'Sauce' Gardner aims to give teens a step in the right direction with football camp

Coming off of his rookie season, when he was named Defensive Rookie of the Year, New York Jets All-Pro Sauce Gardner is in high spirits.

“It was pretty cool you know, like always,” Gardner said. “You always have something to work on. I got a lot of things I can work on that’s going to get better coming into my second season. I had a pretty good year.”

The first annual Sauce Gardner Family Foundation Football Camp took place Saturday afternoon in Detroit. The camp was created to help under-served teens in Detroit, and Gardner put young football hopefuls through drills and talked about leadership, work ethic and the importance of education.

Detroit is Gardner's hometown, and he felt it was important to give back and help the kids in his community.

“Its always important because these kids need some guidance,” Gardner said. “All of these kids don’t have father figures in their lives, it’s just a good deed. Me personally when I was young, I didn’t have an NFL player who was having camps that I could just go to at the age of these kids.”

“I wanted to get ahead of the curve, and I want to do it every year,” Gardner said. “I just want to watch these kids develop each and every year. There are a lot of reasons why this camp and the camps I am going to be doing in the future are going to be very beneficial to not only the kids but the parents as well, making their job easier. I just want to give these kids as much knowledge I can give them.”

Gardner said his expectations for his second year with the Jets are to win.

“I want to win a Super Bowl,” said Gardner. “I want to be the best teammate I can be. Not just my personal goals but I just want to be more team oriented. I just want to be the best teammate I can be to help my team win.”

jclowers@detroitnews.com