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Charles Nelson

(Thomas Boyd/The Oregonian)

EUGENE -- Charles Nelson is wearing a Mike Tyson T-shirt.

The Oregon freshman sits back into a couch away from the TVs inside the Hatfield-Dowlin Complex. He's got jean shorts on and his brick-red shoes are flashy, but it's the Baddest Man on the Planet pressed on cotton that really stands out.

Nelson didn't buy the shirt; a friend gave it to him. It fit.

Of course it did.

The 5-foot-9, 170-pounder doesn't have the frame of Iron Mike, but through the first eight weeks of Oregon's season he's packed the punch. The Daytona Beach, Florida, native has returned two punts for touchdowns. He wears De'Anthony Thomas' number, but DAT never hit like this. Nelson's forced fumbles, blown up returners and barreled through blockers. He's been so good, so early that fans adore him and coaches fight for his services.

"Charles Nelson," defensive coordinator Don Pellum says, "can do anything he wants."

That may be so, but the Ducks aren't sure what to make of the Florida native. He's listed as a receiver, returns kicks, guns and has taken reps in the backfield. As the season wears on, the Ducks are searching for ways to further implement the small-packaged talent. Every week it seems the Ducks learn something new about Nelson. It's the same thousands of miles away, where an older Charles Nelson keeps learning about a son who never quite opened up.

***

In Eugene, Nelson sits with his back to Monday Night Football. Watching doesn't interest him. The apartment he shares with Royce Freeman and Arrion Springs doesn't have cable. He'd rather be playing, anyway.

Back in Florida, he didn't like the beach, either. Nelson's friends loved hanging out at Ormand Beach, one of those picturesque plots of sand just north of Daytona. Pick up a travel magazine. It looks like that.

It was boring, Nelson says.

"I don't like the sun like that," he says, rubbing his arms. "I'd rather be running. Or playing football or something like that. I don't want to just sit in the sun and tan. I'm already tan."

He's never been one to sit.

Nelson's grandfather once had a Chihuahua that drove everyone crazy. One of those wind-up small dogs that never stopped. Except for when Nelson came over. Bud hated Nelson.

"That dog would run everyone else crazy," Nelson's dad, Charles, remembers. "He ran that dog to death. The dog would hide every time he came over. He was dead tired."

It was the same way in fifth grade flag football, when Nelson was often flagged for unnecessary roughness. Or how when he took to music he chose the drums. Always going. Always moving.

At Seabreze High School he made varsity as a freshman. He'd rattle off 50-yard touchdowns and stay on as the team's long snapper.

"Somebody wasn't doing well and I just tried it one time," Nelson says. "We would score and I would snap the extra points. It was pretty easy."

Of course it was.

Over the next two years, Nelson's motor and explosiveness turned him into one of the state's most versatile prospects. Nelson was listed as a running back, receiver, safety and kick returner during his junior year. He averaged 10.9 yards every touch and scored a touchdown every 8.4 times he got the ball.

Playing the game was perfect for Nelson. The field was a place for a relatively quiet kid off the field to expend energy.

In the Sand Crabs' seventh game of the season, he tore his ACL. And with football taken away, it left the always-moving Nelson immobile.

***

Charles Nelson fears Charles Nelson. No, the Oregon freshman isn't quote-on-quote afraid of his father. It's more about disappointment. Nelson has lived his his father primarily since the fourth grade, with his mother living about 50 miles north in Palatka. He'd see her just about every other weekend, but for the most part, it was Charles and Charles.

The elder Nelson is a contractor at Raydon Corperation, a company that builds simulators for the military. He ran a pretty strict house, keeping on Nelson about his grades. There were standards and then there were his standards.

"I got asked a question one time about the one thing I fear," Nelson says. "I don't fear my dad. I'm not scared of him. I just fear him.

"I can talk to my mom about anything. With my dad it's more about a not disappointing feel."

There's seven Charles Nelson's in the family, and on long car rides, Charles Alphonzo Nelson used to bet Charles Keanan-Tyler Nelson that he couldn't' stay awake for 15 minutes.

Dad almost always won.

"He's always been that way," the elder Nelson says. "Never talks a lot. Never says much. Just goes out and plays."

Nelson wasn't able to play after the seventh game of his junior year. In a 34-30 loss to Palm Bay Bayside his ACL snapped.

It was a major loss for the Sand Crabs, a team that would go on to lose two of three games without him. For Nelson, though, it was devastating. It wasn't great for the home dynamic, either.

"He drove us all crazy. He would not sit still," Dad says. "Physically and mentally that was probably the toughest thing for him. To have to sit out. I've watched him cry. That first game he missed he didn't know what to do. He just wanted to be out there."

