August 17, 2022 • 25 mins
_Marlon Humphrey talks Steelers-Ravens rivalry and playing defensive back with Hall of Famer and Ravens color commentator Rod Woodson._
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
I love robberies. It's great for the game. I currently
my biggest robbery is the other side, the Pittsburgh Steelers.
You have a unique experience of playing for both of
them and doing pretty well with both. How does that
come when that game comes up twice a year? How
do you how do you kind of feel? I'm neutral,
(00:20):
You're neutral, I'm neutral. And you know I got to
play for I say, four Conic franchises in my lifetime,
and you know in Baltimore with the one that gave
me my Super Bowl ring, So they got a special
place in my heart. Yeah, okay, I thought so. Carlin
Humphrey is without a doubt in the conversation to be
(00:41):
the best pointer in the football. All right, guys, we're
back at Studio forty four with Hall of Famer Rod Woodson.
Really excited to have him here. Always great to have
a gold jacket sit in front of me. Rod, How
are we doing today? I'm doing good? And how about yourself?
I gotta start off with this. I love robberies. It's
(01:05):
great for the game. I currently my biggest robbery is
the other side, the Pittsburgh Steelers. You have a unique
experience of playing for both of them and doing pretty
well with both. How does that come when that game
comes up twice a year? How do you how do
you kind of feel? I'm neutral, You're neutral? I'm neutral. Yeah.
(01:26):
I came into the league, got drafted by the Steelers
with first round ten player taken. Spent ten wonderful years there,
great organization. They have their motto is a standard as
a standard, right. So I got to be around Chuck Nole,
who's you know, two time winning super Bow champ back
to back, the only coach ever do that. Me and
(01:47):
Joe Green was there, got to play Donnie Shell, he
was in his last year. John Stalwart, that's how old
I am. John Stalworth was still playing. That was his
last year. So I got to be around all those
iconic guys. And then Meyl Blunt, who I think is
the best corner to ever play in the National Football League.
When they change rules for you, you're doing something right.
(02:08):
So Mayl was there, and I got to meet Mayl
and be a part of that whole organization for ten years.
You know. It was one of those things that when
I got to come here, this was a young team
when I got here third year, you know, they just
got back and a football just got back into town.
And you know, Ray was in his third year. Jail
(02:30):
was his third year. You know, those guys were really
good athletes, but we had to try to figure out
how to win. So all the stuff that we kind
of did in Pittsburgh, we just kind of started doing
here a little bit. But then Ray took it to
the next level. And then now the same heres, you know,
played like a raven. That's why I think the teams
always played extremely well against each other. You know, they
(02:51):
don't they don't like the colors. You know, it's like
a turf war, right, they don't like the colors, But
I think they respect each other, and so I like
to I like to watch the game because it's always
a close game. I think all the games except one
or two in the time frame in the last ten
years of being score, I think we've been won by
more than ten points. So it's always a close game.
(03:13):
So I just like watching that. I get I take
my emotions out of it. I like watching ball. I mean,
I'm a football junkie. I've been playing football since I've
been nine years old, and you know I got to
play for I say four Conic franchises in my lifetime,
and you know, in Baltimore was the one that gave
me my Super Bowl ring, So they got a special
(03:34):
place in my heart. Yeah, okay, I thought so. So
you spoke on Ray. I think it's interesting. You know,
what was it like seeing Ray and Jonathan, those guys
that were young kind of grow into these I mean,
you were well on your way to your own Hall
of Fame career. But seeing those guys young and then
seeing them put on their own own gold jacket, how
is that like seeing them kind of grow those years? Yeah?
I mean when I got here, you know, I was
(03:54):
a year twelve for me. So they called me mister
Woodson when they told me, hey, man, I used to
play with you. I played with you Techmobile. I'm like, oh,
come on, man, come on, I said, mister Woodson. My dad,
don't call me mister Woodson. I'm Ride. But you know,
being with Ray, you know, I didn't spend a lot
of time with Jo. I spend more time with him
now than I do when I was, you know, playing
because OFFENSI difference is always split up, you know that, um.
(04:17):
But being with Ray, he was just one of those runners,
the guy that led the team in tackles. Every year,
it led the league in tackles. And my challenge to
him was to let's learn the game at a higher level.
I mean, he studied film already, but let's studied even
better unless and let's push all our teammates to do
the right thing every single day, every single play, every
(04:39):
single moment of the day. And if you do that
and you speak up when when practices are going slow,
when they're going fast, when you give love the players,
they're gonna they're gonna follow you because you're the contemporary.
And the first year he did it a little bit.
The second year he did it even more. The third
(05:00):
year kind of clicked for him. And that's where I
started seeing how great ray Lewis is going to be
as a leader. He was a baller already on the
football field, but as a leader of men on the
field north the field, that's when he really developed as
a as a one of those guys that people followed.
And when he when he spoke, the guys not just
in Baltimore but around the league, they listened to him.
(05:23):
And to me, that was it was kind of like
that big brother feeling like I was really proud of
him to see him kind of grow up and get
through his adolescence in his late thirty because I know
it took me a long time to get through my adolescence,
but to see the type of player he became at
the end where I can say, arguably he's the best
mental linebacker I've ever seen him play. It's pretty special.
(05:46):
And speaking of great players, you know you have Defensive
Player of the Year, All Pro, Pro Bowl, Super Bowl,
take Away, the you know, the accolades, and the Super Bowl.
