Inside the Helmet: Hard Knocks, Pulling Together, and Triumph as a Sunday Afternoon Warrior

by Michael Strahan

  This is also what makes guys like Peyton, Favre, Brady and Brees so great. This is where the Dan Marinos and Troy Aikmans are better than the rest of the walking world. In addition to the physical aspect, they recognize our games and make us pay.

  The guys who aren’t so successful, they get stuck on one thing and lock in on receivers. Most young quarterbacks do this and can’t break out of the habit until they gain some success. Poor Eli, his first year he dropped back, looked at one spot and was either throwing it there or getting annihilated. He had not learned to check off. The great quarterbacks not only see all their options and use them, they create even more options on the fly. Favre is by far the best I’ve gone against. He can make something out of nothing. John Elway was great because he did the same thing.

  If all this is a little dizzying, how do you think we feel? As nuts as this all sounds, it gets even crazier.

  All those little switch-ups and adjustments and calls to counter original calls—the defense has the same exact zaniness on our side. We also have calls that are made in the huddle and then are adjusted based on their first formation and then comes another call we must all adjust to after the offense sets, following the motions and shifts of their players.

  Full-contact chess. Whose move is it now?

  Every time the offense tries to make sight adjustments and dupe us into tipping our next move, we’re simultaneously trying to dupe them into believing we’re running a defense that we’re not. You never knew contact chess could be this complicated, did you?

  Just like I gave you on offense, let me give you a couple of examples of how much we’ve got to process mentally and defensively before I’m unleashed to hit anybody.

  We may have one call where my assignment is to drop into coverage. It’s absolutely imperative on these plays that whoever is playing quarterback thinks I’m coming after his ass. Not only do I have to be a great chess and poker player, I’ve got to put forth a slew of Emmy Award–winning performances, too.

  The cards I’ve been handed by my coaches calls for me to drop into coverage, but my poker face needs to scream to the quarterback, “I’m plowing through this tackle and drilling you into the ground!” At the same time I need to look over the offense to recognize the formation in order to judge where I’m supposed to drop and who I’m supposed to cover.

  If there are three receivers outside to my left, my assignment may be to drop into coverage and take the third receiver, usually the tight end or a running back who shifted to the outside.

  But if somebody gets up and shifts to the backfield or motions to the other side, my entire drop back could be altered. One shift or simple motion of a player from one side of the field to the other may completely change the strength of their offense, which in effect changes where we need to make the strength of our defense. Once again we switch our assignments on that play.

  The safeties, linebackers and I all need to recognize this within a second or two because we may have to switch to something completely different in the next three-tenths of a second.

  If they suddenly make one more minor shift, a safety or linebacker may call a kill to the blitz and yell for us to switch back to a normal play, which calls for me to rush a certain lane.

  Sometimes we’ll yell “Switch,” but that’s done simply to dupe the offense into thinking we’re checking into something that we’re not. Just as they have fake calls and cadences, so do we.

  Now that I’ve deluged your senses with a new language, factor in yet another thing. Each time we play these games within our game, we’re tired, we’re hurting, the crowd is going nuts and at times we can’t hear a thing. But despite the fatigue, the pain, the noise and the dupes, I have to be down in my stance, listen for every little call and be ready to adjust at all times. Fatigue or no fatigue, it simply has to be done.

  Now add in something that makes each snap, each altercation, more complicated. Before I get lined up in my stance for a shot at Manning, Brunell or Favre, I have to run in my mind anywhere from three to five scenarios that could happen before and as the ball is being snapped on every single play of every single game.

  Not only do we have calls, checks, fakes, decoys, adjustments, shifts and games, we have separate calls and adjustments based upon current field position. When the Redskins are pushed back inside their 10, we have certain calls. If they’re between the 10 and the 20 we may have different calls. When we adjust, it has to be the correct adjustment depending what makes the most sense, given where the ball sits at that point.

