Exclusive: CJ Heard Feels Improved and Ready For Second Season in the SEC for Vanderbilt Football – Sports Illustrated

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Months before the 2025 college football season began, Vanderbilt built its transfer portal class that ultimately helped them achieve its first 10-win season in program history. In that portal class was FAU safety transfer CJ Heard.
The Commodores knew going into last season that they had an impactful player that had been overlooked at the Group of Five level. Little did they know it at the time, but Heard quickly became a big part of Vanderbilt’s defense last season. So impactful that Heard started all 13 games for the Commodores and finished the season with 71 tackles, an interception and a fumble recovery.
Going into his junior season, Heard wants to take it up a notch. He feels he has improved aspects of his game that are setting him up to be an even more important player in 2026.
“I think my biggest area where I really improved, I’d say, is my movement and my confidence. The coaches trusting me and giving me the keys and stuff like that just instills the confidence in you. You get that from repping, but when coaches believe in you in a different way it gives you a different type of confidence,” Heard told Vandy On SI.
Heard has spent plenty of hours this offseason becoming more mobile as a defensive back and feeling faster than he was a season ago. That improvement has come from increased time spent with the strength coaching staff. From a mobility standpoint, Heard says that he has learned to unlock his hips when backpedaling.
All the work he has put into getting his body and his movement right for the 2026 season has definitely made a difference, noting that the reps he takes as a defensive back now flow much easier.
Last season was Heard’s first year playing in the SEC. Making the jump from the American Conference to his current one was an adjustment that he took lessons from that he is ready to apply this season.
“The biggest lesson, I’d say is consistency., Just stay grounded, don't get too high or too low based on the game. Every week's gonna be a challenge when you're in the SEC, so every game is gonna be like a championship game,” Heard said. “You can't have an off day in practice. Every day, you got to be the same. Coach Lea always talks about descending, just going back to the bottom and going back to the top. Your process can't change, you got to stay at it.”
What may be a surprise for some people to hear, though, is that the physicality element of football was not as big of an adjustment going from FAU to playing SEC competition each week. In fact, Heard believes the physicality of the sport is comparable between the two.
The difference he did notice was the size of the opposing offensive lineman. Having to blitz against the bodies up front in the SEC is a different experience than his freshman year in Boca Raton. That brought the toll on his body.
“When I'm blitzing and when I'm down there in a box and I have to take a lineman, like those guys are not G5 guys. There's a reason those guys are in the SEC. You don't feel it right after, but after weeks and weeks and weeks of going against opponents, they start to pile up on your body,” Heard told Vandy On SI.
Going into this season, Heard is more familiar with the type of players he is going to be matching up against. He’s used it to his advantage through getting his body right for the season and believes he is ready to play fast and play at a high level.
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Graham Baakko is a writer for Vanderbilt Commodores On SI, primarily covering football, basketball and baseball. Graham is a recent graduate from the University of Alabama, where he wrote for The Crimson White, WVUA-FM, WVUA 23 as he covered a variety of Crimson Tide sports. He also covered South Carolina athletics as a sportswriting intern for GamecockCentral.
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