What year do you think, well, just a year when
you were like, man, I played my best ball this year. Well,
(06:08):
how I got to the best ball first? Is in
my third year, Tony Dungee just left us. He was
my defensive back coach and my defensive coordinator. He just left.
We got a guy named Rod Ruster came in as
our defensive coordinator. He challenged me to learn the game
more mental to physical, and I was like, okay, we'll
didn't teach me in no way. I ain't doing nothing
after practice and this is the offseason. So we him
(06:32):
and I all by ourselves met in the office five
straight weeks. His first question was asked me was how
many formations can our offense get into. I like, I mean,
I don't know, you know, and he was like, no,
how many? How many eligible receivers? I said five? It's
like they can get in five formations and he said,
what they do is that they give you different personnel groupings,
(06:55):
move those pieces around, finish up with the formation, and
they only run so many plays those formations. And then
he starts showing film and I'm like okay, and then
about four weeks into it, a little green light clicking.
I like, you got that's all they do. He's like, yep,
that's all they do. You just gotta believe it when
you see it. I said, oh, I ain't, don't worry
(07:17):
about that. I'm gonna believe it. And so if it
wasn't for him to get to my best year and
I think my best year was the year I won
MVP because I had I had seven picks in the
first six weeks and then I had one pick after that.
I didn't do my way, ain't done my way to work.
But I mean, it's it's one of those things that
(07:37):
it was one of those years that Dick lebo and
playing in that system, I got the bleds I got
to show different coverages, got He let me be me
inside of this system, and a lot of coaches don't
let you do that because they want you to play
their way. But I think the great coaches allow their
players to be who they are inside their systems because
(07:59):
when you when you're comfortable, that's when you played your best.
So I would say it was that that MVP year,
the defensive every year ninety three and so I think
it's really interesting to play such a long career at dB.
I know later you ended up making the transition to safety.
(08:19):
How was that transition? Like what kind of led to that? Well?
I was a safety of my whole life until I
ran my forty at the combine. Okay, I ran at
four to eight. There's like, you're gonna be a corner.
I like, what, No, I'm not. I'm not. I played
with my eyes. You can't play with your eyes at corner,
and I do that. That is true. So that was
a learning lesson for me though. So when I got
(08:41):
in the league, Tony was good for me because Tony
wasn't gonna yell at me, curse at me, belittle me
because I didn't know what I was doing out there.
I always played from the top down. I always I
was a safety from nine years old. All that they produce.
I played a little corner my last year, but I
played a bunch of positions my last year or produced.
I played corner, safety, receiver, running back. So I did
(09:04):
a little everything, not knowing what I was going to
do in the league. So it took me probably two
and a half years to understand corner, Like what do
I really need to do? Because Tony used to ask
me all the time, Amy, what are you thinking about?
I'm like, I don't know, Like I don't know what
I'm thinking right now because I still don't know how
to play out here. I play with my eyes and
(09:25):
then I realized I can play with my eyes, but
then I can make that quarterback see something he really
does see. So that's when I started playing off on
cover two at eight yards. Then I start press baling,
stopping at three yards and cover two. Then I started
I would move around and my coverages, and I started
(09:45):
doing my half split rules, so depending on where the
ball was at on the field, I would line up
inside or out. All that stuff kind of came over
the over course of time, but it was that third
year kind of really clicked for me. I need it.
I needed those three years to get it. But then
on that third year, that's when I got ribbed rus
too though. That's when he cuts me out and he
(10:06):
really challenged me, and then in all came together. So
four to eight forty, he guys, that's back in the combine.
You guys are doing combent lines. So what were we doing?
How old you think? They're like, like, how do you
think we like? Ain't you? Honestly, I don't know what
you used to being. We had other helmets back in
the day. Honestly, I didn't know you had. But no, um,
(10:33):
I didn't know there was I didn't know when that.
So the Combine was in Indianapolis for the first time
the year I came out in nineteen eighty seven, that
was the first year it was in Indie and I
went to Purdue. So it was it's straight up the road,
you know, forty five fifty minute drive, right up the road.
They told me, hey, you got the uh you got
the combine in a couple of weeks, But I was
(10:55):
already ring a track, so he was I was like,
combine was a combine. I didn't know what the combine us.
And I was like, uh's when they get the top
three hundred guys and they take them up to your
work out A D for football. I'm like, okay, So
I just drove up combine was two days. Did our
little that are stuff that are physicals and all that
stuff that our own field work, did our little wonder
(11:17):
leg wonder leg test. I think it took me probably
thirty seconds to finish that. All I did would go
A B C D dB C A A B C D.
I went to I went to I went to school
for four years. I know more than that what you think.
So you were a track got too. I know you
did hurdles. I did hurdles as well. Um you saw
some records in the hurdles. I wonder do you think
(11:40):
there's a big correlation from track to football that helped
you with your game? Oh? Yeah, I think speed is
speed is everything. When you can run fast, I don't
care what position you're talking about. When you see those
big linemen pulling, they coming really quick, I mean they're
a little a little scary. So speed for me was
I mean, track was my first love. Nice right, Track
(12:04):
was my first love. Football is my first, like team
love though, because track is a team but there's eight
individual lanes for a reason. You run it against your boys,
right guy. You guys all gather points up at the
end of the day to try to win the track
meet for your team. Football there's no individual lanes in football.