  Once you’ve accounted for these different scenarios, you try to process what formation the other team has lined up in, where the strength of that formation is, what actual players are out there and what we believe the snap count will be. Already having gotten a call from the sidelines, my teammates and I, based on all this information, have to decide within a couple of seconds what our assignments will end up being.

  Throw one more complication into the mix—that’s just on my side of the ball! Osi does the same thing on his side. Our linebackers run through the same fight. Then safeties play through their own battles as well. All the little chess games, all the little poker games.

  To put it as bluntly as possible, you cannot be a dummy and be a longtime successful player in the NFL. If you can’t process information on the spot, in a few seconds, you will become a situational player.

  Everybody can get by on talent, size and speed, but the guys who can’t adapt mentally are probably going to have shorter careers. If you’re a thinker, you can stay on that field longer.

  It honestly took me five years before I really felt comfortable with what I was doing and seeing out there. It took me five years until I truly grasped exactly how to properly process everything on the field so I could play as if I’m not thinking first, playing second. I’m thinking constantly, but now I can think at the same time I play, both with reckless abandon.

  It’s comparable to how your golf swing looks right after you’ve taken golf lessons. Your swing is awful at the end of those lessons. You understand the lesson, but at the same time you need to work it out on the range before hitting the links.

  Where it’s even more challenging in this game is when we’re playing against an NFL vet like Brunell. Most of the older successful quarterbacks, and Peyton Manning is the absolute best at this, have such a comfort level, they can’t wait to screw with the heads of some young defensive players. The vet will use all these little hand signals, claps, waving of the arms, cupping of the ears and it’s up to us to decide what’s real and what’s phony. Much of it is completely bogus, but how are we supposed to know when to challenge or when not to?

  A lot of that comes from film work. We’ll study the hell out of a guy’s signals and signs and try to decipher them. That’s the first part of the battle. Once we think we know when it’s a fake and when he’s really changing the call, we’ve all got to get on the same page and figure out what he’s changing the play to.

  Every time Mark Brunell makes a hand signal or gesture Antonio Pierce, our middle linebacker and one of the brightest guys I’ve ever played with, or a safety has to quickly take it in and immediately decide if it’s a real check or not. If it is, within the same second it took for him to figure out that part of it, he also needs to check us into a different play to counter the Colt’s new play.

  Antonio Pierce is the mental leader of that huddle, plain and simple. Your middle linebacker cannot be dumb. When we get into the huddle, a safety receives signals from the coaches about the offense’s personnel grouping and Pierce gets the call, relays it to us, then gives us some possible adjustments.

  In this particular game Brunell would come to the line and, without ever letting on, try to find the tip to our defensive call. He knows what we’re going to call and probably knows what we’ll check into before we do. It’s up to Pierce to recognize what he recognizes and then yell out any adjustments based upon his observations.

  This is where all that film he studi
es comes in handy. Guys give away everything; you just have to know what you’re looking for.

  For example, the longtime veteran quarterback Doug Flutie used to give away the snap count by a very slight thrust of his right hip the moment he was going to get the snap. For those of us who saw this on film, we knew not to jump off the line until we saw that hip move.

  By recognizing flinches and habits, tiny differences in guys’ stances from play to play tips a player’s hand. It gives me an instant look at your playing cards. Jeff Garcia rocks ever so slightly right before he gets the snap. Daunte Culpepper used to clap his hands right before the snap, so we knew to look for the clap and ignore his cadence.

  There’s one team I’d rather not name because they are on our 2007 schedule. I’ve discovered via film work over the years that this team’s players tip so much stuff, I now know whether they are running or passing, and which side the run is going to and when the quarterback is going to run a bootleg—all tipped before the quarterback drops back. It’s all detected by a series of tiny habits that would never be picked up in real time.

  While some quarterbacks do things like clap before the ball gets snapped or rock back on their heels on plays they’ll drop back to pass, it’s not just the quarterbacks who tip their hands. It’s everyone.

