{"id":229393,"date":"2026-04-13T06:44:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T06:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/229393\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T06:44:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T06:44:08","slug":"former-nfl-player-chris-payton-jones-30-dead-in-a-florida-car-crash","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/229393\/","title":{"rendered":"Former NFL player Chris Payton-Jones, 30, dead in a Florida car crash"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Former NFL player Chris Payton-Jones died in a Florida car accident on Saturday night. He was 30.<\/p>\n<p>Payton-Jones, who was driving a sedan, collided head-on with a pickup truck in Alachua County, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.news4jax.com\/sports\/2026\/04\/12\/one-of-my-all-time-favorites-friends-coaches-recall-impact-of-chris-payton-jones\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">News 4 Jacksonville<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39069082\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/chris-payton-jones-9-st-125550205.jpg\" alt=\"Chris Payton-Jones in a white football jersey with blue accents and the UFL logo.\" class=\"wp-image-39069082\"  \/>Chris Payton-Jones #9 of the St. Louis Battlehawks poses for a portrait on March 07, 2024. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>He was the only person killed in the crash. The truck\u2019s three passengers suffered only minor injuries. His family confirmed his death.<\/p>\n<p>Payton-Jones signed with the Lions, Titans, Vikings and Raiders, playing in 29 games over six seasons in the league. He recorded 48 tackles and seven passes defended in the NFL.<\/p>\n<p>The 6-foot, 230-pound defensive back out of Nebraska most recently played for the Seattle Battlehawks of the UFL in 2024 after spending 2022 in the XFL with the SeaDragons.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39069083\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/3-nick-whiteside-10-st-125550219.jpg\" alt=\"Football players Chris Payton-Jones and Nick Whiteside posing for a photo.\" class=\"wp-image-39069083\"  \/>Chris Payton-Jones #3 and Nick Whiteside #10 of St. Louis Battlehawks pose for a photo after a game against Arlington Renegades at The Dome at America\u00e2s Center on May 02, 2025. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSeeing him get the call from the Detroit Lions to welcome him to the National Football League and, you know, hugging his family and just being in that atmosphere\u2026 it hits you a little different because he had so much more to give to the world,\u201d Patrick Clark, Payton Jones coach at Sandalwood High School, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.actionnewsjax.com\/news\/local\/he-had-so-much-more-give-community-mourns-passing-chris-payton-jones-former-nfl-star\/34J4KZFLDFGORPH7BB3SS7GIZY\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">told Action News Jacksonville.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n<p>In recent years, Payton-Jones became well known in his local community for his Flashflix media company and YouTube channel, which has more than 1.3 million views. The channel was focused on local sports in Jacksonville.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe just was an honest, genuine, true-to-himself type of person,\u201d Clark said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former NFL player Chris Payton-Jones died in a Florida car accident on Saturday night. He was 30. Payton-Jones,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[2864,28,30,29,116,119,110],"class_list":{"0":"post-229393","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-car-crashes","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-florida-headlines","11":"tag-florida-news","12":"tag-jacksonville","13":"tag-nfl","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}