(12:26):
You have to play together. So there are two team
sports that are completely different. And that's why I love
track though, because yeah, I had a team atmosphere, but
I got to run against my fellows, you know how.
You know how it is when you go get your guys,
you get to like tease your guys, like, yeah, dure,
I got you today, right. So for me, I started
running track when I was twelve, and I just got
(12:47):
a little bit better, a little bit better, a little
bit better, and then luckily I found some great coaches,
especially my last year in college when I started running
track before I got into the pros and in and
ran my really good time in the hurdles, where I
got a hurdling coach. So that to me or I think,
are two different sports. But track was always been that
(13:09):
love that I still followed the day. A lot of
my buddies ran track back in the day, you know,
That's one of the things I think if I didn't,
I have not ran track. I don't know if I
would have been as good as a football player because
I've never been optimizing my top end speed track. I
really enjoyed track. I love I keep up with them now.
(13:29):
I have a lot of people that actually I know
that are competing, so it's been it's been cool seeing
those people blossom. Do you think track helped you in
your think? So? For sure. I think for me it
gave me something completely different to work on as far
as especially with hurdles. You know, I never was doing
football year round. I think that breakup was really good
for me, just to get that breakup doing something different,
(13:49):
still working on speed that can help with both. But
it was a really good kind of break up for me. Yeah,
I mean for me, I loved it. Also, it kept
me very flexible, Yeah, because you can't be a tight hurtler, right,
So if you're a tight hurtler, you got some issues.
He's knocking down on all the hurdles. Um. So for me,
the flexibility of being the hurtler really helped me in football.
(14:11):
It allowed me to be in od positions and still
get out of it all getting hurt. Yeah, I think
that's a that's a big key. So when you talk about,
you know, the people you saw, I know you had
some matchups to Jerry Rice, a lot of different great players.
I'm all sides of the ball. Who would you say
was a matchup that was probably your favorite guy to
go against? Your favorite never really a favorite, but that's
(14:36):
an interesting way to say. I know there's not a favorite,
but I would say the toughest, like I played against Jerry,
but I don't. He played against Jerry twice, and Jerry
is young the first time around. Um. But the person
that really gave me issues that I saw twice a
year every year was Webster Slaughter. So he's a He
(14:56):
was a you know, five ten receiver from Cleveland, had shakes.
He played in the slot I played nickel. You know,
normally nicols are smaller corners dbs than being six with
foot than two hundred and ten pounds, So him being
in that slot, he gave me some issues. Now, I
(15:16):
was still learning how to play corner and nickel at
the same time, so he gave me issues. And he
talked a lot, and I'm not a real talker. I'm
a blue collar guy like, all right, just bro shut up,
we'd be good. But you know, he was one of
those guys that level run his little mouth and he
was hard to cover though, and he made it hard.
(15:37):
He was one of them. And Andre Reid was another one,
because Andre Hall of Fame receiver, you know, Andre was
He might be a little big big, a little bit
bigger than me, about six one, a six two, about
two fifteen, And normally those slot receivers, I put my
hand on him, they would stopped. So I put my
hand on him. He just slapped it down, kept on
(15:59):
going to figure out another game plan with him. Yeah. Yeah,
I think I get in the slot too. Those those
smaller guys were easier, but it was bigger. It's stuff,
it gets stuff. So out of all those matchups, I
guess I kind of still want to ask you about
corner to safety. What were kind of the biggest differentials
(16:19):
you You moved to safety later in your career. I
moved to when I was here in Baltimore after my
twelfth year, I moved there and you stayed there for
the rest of your career, right first my career, So
how was that kind of later in your career how
was your body, I guess feeling as as you went
through those later years. I mean it was a it
was a relief, but I had to re calculate everything
(16:39):
because playing corner, and you played corner, you know everything's
over here. Yeah, I mean, everything's always at an angle
this way. And then when you come back here and
you're like that all twenty two, You're like, yeah, that's new.
It's a little bit different. It's a little bit different.
And I think I don't know if it was our
first preseason game or a second. We played a land
(16:59):
in the season. Jamaalus came through hit me. A matter
of fact, he gave me that little scar right here.
I woke up. I got up and bleeding. I looked
at right and I said, who, I don't know about
the safety. Bro. We go back to the hell of
laugh and I'm like, man, okay, I gotta get a
little bit. I got a little bit stronger, got a
gain some weight. So I came again, I think again,
(17:21):
like another four to five pounds, but it was more muscle.
And then all the feelings came back, like what I
could do? How I can you know, because on the
corner they might not throw your way, they just don't
throw your way. Well you can, you know you can
at safety. You can kind of act like you're going
somewhere to come back. You can move around a lot,
still be involved in the game, which I mean, that's
(17:42):
what I enjoy doing. And it kind of came back
a little by a little week after week. I had
to figure out, like what my angers were going to be,
how how I want to what I want to show
to the quarterback and the receivers. And then it kind
of probably mid season the first year, I click it
all back in. Yeah, that transition I know was I
(18:02):
was on the team with Jimmy. He tried to make
that transition. It's it's definitely a lot of different coming
downhill as opposed to having that angle. And so I
want to talk about that two thousand championship defense. I
I played for the Ravens obviously, but I did not
know much history about it. I didn't know that it
was a very The defense did a lot of scoring,
(18:22):
like a lot of scoring. Sometimes the offense didn't. What
was kind of you guys's mind said, I know there
was a streak when the offense went four games five
five no no touchdowns. How was kind of what was
the mindset on defense. I think, we really can't give
up anything if we're gonna win this game. You know,
that was but that was a that was a process though.