  Some centers squeeze their free hand before the snap. You have running backs who glance over and over at a certain spot if they’re getting the ball. Many receivers, when they’re the target, raise their upper bodies up ever so slightly while they are running so they are in position to raise their arms to make a quick catch. Most guys have no idea they’re committing any of these boo-boos.

  It’s the same thing poker players look for. A twitch here, a slight grimace there. Maybe a vein that pops out during tense times. A tell.

  It’s this film work that make guys like Bruce Smith, Warren Sapp or Ray Lewis so great. They’re already more talented than most. Combine that with the fact that they’ve got your hand figured out and you don’t even know it. I learned a lot of how to properly watch for things from Bruce and even Jessie Armstead. For many of us, it becomes an art form.

  Ever notice that when I’m getting down in my stance early in a game, I’m the last one to actually get all the way down and set? I’m not just being lazy or trying to work the kinks out. I’m looking at your offensive linemen, your tight end, your backs and your quarterback to see if what I saw on film is visible. I’m looking for those little nuances tipped off by hours upon hours of film work.

  I can’t get into specifics because for my fifteenth season, I’ll need some of those secret weapons. It’s all part of my chess game. When I’m lined up to play the Redskins today, I’ll already know which piece I’ll move where and when depending on certain tendencies I’ve already seen by studying film at the stadium and at home.

  When we line up against guys like Brady or Brees, I head into the game knowing most of us are already at a disadvantage. They’ve already found things out about us that we have no idea we’re doing. And while we’re tipping our hand the whole time, we’re trying to figure out what makes them tick.

  Usually, there’s no such luck. These men don’t budge. Most of their offenses are pretty disciplined and don’t give up a lot.

  But on this day Brunell was no match for the barrage of our chess moves. His chess master didn’t put him in the greatest position to win. Every time Brunell came to the line of scrimmage, we felt they had no surprises for us. They couldn’t trick us. His snap count couldn’t fool us. His checks, we had all figured out. This is exactly the type of chess I look forward to playing the older I get. One old man looking to outplay another old man.

  The great thing about these chess matches is that it doesn’t matter which one of us corners your king. Just get a checkmate. They couldn’t score on us because we literally figured out every little thing they did, whether it was an adjustment or just straight up. Plus, it was as if football just didn’t make sense to them this afternoon. 19–3. Checkmate!

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The Art of Sunday Trash-talking

  Sunday, October 29, Giants versus Bucs

  “Hey, Juran, tell your boy Simeon he plays like a little bitch!” I yelled to Bucs cornerback Juran Bolden early in our game against Tampa in Week Eight. “He doesn’t do nothin’ but rush the passer. Tell him to play the run like a man!”

  Welcome to Trash Talk 101. This is how I started my Sunday afternoon on October 29 in the Barber Bowl, Tiki versus Ronde. I wasn’t just talking trash for my own benefit. I didn’t initiate a war of words to begin the game simply to entertain my teammates or fire myself up.

  There’s a method to my madness here. I’m not just trying to insult my Pro Bowl cohort Simeon Rice for the sake of starting trouble or insulting the guy. He’s been a friend of mine, but in the game of pro football, the psychological part is just as important as the physical.

  Every chance I got throughout that game, I loudly repeated my sentiments to different Bucs players, anybody I believed would deliver my message.

  I yelled it at the start of the game, I yelled it between series. I yelled it over to their sideline. “Simeon, stop playing like a little bitch!”

  Okay, here’s the deal. Simeon is a hell of a pass rusher, one of the best in the game. Coming after that quarterback is all he’s focusing on. He can seriously disrupt the outcome of any Sunday afternoon. But if you get him to think about the run, his pass rush suffers. Simeon doesn’t like to play the run because sacks are what get guys like him, Julius Peppers, Jason Taylor and me paid.

