Eagles' Malcolm Jenkins, Rodney McLeod have a strong partnership in secondary | David Murphy
The veteran safeties are able to ad lib on the job, because they work so well together
RODNEY McLEOD was standing on the 43-yard-line when the sense of something familiar flickered through him. It was late in the first quarter of his first regular-season game as an Eagle, and he was settling into position as the deep man in a single-high set when the Browns broke the huddle for a second-and-4 play. As McLeod scanned the line of scrimmage from 17 yards downfield, he saw two Cleveland tight ends bunched tight to the right side of the formation along with diminutive wide receiver Andrew Hawkins. To anybody who had not spent much of his previous week poring over game tape of Hue Jackson's offense, the scene offered little to suggest what was about to unfold. But as McLeod's mind buzzed through all of the usual presnap variables - down, distance, field position, personnel, formation - he began to suspect something was up.
"It's midfield, we know they're a gadget type of team, they like reverses, funky formations, just to get you out of sorts, create some miscommunication," McLeod said later.
From his perch in centerfield, McLeod called out a check to cornerback Leodis McKelvin, who was lined up across from Hawkins. Rather than following Hawkins on any kind of reverse movement, McKelvin would drop back and replace McLeod deep as McLeod assumed responsibility for his man.
Sure enough, as soon as the ball was snapped, Hawkins took a step backward, and McLeod took off at a dead sprint toward the opposite side of the field, covering five yards even before quarterback Robert Griffin III executed the pitch. By the time Hawkins secured the ball and looked to round left tackle, McLeod was there, 20 yards from where he lined up, corralling the runner for a 1-yard loss.
"I always tell guys, there are, like, four or five plays during a game that you can pick out and they hold true," McLeod said. "You gotta make 'em count."
It's a formula that had bedeviled Eagles safeties for much of the decade leading up to the organization's signing of McLeod to a five-year, $35 million contract last offseason. One year later, he and fellow veteran Malcolm Jenkins have established themselves as one the best tandems at the position in the NFL, with a unique synergy that has both players expecting even better results in 2017.
For much of the last three weeks, the two players have formed a breakfast club of sorts, arriving at the NovaCare Complex 45 minutes ahead of schedule to sit down together and go through tape of the Eagles' 2017 opponents. From Day 1, defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz has afforded the duo a remarkable amount of freedom in their handling of the position, trusting them to divvy up the safety responsibilities on each play. Their ability to do so stems largely from their common upbringing in longtime NFL defensive coordinator Gregg Williams' scheme.
Jenkins was Williams' first draft pick when the latter became defensive coordinator of the Saints. The No. 14 overall selection that year, Jenkins spent three years in the system until the Saints' infamous bounty scandal forced Williams into a three-year NFL hiatus.
When Williams returned to the NFL in 2014 as defensive coordinator of the Rams, he coached a unit that included an undersized safety who two years earlier had made the club as an undrafted free agent out of the University of Virginia. After starting 32 games for Williams, McLeod moved on to the Eagles, where he now plays for a man who who spent two years on Williams' staff and then replaced him as defensive coordinator of the Titans in 2001.
"When he got here, we were speaking the same language," Jenkins said of McLeod. "We talk the game the same way, so we see it the same way. That's been refreshing, because it's rare that you can see a play the exact same way as somebody did, and we've had that from very early on because we were taught the game by the same person."
If you're looking for a reason to believe in the Eagles defense this season, the symbiotic relationship between their two safeties is a good place to start. Both players smile when recounting the early weeks of their partnership as they tried to figure out the optimal way to split their duties. Instead of the traditional "strong" and "free" roles, Jenkins and McLeod started out by cutting the field in half, one of them taking the left side and the other the right side. But as the season progressed and they spent more time together on the field and in the film room, they began to approach things on an opponent-by-opponent basis.
"Both of us are kind of the same way, where if we play deep for too long, we get a little bored," Jenkins said. "Sometimes we like to be down in the mix just to get a change of pace. So the first two weeks we were kind of trying to feel each other out, who wants to play where. But as we got further into the season, we started changing things."
With an inexperienced group of cornerbacks, the Eagles are hoping their safeties can make up some of the difference. Just this week, second-year corner Jalen Mills credited an interception he made in a 7-on-7 drill to a presnap coverage check by McLeod. Stuff like that makes Jenkins smile as he considers the possibilities for Year 2.
"It's nice to have another air traffic controller back there," he said.
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