(18:43):
So when I got here in ninety eight, the process
was to be the best that we could be each
and every day, or be a better version of ourselves
tomorrow than we are today. Well, how do you do that?
You gotta work. I mean there's no I mean, there's
no secret to success outside of working at it. So
for us, it was going into practice running to the
(19:03):
ball every single every single down, every single play, even
the big boys, everybody had to touch the ball. And
that's what we did. Everybody every single down and had
to go touch the ball. And I was our conditioning.
So when you played against us, we're gonna play just
as fast in the first quarter that we did in
the fourth quarter. And you know, each year we got
(19:25):
a little bit better. But that that third year, everything
everything kind of clicked. I think Marvin called some Marvin Lewis,
who was our defense coordinator, he called some great games.
He had some great game plans. But then Marvin would
also start he started listening to us like we were
uncomfortable with some of the plays and some of the calls.
He would take him out of the out of the
(19:46):
game plan. And then you know, all the guys from
the front end to you know, to Sam Adams, to
Tony Sierragosa, to Michael McCray, to to Peter bow Ware
to Rob Burnett. I mean, those guys can get after
the quarterback and they couldn't run the ball agausiness. I mean,
(20:07):
nobody could run the ball against it. So in the
secondary we didn't have to worry about it. So we
just we stayed back. No seams, no post, no goals.
They try to throw the ball deep, We try to,
you know, make some plays on the ball deep. We
knew they weren't gonna run a ball against us, And
you know, at the end of the day, I could
arguably say that that was the best defense I've ever
(20:29):
seen play football. And I'm including than eighty five eighty
six Bears. I'm including those guys just for the fact
we broke their record. So there, they're scoring record in
sixteen game season. We broke that by I think like
twenty three points or something like that. I mean, obviously
that record is never gonna be broken. Adding the seventeen
(20:51):
game and the rule changes and all that stuff. I
think it all this kind of came together and we
played for each other. Marvin. I think that year Marvin,
if he wasn't, should have been assistant Coach of the
Year because he had some great game plans for us.
So you guys just all on one accord, man. That's
(21:11):
what so we preach about all the time in our
in our room. It's it's crazy when it all clicks. Um.
And we were talking about today as a as a
DBS our coaches asking us, you know, what's your when
did you start playing the game? And why do you
still play the game? And I'm curious, what are your
(21:33):
when did you start? And what is your why? The why?
I mean, I started playing because my brothers played. I
was the youngest of three boys. They were playing. Like,
I don't want to be at the career by myself, mom,
I want to play. So I started playing for the
Pole Raiders when I was nine. And the reason, but
the reason I dedicated myself when I got into the
(21:55):
league is my father was a blue collar worker. It's
all he did. He didn't even have a high school degree,
so he worked two jobs to make ends meet. All
I knew was how to work. So me running on
the track and working out in the weight room, that's
that was nothing. Seeing him come home with like grease
(22:17):
in his hands and not making enough money to make
ends meet. And do we have to keep the water
on or the gas on and get food? That's life.
Those are life issues. So what I was doing, it
was kind of easy to be honest. And I had
coaches in place and people in place in my life
(22:37):
throughout my time, especially in the Pros, having Tony Dune
when I first come in, because if I would have
had a yeller in holler when I first came in,
I don't know if I would have made it because
I would have been more. I would have pushed back
a little bit. And then Tony taught me to calm down.
You don't always have to speak your mind about everything.
And then Rod Russ comes in, and then after that
(22:59):
I get Dick Lebo, Don Capers and Bill Kawer. But
Dick Lebo was the you know, he was the key.
He was a catalyst of his defense. And you know,
not having all those guys taught me offseason, just work hard,
just train, stay on the track, keep my speed, keep
my endurance, get to a point where I've trained while
(23:22):
I'm tired. So we used to get up in the
morning at six o'clock, go swimming, had a swim workout.
From the swim, we went to the track. From the track,
we went to lifting. From the lifting, went to the field.
We did that every single day. I did that for
fifteen years. That's a day and we were there from
six in the morning. I probably got home about two
thirty three o'clock in the afternoon. That to me, helped
(23:43):
me become the player I was because in the game,
even when I got tired, I still was going to
challenge myself. I wasn't gonna playoff. I'mst do gotta show
me you're gonna beat me. Yeah, okay, last question, and
I love asking people this and whatever sport, whatever position.
What is the hardest thing about playing corner in the NFL.
I think it's the hardest position to play, especially with
(24:07):
the rules, especially for you guys. It's different, you know,
because you guys, even though there's a five yard chuck rule,
they just don't let you touch him. Yes, um, but
I think playing corner the hardest thing is, you know,
if if you give up one touchdown out of nine,
(24:28):
you had a bad day, you know. But if you
if a quarterback is you know, seven of ten with
two tubs, he had a great day. Yeah, you can't
have You can't give up touchdowns in the pros, right,
If you do that here, then you you lose it.
So that's to me the hardest thing was, you know,
(24:50):
getting beat and then happen to apologize to your teammates
if we lose, I thank you for you. Appreciate it.