  Prior to the season, Simeon said in interviews that guys like me, Peppers, Taylor and Dwight Freeney are good, but we all know we’re not in his league. He boldly claimed that he is the prototypical defensive end, which pisses a man off who has the single-season sack record and many more Pro Bowls under this belt. It also pisses off every single Pro Bowl defensive end in the league.

  Rice is notorious for wanting to play only against the pass. He doesn’t like to get his hands dirty when it comes to the run, but the position is not one-dimensional. However, when he focuses on that one dimension of his game, I admit, he’s a phenomenal pass rusher.

  The strongest muscle in the human body is the tongue and today I was going to try to use my hands, feet, legs, arms, and, yes, tongue to disrupt things for the Bucs. Even the tiniest thing you can find to disrupt an opponent’s rhythm comes in handy on Sundays.

  My goal today was to help out Luke Petitgout, our left tackle. I wanted the message to get to Simeon that he had to prove to me that he could play both ways. I wanted him to get so ticked that he would try to stick the notion he couldn’t play the run down my throat. If he did, his pass rush would suffer.

  Who else can I tell? I looked for Ronde Barber, Derrick Brooks, Ike Hilliard, Joey Galloway and Anthony Becht. I drilled it home over and over and over again.

  The unfortunate part of trash-talking is the unpredictability of how the target is going to react. Would he boil over and lose his temper on the field (which would be good, too, because it could draw a 15-yard penalty)? Would he forget about Eli and just try to go after Tiki and Brandon Jacobs? Would he get caught up and talk smack back to me and thus get distracted from his game?

  I got no reaction from Simeon in that game. I got nothing from him after the game or in the postgame interviews, either. I didn’t hear a peep until months after the season ended.

  “I want to fight your boy,” Rice said when he phoned my coauthor, Jay Glazer, in February. “Mike used to be my boy. Seriously, tell him I have some guys who want to set up a boxing match with us in the Bahamas this off-season. They’re looking to put on a whole card. Seriously, this is no joke. Ask him if he’ll fight me. I’ll whip your boy’s ass!

  My reaction? After a tremendous burst of laughter, I pointed Simeon to the facts.

  Number one, he won’t play the run. All the defensive ends who play the pass and the run think this way about Simeon. He was the one out there runn
ing his mouth how he’s the prototype defensive end and we’re all just pretenders. He’s not even the best defensive end in his division, let alone the game. I won’t take anything away from his pass rushing ability, but that’s what he is. He should have his own position, pass rusher. Julius Peppers causes more fear within that division. But with that being said, Simeon’s still a bona fide force.

  Second, he wants to fight me? Come on, man, are we in the fifth grade? Fights are an integral part of our NFL world, but they never leave the field and reach the street. It’s taboo. Warren Sapp and I engaged in a terrible war of words years back, but neither one of us ever mentioned meeting the other behind the 7-11. I guess I would have broken that code with Tiki, but, thankfully, that didn’t happen.

  Third, I would have whipped his ass!

  It’s a shame this is his reaction. Simeon is my boy. I took him out on a recruiting trip to New York when he was a free agent, and off the field I really like the guy. But he let the emotions about what we do on Sundays creep over into our everyday lives.

  That, my friends, is exactly why you talk trash. It’ll either fire you up or take another man out of his complete focus. Let the gums start flapping. There is an art to trash-talking. Some guys need to get themselves fired up. Others want the attention and they love making guys feel like crap. Still others say it purely to be a jackass. Me? I use it for all three, but usually to alter the way a guy is playing.

  Shockey is the most talkative guy we have on our team by far. He talks trash for two reasons—to fire himself up and because everybody hates him. The whole league hates Shockey because they don’t know him. Every single linebacker and safety inside the NFL really despises the guy. Often when I’m at a function and I see a defender from another team, they hit me up about Shockey. If they knew him, they’d love him. I’d take fifty-two Jeremy Shockeys on my team every day of the week and I’d guarantee we’d win as many Super Bowls as we wanted.