Anyhow, Jackson was never around on days the team spoke with members of the media, so none of my colleagues asked him about this. But he did stop in at the set of Larry Michael’s “Redskins Nation” this week, where he explained why he’s been absent much of this spring.

“Really I’ve just been spending a lot of family time,” Jackson said. “You know, my home is so far from here, East Coast / West Coast, so that flight is a little hectic. But I’ve really just been spending time with my mother. You know, she had a birthday coming up. I had a grandma spending a lot of time out there because she’s been sick a little bit, so she’s been staying with my mom and kind of back and forth to my uncle’s. So just really being able to enjoy that and enjoy being a dad.

“You know, you don’t get really that time too much to spend during the season, because our schedule’s so crazy,” Jackson said. “So really the time’s been used just spending family time, taking a couple vacations and working out at the same time. I’m a big firm believer that you get you results from working out, so I’ve been doing a lot of training and speed work and beach work, lifting weights. Gained a couple pounds, not too much. Still got the speed though.”

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Jackson said he’s dedicated his offseason to getting in the weight room and getting a little more physical, “just to be able to keep the durability up during the year and not take a couple hits and go out of the game; to stay in there and block a couple bigger guys and things like that.”

“Even though I haven’t really been here that much, I’ve dedicated the time,” Jackson said. “And you hear the reports, people saying I forfeited the workout bonus. Don’t get it wrong, it’s definitely something I would have loved to do, but spending that time with my family and doing things on that side of the world definitely pays off too.”

“You knew what you were doing?” Michael asked.

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“I do,” Jackson said. “You know, I’m the one that’s out there jeopardizing my life, my body and everything in between the white lines.”

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Michael, the Voice of the Redskins and a senior VP of the team, also asked Jackson a few pointed questions about this issue, like whether his absence from last year’s voluntary workouts might have contributed to his hamstring injury.

“You know, some people say that the fact you weren’t here last year had anything to do with your [hamstring] injury,” Michael mentioned. “How could that be true? And how would you address that, because you’ve got guys like Usain Bolt who’s going to pull a hamstring, and he’s training 24 hours a day, so what do you say to folks who might have a comment like that?”

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“Well, I think everybody has their own opinion, truth be told,” said Jackson, then explaining that his hamstring injury was related to his shoulder injury in training camp, but not to his offseason absences.

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“I see how you interact with your teammates, you’ve got all your buddies on the team — how much do you like being with this football team?” Michael also asked. “I don’t know why people always question something like that, but I see you — you seem like you’re a pretty happy dude.”

“Yeah, I mean, I love being here,” Jackson said. “Washington, this is home to me. Since I came here the first day I’ve said all along they had open arms in bringing me here and making me feel like a guy that’s one of them. All the way up to Bruce, to Dan Snyder, I feel like this is a home for me and I can call this a home, and hopefully I can stay here throughout my career until I’m over and done and retire here and be a Washington Redskin. Teammates love me, I love them, all the way to the coaching staff and to the [front office]. … So hopefully we can make it work to where I come back here. It’s a big year, the last year on my contract, so you never know how it’ll play out, but I’m hoping everything goes right and I’m back here next year.”

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“I hope so too, man,” said his interviewer. “You’re so highly regarded here.”

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Truth be told, if I were a player facing possibly uncomfortable questions, Redskins Nation seems like a decent place to answer them. If I were a media member hoping to ask those questions, I would probably go take a look at my whiskey selection about now.

Redskins coaches and teammates, meanwhile, said exactly what’d you expect they might say about Jackson.

“We’re gonna coach the guys that are here,” Coach Jay Gruden said. “We’d love for ’em all to be here. But I trust the fact that when [Jackson] is not here, he’s getting his body ready to go. And he proved that the last couple days. He looked as fast as he has ever been, had great stamina, was in good shape, had great knowledge of the game and was a lot stronger than I’ve seen him before. DeSean is gonna be just fine.”

New cornerback Josh Norman said Jackson and Kirk Cousins “kicked my butt” on Tuesday, and that he was looking forward to more.

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“The first day was cool. The second day he came out and gave me that work,” Norman joked on Wednesday. “So I enjoyed it. I look forward to seeing more of that, but he wasn’t here today. I was like dang, this guy. I called him up; he didn’t answer my phone call. But it’s cool, though. I mean, we’re not pressing that. To each his own.”

“To go against a guy like that changed the game,” Norman also said on ESPN 980. “If I can go and cover that, I’m gonna consider myself a game changer as well. We’re only going to help each other out.”

Gruden has said he expects Jackson to attend next week’s mandatory minicamp, and Jackson had praise for his coach.

“We’ve got a great coach in Jay Gruden,” the receiver said on Tuesday. “He’s doing a great job of challenging guys out there. This is my second day back, and I’ve just been seeing how fast the team’s working. He’s putting us in positions to go out there and do great.”