Man to the great, absolutely m hm
I love robberies. It's great for the game. I currently
my biggest robbery is the other side, the Pittsburgh Steelers.
You have a unique experience of playing for both of
them and doing pretty well with both. How does that
come when that game comes up twice a year? How
do you how do you kind of feel? I'm neutral,
(00:20):
You're neutral, I'm neutral. And you know I got to
play for I say, four Conic franchises in my lifetime,
and you know in Baltimore with the one that gave
me my Super Bowl ring, So they got a special
place in my heart. Yeah, okay, I thought so. Carlin
Humphrey is without a doubt in the conversation to be
(00:41):
the best pointer in the football. All right, guys, we're
back at Studio forty four with Hall of Famer Rod Woodson.
Really excited to have him here. Always great to have
a gold jacket sit in front of me. Rod, How
are we doing today? I'm doing good? And how about yourself?
I gotta start off with this. I love robberies. It's
(01:05):
great for the game. I currently my biggest robbery is
the other side, the Pittsburgh Steelers. You have a unique
experience of playing for both of them and doing pretty
well with both. How does that come when that game
comes up twice a year? How do you how do
you kind of feel? I'm neutral, You're neutral? I'm neutral. Yeah.
(01:26):
I came into the league, got drafted by the Steelers
with first round ten player taken. Spent ten wonderful years there,
great organization. They have their motto is a standard as
a standard, right. So I got to be around Chuck Nole,
who's you know, two time winning super Bow champ back
to back, the only coach ever do that. Me and
(01:47):
Joe Green was there, got to play Donnie Shell, he
was in his last year. John Stalwart, that's how old
I am. John Stalworth was still playing. That was his
last year. So I got to be around all those
iconic guys. And then Meyl Blunt, who I think is
the best corner to ever play in the National Football League.
When they change rules for you, you're doing something right.
(02:08):
So Mayl was there, and I got to meet Mayl
and be a part of that whole organization for ten years.
You know. It was one of those things that when
I got to come here, this was a young team
when I got here third year, you know, they just
got back and a football just got back into town.
And you know, Ray was in his third year. Jail
(02:30):
was his third year. You know, those guys were really
good athletes, but we had to try to figure out
how to win. So all the stuff that we kind
of did in Pittsburgh, we just kind of started doing
here a little bit. But then Ray took it to
the next level. And then now the same heres, you know,
played like a raven. That's why I think the teams
always played extremely well against each other. You know, they
(02:51):
don't they don't like the colors. You know, it's like
a turf war, right, they don't like the colors, But
I think they respect each other, and so I like
to I like to watch the game because it's always
a close game. I think all the games except one
or two in the time frame in the last ten
years of being score, I think we've been won by
more than ten points. So it's always a close game.
(03:13):
So I just like watching that. I get I take
my emotions out of it. I like watching ball. I mean,
I'm a football junkie. I've been playing football since I've
been nine years old, and you know I got to
play for I say four Conic franchises in my lifetime,
and you know, in Baltimore was the one that gave
me my Super Bowl ring, So they got a special
(03:34):
place in my heart. Yeah, okay, I thought so. So
you spoke on Ray. I think it's interesting. You know,
what was it like seeing Ray and Jonathan, those guys
that were young kind of grow into these I mean,
you were well on your way to your own Hall
of Fame career. But seeing those guys young and then
seeing them put on their own own gold jacket, how
is that like seeing them kind of grow those years? Yeah?
I mean when I got here, you know, I was
(03:54):
a year twelve for me. So they called me mister
Woodson when they told me, hey, man, I used to
play with you. I played with you Techmobile. I'm like, oh,
come on, man, come on, I said, mister Woodson. My dad,
don't call me mister Woodson. I'm Ride. But you know,
being with Ray, you know, I didn't spend a lot
of time with Jo. I spend more time with him
now than I do when I was, you know, playing
because OFFENSI difference is always split up, you know that, um.
(04:17):
But being with Ray, he was just one of those runners,
the guy that led the team in tackles. Every year,
it led the league in tackles. And my challenge to
him was to let's learn the game at a higher level.
I mean, he studied film already, but let's studied even
better unless and let's push all our teammates to do
the right thing every single day, every single play, every
(04:39):
single moment of the day. And if you do that
and you speak up when when practices are going slow,
when they're going fast, when you give love the players,
they're gonna they're gonna follow you because you're the contemporary.
And the first year he did it a little bit.
The second year he did it even more. The third
(05:00):
year kind of clicked for him. And that's where I
started seeing how great ray Lewis is going to be
as a leader. He was a baller already on the
football field, but as a leader of men on the
field north the field, that's when he really developed as
a as a one of those guys that people followed.
And when he when he spoke, the guys not just
in Baltimore but around the league, they listened to him.
(05:23):
And to me, that was it was kind of like
that big brother feeling like I was really proud of
him to see him kind of grow up and get
through his adolescence in his late thirty because I know
it took me a long time to get through my adolescence,
but to see the type of player he became at
the end where I can say, arguably he's the best
mental linebacker I've ever seen him play. It's pretty special.
(05:46):
And speaking of great players, you know you have Defensive
Player of the Year, All Pro, Pro Bowl, Super Bowl,
take Away, the you know, the accolades, and the Super Bowl.