Naturally, Nelson attacked the rehab process as hard as he could. By the time track season came around, Nelson was convinced he was ready to return to competition. The doctors agreed. His dad didn't.

While Nelson desperately desired to get back on the track to qualify for the postseason, his dad wanted him to wait.

The health clearance didn't meet his standard.

It didn't go over well.

The two got in a argument that resulted in Nelson staying with his mom for a couple of days to cool off.

Both concede it was a typical argument between a father and teenage son, though Nelson still contends that he was healthy enough to run.

"He wanted me to do training and I didn't understand what the difference was," he says. "He was (just looking out for me). I still feel like I had the right decision."

"He just wanted to qualify for districts for track," his dad adds. "'What if you trip? What happens? Now you have to start all over.'

"We got into a bit of an argument. He will not stop."

Nelson didn't run track that spring. He unleashed his pent-up energy that fall during football.

***

Nelson returned to full form. By the end of his senior season, he had racked up at least 18 offers. He didn't, however, have the one he wanted. Nelson was holding out for Oregon.

He finally got it with a little assistance from his coach.

To help bump up the stock of his two-way starter for three seasons, Seabreeze High head coach Marc Beach put the word out about Nelson. And one of his first calls was to a friend who happened to play in college at Nebraska.

That friend knew another former Cornhusker, Oregon offensive coordinator Scott Frost, who soon was calling Daytona Beach after watching Nelson's highlight package.

USC was pushing hard. Schools out east were closing in.

"(Frost) said, 'Is it too late to get in on this guy?'" Beach said.

It wasn't.

"I was trying to make a decision soon and I hadn't really heard from them," Nelson says. "Didn't hear from them until January. They called and said they were going to offer me and I was excited. Seemed like a trip worth taking."

***

Nelson was convinced his teammates thought he was too small. He never heard anything, but he was sure they underestimated him. He's always been the competitive type, whether its with football, video games or on the track. In fall camp his goal was to quickly dispel the notion about his size.

It was something that the 5-foot-8 Johnathan Loyd gravitated toward. The basketball star turned football player remembers seeing a kid running around camp at a million miles an hour. He was a blur, but his heart was easy to spot, Loyd says.

"He always says, 'I'm going to bring the train and the train don't stop,'" Loyd says. "That's what me and him say together, whether it's on the kickoff, punt or anything. He's just running full speed into that contact."

That's probably what Ducks fans recall the most about Nelson. Sure, he's had two highlight-reel punt returns for touchdowns. But as special teams coach Tom Osborne says, those are easy.

"If they block well, all he should have to do is beat the kicker," Osborne says.

Nelson's touchdown against Cal was a little more complex, as he dipped and cut his way to a 58-yard score. What was more impressive to those who know him, though, was the fumble he forced as a gunner later in the game.

Nelson charged onto the defensive scene with a jarring hit against a Michigan State returner in Week 2, though he was flagged for early contact. Six games later against Cal, Nelson timed it just right, exploding into Bryce Treggs to force a fourth-quarter fumble. If he hits perfect, Nelson says it feels like hitting the sweet spot on a baseball bat.

Charles Alphonzo Nelson has watched each game from Florida, sometimes driving 15 minutes down the road to a friend's place that has the Pac-12 Network. None of the highlights have surprised him. He's never doubted his son's abilities. He's been blown away by the way he's grown up. Nelson's been the focus of numerous interviews, press conferences and podcasts. Where Dad remembers a shy son that would squeak out one-word answers, he's doesn't quite recognize what Nelson's turned into.

"Everything was always, 'Yes sir' or 'No sir'," Dad says. "For him to do an interview and to actually speak, it's like, 'Is that really my son up there?'"

And if the Ducks vision of Nelson is correct, he'll be talking heavily for a few more years. Head coach Mark Helfrich and Frost keep saying he'll be more involved in the offense. Defensive backs coach John Neal is trying to lure him over to the defense. Some Ducks fans think he should run for president.

So what does Nelson, the quiet kid with seemingly limitless possibilities, want to do? It harkens back to the standard his dad set in high school.

"You got to be on the field," his dad would tell him. "If you're not on the field, nobody will see you."

The two never communicated that well, but this was something that always stuck with him. Nelson has seemingly infinite opportunities at the college level and has no desire to box himself in.

Would he prefer to play at a certain position?

"I wouldn't," Nelson says. "I'll play anywhere and try to be the best at anything I do."

Charles Nelson can do whatever he wants. And right now, he wants to do everything.

-- Tyson Alger | @tysonalger