She had reported him to police for playing his music too loud, and she claimed he said he'd do bodily harm to her.

Or there was the time he thought his coach, Paul Hackett, was spying on him.

Or the time his USC teammates asked him if he was on cocaine.

Or the time he committed early to the NFL and threw a "Going to the NFL Party."

Only to change his mind the next day and stay in school.

Only to throw another "Going to the NFL Party" the next night.

Or the time he refused to have a telephone -- so the coaches couldn't find him.

Or the time he agreed to get the phone, but not an answering machine -- so he wouldn't have to return their calls.

Or the time he started hanging out with a 28-year-old rapper.

Or the time he began writing his first rap song. A song that went like this: People trying to get on my good side, thinking I'm gonna be their ticket to fame and riches. But they're some stupid bitches. They try to play me for a fool, but I've got no time for these wanna be'd, ashey-kneed, no-teeth, n-----s thinking 'we cool.'

Or the time he tattooed his left arm with "Outlaw."

Or the time he was homeless, living in a Chrysler Sebring.

Or the time Keyshawn Johnson tried talking him straight.

Keyshawn, before R. Jay turned pro, told him: "Why do you braid your hair? Why be something that's not you? You didn't come to USC like that. You grew up in Rialto! That's the suburbs. You're not from Compton! Be who you are! You're no rapper."

R. Jay's response: "Tell Keyshawn to s--- me."

So these were all the signals that it would be over soon. But on the other hand, R. Jay Soward ran that 4.2 forty at the combine and he started lifting his one 40-pound barbell at home -- "Penitentiary lifting," he'd say. "Lifting for no reason at all." -- and the Jacksonville Jaguars actually bought into it.

He fooled them into picking him in the 2000 first round. Fooled them into handing him over millions of dollars in signing-bonus cash. And if it wasn't them, it would've been somebody else.

But now, in only his second season, he's been suspended twice. For substance abuse each time. The other day, the NFL told him he cannot play until Week 11 this year, and even then, it's not clear if the Jaguars will have him back.

If they're smart, they'll hand him over to Alcoholics Anonymous instead. Of course, if they can even find him.

From what I hear, he still doesn't own an answering machine.

Tom Friend is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. E-mail him at tom.friend@espnmag.com.