What year do you think, well, just a year when
you were like, man, I played my best ball this year. Well,
(06:08):
how I got to the best ball first? Is in
my third year, Tony Dungee just left us. He was
my defensive back coach and my defensive coordinator. He just left.
We got a guy named Rod Ruster came in as
our defensive coordinator. He challenged me to learn the game
more mental to physical, and I was like, okay, we'll
didn't teach me in no way. I ain't doing nothing
after practice and this is the offseason. So we him
(06:32):
and I all by ourselves met in the office five
straight weeks. His first question was asked me was how
many formations can our offense get into. I like, I mean,
I don't know, you know, and he was like, no,
how many? How many eligible receivers? I said five? It's
like they can get in five formations and he said,
what they do is that they give you different personnel groupings,
(06:55):
move those pieces around, finish up with the formation, and
they only run so many plays those formations. And then
he starts showing film and I'm like okay, and then
about four weeks into it, a little green light clicking.
I like, you got that's all they do. He's like, yep,
that's all they do. You just gotta believe it when
you see it. I said, oh, I ain't, don't worry
(07:17):
about that. I'm gonna believe it. And so if it
wasn't for him to get to my best year and
I think my best year was the year I won
MVP because I had I had seven picks in the
first six weeks and then I had one pick after that.
I didn't do my way, ain't done my way to work.
But I mean, it's it's one of those things that
(07:37):
it was one of those years that Dick lebo and
playing in that system, I got the bleds I got
to show different coverages, got He let me be me
inside of this system, and a lot of coaches don't
let you do that because they want you to play
their way. But I think the great coaches allow their
players to be who they are inside their systems because
(07:59):
when you when you're comfortable, that's when you played your best.
So I would say it was that that MVP year,
the defensive every year ninety three and so I think
it's really interesting to play such a long career at dB.
I know later you ended up making the transition to safety.
(08:19):
How was that transition? Like what kind of led to that? Well?
I was a safety of my whole life until I
ran my forty at the combine. Okay, I ran at
four to eight. There's like, you're gonna be a corner.
I like, what, No, I'm not. I'm not. I played
with my eyes. You can't play with your eyes at corner,
and I do that. That is true. So that was
a learning lesson for me though. So when I got
(08:41):
in the league, Tony was good for me because Tony
wasn't gonna yell at me, curse at me, belittle me
because I didn't know what I was doing out there.
I always played from the top down. I always I
was a safety from nine years old. All that they produce.
I played a little corner my last year, but I
played a bunch of positions my last year or produced.
I played corner, safety, receiver, running back. So I did
(09:04):
a little everything, not knowing what I was going to
do in the league. So it took me probably two
and a half years to understand corner, Like what do
I really need to do? Because Tony used to ask
me all the time, Amy, what are you thinking about?
I'm like, I don't know, Like I don't know what
I'm thinking right now because I still don't know how
to play out here. I play with my eyes and
(09:25):
then I realized I can play with my eyes, but
then I can make that quarterback see something he really
does see. So that's when I started playing off on
cover two at eight yards. Then I start press baling,
stopping at three yards and cover two. Then I started
I would move around and my coverages, and I started
(09:45):
doing my half split rules, so depending on where the
ball was at on the field, I would line up
inside or out. All that stuff kind of came over
the over course of time, but it was that third
year kind of really clicked for me. I need it.
I needed those three years to get it. But then
on that third year, that's when I got ribbed rus
too though. That's when he cuts me out and he
(10:06):
really challenged me, and then in all came together. So
four to eight forty, he guys, that's back in the combine.
You guys are doing combent lines. So what were we doing?
How old you think? They're like, like, how do you
think we like? Ain't you? Honestly, I don't know what
you used to being. We had other helmets back in
the day. Honestly, I didn't know you had. But no, um,
(10:33):
I didn't know there was I didn't know when that.
So the Combine was in Indianapolis for the first time
the year I came out in nineteen eighty seven, that
was the first year it was in Indie and I
went to Purdue. So it was it's straight up the road,
you know, forty five fifty minute drive, right up the road.
They told me, hey, you got the uh you got
the combine in a couple of weeks, But I was
(10:55):
already ring a track, so he was I was like,
combine was a combine. I didn't know what the combine us.
And I was like, uh's when they get the top
three hundred guys and they take them up to your
work out A D for football. I'm like, okay, So
I just drove up combine was two days. Did our
little that are stuff that are physicals and all that
stuff that our own field work, did our little wonder
(11:17):
leg wonder leg test. I think it took me probably
thirty seconds to finish that. All I did would go
A B C D dB C A A B C D.
I went to I went to I went to school
for four years. I know more than that what you think.
So you were a track got too. I know you
did hurdles. I did hurdles as well. Um you saw
some records in the hurdles. I wonder do you think
(11:40):
there's a big correlation from track to football that helped
you with your game? Oh? Yeah, I think speed is
speed is everything. When you can run fast, I don't
care what position you're talking about. When you see those
big linemen pulling, they coming really quick, I mean they're
a little a little scary. So speed for me was
I mean, track was my first love. Nice right, Track
(12:04):
was my first love. Football is my first, like team
love though, because track is a team but there's eight
individual lanes for a reason. You run it against your boys,
right guy. You guys all gather points up at the
end of the day to try to win the track
meet for your team. Football there's no individual lanes in football.
(12:26):
You have to play together. So there are two team
sports that are completely different. And that's why I love
track though, because yeah, I had a team atmosphere, but
I got to run against my fellows, you know how.
You know how it is when you go get your guys,
you get to like tease your guys, like, yeah, dure,
I got you today, right. So for me, I started
running track when I was twelve, and I just got
(12:47):
a little bit better, a little bit better, a little
bit better, and then luckily I found some great coaches,
especially my last year in college when I started running
track before I got into the pros and in and
ran my really good time in the hurdles, where I
got a hurdling coach. So that to me or I think,
are two different sports. But track was always been that
(13:09):
love that I still followed the day. A lot of
my buddies ran track back in the day, you know,
That's one of the things I think if I didn't,
I have not ran track. I don't know if I
would have been as good as a football player because
I've never been optimizing my top end speed track. I
really enjoyed track. I love I keep up with them now.
(13:29):
I have a lot of people that actually I know
that are competing, so it's been it's been cool seeing
those people blossom. Do you think track helped you in
your think? So? For sure. I think for me it
gave me something completely different to work on as far
as especially with hurdles. You know, I never was doing
football year round. I think that breakup was really good
for me, just to get that breakup doing something different,
(13:49):
still working on speed that can help with both. But
it was a really good kind of break up for me. Yeah,
I mean for me, I loved it. Also, it kept
me very flexible, Yeah, because you can't be a tight hurtler, right,
So if you're a tight hurtler, you got some issues.
He's knocking down on all the hurdles. Um. So for me,
the flexibility of being the hurtler really helped me in football.
(14:11):
It allowed me to be in od positions and still
get out of it all getting hurt. Yeah, I think
that's a that's a big key. So when you talk about,
you know, the people you saw, I know you had
some matchups to Jerry Rice, a lot of different great players.
I'm all sides of the ball. Who would you say
was a matchup that was probably your favorite guy to
go against? Your favorite never really a favorite, but that's
(14:36):
an interesting way to say. I know there's not a favorite,
but I would say the toughest, like I played against Jerry,
but I don't. He played against Jerry twice, and Jerry
is young the first time around. Um. But the person
that really gave me issues that I saw twice a
year every year was Webster Slaughter. So he's a He
(14:56):
was a you know, five ten receiver from Cleveland, had shakes.
He played in the slot I played nickel. You know,
normally nicols are smaller corners dbs than being six with
foot than two hundred and ten pounds, So him being
in that slot, he gave me some issues. Now, I
(15:16):
was still learning how to play corner and nickel at
the same time, so he gave me issues. And he
talked a lot, and I'm not a real talker. I'm
a blue collar guy like, all right, just bro shut up,
we'd be good. But you know, he was one of
those guys that level run his little mouth and he
was hard to cover though, and he made it hard.
(15:37):
He was one of them. And Andre Reid was another one,
because Andre Hall of Fame receiver, you know, Andre was
He might be a little big big, a little bit
bigger than me, about six one, a six two, about
two fifteen, And normally those slot receivers, I put my
hand on him, they would stopped. So I put my
hand on him. He just slapped it down, kept on
(15:59):
going to figure out another game plan with him. Yeah. Yeah,
I think I get in the slot too. Those those
smaller guys were easier, but it was bigger. It's stuff,
it gets stuff. So out of all those matchups, I
guess I kind of still want to ask you about
corner to safety. What were kind of the biggest differentials
(16:19):
you You moved to safety later in your career. I
moved to when I was here in Baltimore after my
twelfth year, I moved there and you stayed there for
the rest of your career, right first my career, So
how was that kind of later in your career how
was your body, I guess feeling as as you went
through those later years. I mean it was a it
was a relief, but I had to re calculate everything
(16:39):
because playing corner, and you played corner, you know everything's
over here. Yeah, I mean, everything's always at an angle
this way. And then when you come back here and
you're like that all twenty two, You're like, yeah, that's new.
It's a little bit different. It's a little bit different.
And I think I don't know if it was our
first preseason game or a second. We played a land
(16:59):
in the season. Jamaalus came through hit me. A matter
of fact, he gave me that little scar right here.
I woke up. I got up and bleeding. I looked
at right and I said, who, I don't know about
the safety. Bro. We go back to the hell of
laugh and I'm like, man, okay, I gotta get a
little bit. I got a little bit stronger, got a
gain some weight. So I came again, I think again,
(17:21):
like another four to five pounds, but it was more muscle.
And then all the feelings came back, like what I
could do? How I can you know, because on the
corner they might not throw your way, they just don't
throw your way. Well you can, you know you can
at safety. You can kind of act like you're going
somewhere to come back. You can move around a lot,
still be involved in the game, which I mean, that's
(17:42):
what I enjoy doing. And it kind of came back
a little by a little week after week. I had
to figure out, like what my angers were going to be,
how how I want to what I want to show
to the quarterback and the receivers. And then it kind
of probably mid season the first year, I click it
all back in. Yeah, that transition I know was I
(18:02):
was on the team with Jimmy. He tried to make
that transition. It's it's definitely a lot of different coming
downhill as opposed to having that angle. And so I
want to talk about that two thousand championship defense. I
I played for the Ravens obviously, but I did not
know much history about it. I didn't know that it
was a very The defense did a lot of scoring,
(18:22):
like a lot of scoring. Sometimes the offense didn't. What
was kind of you guys's mind said, I know there
was a streak when the offense went four games five
five no no touchdowns. How was kind of what was
the mindset on defense. I think, we really can't give
up anything if we're gonna win this game. You know,
that was but that was a that was a process though.
(18:43):
So when I got here in ninety eight, the process
was to be the best that we could be each
and every day, or be a better version of ourselves
tomorrow than we are today. Well, how do you do that?
You gotta work. I mean there's no I mean, there's
no secret to success outside of working at it. So
for us, it was going into practice running to the
(19:03):
ball every single every single down, every single play, even
the big boys, everybody had to touch the ball. And
that's what we did. Everybody every single down and had
to go touch the ball. And I was our conditioning.
So when you played against us, we're gonna play just
as fast in the first quarter that we did in
the fourth quarter. And you know, each year we got
(19:25):
a little bit better. But that that third year, everything
everything kind of clicked. I think Marvin called some Marvin Lewis,
who was our defense coordinator, he called some great games.
He had some great game plans. But then Marvin would
also start he started listening to us like we were
uncomfortable with some of the plays and some of the calls.
He would take him out of the out of the
(19:46):
game plan. And then you know, all the guys from
the front end to you know, to Sam Adams, to
Tony Sierragosa, to Michael McCray, to to Peter bow Ware
to Rob Burnett. I mean, those guys can get after
the quarterback and they couldn't run the ball agausiness. I mean,
(20:07):
nobody could run the ball against it. So in the
secondary we didn't have to worry about it. So we
just we stayed back. No seams, no post, no goals.
They try to throw the ball deep, We try to,
you know, make some plays on the ball deep. We
knew they weren't gonna run a ball against us, And
you know, at the end of the day, I could
arguably say that that was the best defense I've ever
(20:29):
seen play football. And I'm including than eighty five eighty
six Bears. I'm including those guys just for the fact
we broke their record. So there, they're scoring record in
sixteen game season. We broke that by I think like
twenty three points or something like that. I mean, obviously
that record is never gonna be broken. Adding the seventeen
(20:51):
game and the rule changes and all that stuff. I
think it all this kind of came together and we
played for each other. Marvin. I think that year Marvin,
if he wasn't, should have been assistant Coach of the
Year because he had some great game plans for us.
So you guys just all on one accord, man. That's
(21:11):
what so we preach about all the time in our
in our room. It's it's crazy when it all clicks. Um.
And we were talking about today as a as a
DBS our coaches asking us, you know, what's your when
did you start playing the game? And why do you
still play the game? And I'm curious, what are your
(21:33):
when did you start? And what is your why? The why?
I mean, I started playing because my brothers played. I
was the youngest of three boys. They were playing. Like,
I don't want to be at the career by myself, mom,
I want to play. So I started playing for the
Pole Raiders when I was nine. And the reason, but
the reason I dedicated myself when I got into the
(21:55):
league is my father was a blue collar worker. It's
all he did. He didn't even have a high school degree,
so he worked two jobs to make ends meet. All
I knew was how to work. So me running on
the track and working out in the weight room, that's
that was nothing. Seeing him come home with like grease
(22:17):
in his hands and not making enough money to make
ends meet. And do we have to keep the water
on or the gas on and get food? That's life.
Those are life issues. So what I was doing, it
was kind of easy to be honest. And I had
coaches in place and people in place in my life
(22:37):
throughout my time, especially in the Pros, having Tony Dune
when I first come in, because if I would have
had a yeller in holler when I first came in,
I don't know if I would have made it because
I would have been more. I would have pushed back
a little bit. And then Tony taught me to calm down.
You don't always have to speak your mind about everything.
And then Rod Russ comes in, and then after that
(22:59):
I get Dick Lebo, Don Capers and Bill Kawer. But
Dick Lebo was the you know, he was the key.
He was a catalyst of his defense. And you know,
not having all those guys taught me offseason, just work hard,
just train, stay on the track, keep my speed, keep
my endurance, get to a point where I've trained while
(23:22):
I'm tired. So we used to get up in the
morning at six o'clock, go swimming, had a swim workout.
From the swim, we went to the track. From the track,
we went to lifting. From the lifting, went to the field.
We did that every single day. I did that for
fifteen years. That's a day and we were there from
six in the morning. I probably got home about two
thirty three o'clock in the afternoon. That to me, helped
(23:43):
me become the player I was because in the game,
even when I got tired, I still was going to
challenge myself. I wasn't gonna playoff. I'mst do gotta show
me you're gonna beat me. Yeah, okay, last question, and
I love asking people this and whatever sport, whatever position.
What is the hardest thing about playing corner in the NFL.
I think it's the hardest position to play, especially with
(24:07):
the rules, especially for you guys. It's different, you know,
because you guys, even though there's a five yard chuck rule,
they just don't let you touch him. Yes, um, but
I think playing corner the hardest thing is, you know,
if if you give up one touchdown out of nine,
(24:28):
you had a bad day, you know. But if you
if a quarterback is you know, seven of ten with
two tubs, he had a great day. Yeah, you can't
have You can't give up touchdowns in the pros, right,
If you do that here, then you you lose it.
So that's to me the hardest thing was, you know,
(24:50):
getting beat and then happen to apologize to your teammates
if we lose, I thank you for you. Appreciate it.
Man to the great, absolutely m hm
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