Chargers safety Marlon McCree is still finding his way in San Diego, so he trusts the turns to Map-quest.
Football coordinates, however, he must learn the hard way. Through trial-and-error. Through terminological translation. By “hitting my head against the wall.”
“We were in Cover 3 today,” McCree said yesterday between minicamp practices at the Chargers' Murphy Canyon Complex. “That's a Roger/Lucky (right/left) call. Well, when the tight end goes in motion, the Roger/Lucky call changes, but it goes from a Roger or Lucky Sky to a Roger or Lucky Buzz.”
This much McCree has mastered. But there's more.
“And I'm thinking, 'Well, we were in Sky to the right, so if he motions to the left, we just go 'Lucky Sky,' right?' ” McCree recalled. “Not so. It goes Roger Sky to Lucky Buzz, and vice versa. If it starts Lucky Sky, it goes to Roger Buzz. That's a little tweak that I had to hit my head against the wall. But other than that, things have been going pretty well for me.”
Marlon McCree starts his sixth NFL season with his fourth NFL team, and no two use precisely the same nomenclature. Changing teams isn't quite as daunting as cracking the Enigma code, but the learning curve can be sharp, even serpentine.
Good thing, then, that McCree has three more months of on-the-job training ahead of him before the Chargers commence playing for keeps on Sept. 11.
“I think if we had to play a game today, I would be ready,” McCree said. “I don't think that I'm behind the eight ball. I just think as an athlete, wanting to be the best, you want to have all of your T's crossed and your I's dotted. Right now, I've got a couple of more T's I've got to cross and a couple of I's I've got to dot.”
As the Bolts' primary acquisition of The Winter Of Drew Brees' Discontent, McCree begins his Chargers career as a perceived consolation prize. In terms of impact, the arrival of an itinerant safety can not begin to balance the departure of a Pro Bowl quarterback, not even if said safety had already endeared himself to his new employer with two playoff interceptions of Young Dr. Evil, Eli Manning.
Yet given his proven versatility and the Chargers' porous pass defense, McCree is bound to make himself useful here. This is a guy who has started at both free and strong safety in the NFL, leading the 2002 Jacksonville Jaguars with six interceptions and the 2005 Carolina Panthers with 88 tackles. When McCree finds his way, he tends to find the ball, too.
“The (main) weapon for a strong safety is knowledge,” he said. “You've got to be a smart guy. You can be the biggest and strongest, but if you can't think, can't make those calls, you're basically like a dead duck sitting in the water.”
If a safety can't distinguish between Roger Sky and Lucky Buzz, for example, he's liable to lead his team to misdirected disaster. Strong safeties are primary responsible for run support, but the free safety acts as the defensive quarterback, ensuring that each player patrols the right position. He has to be able to coordinate on the fly, supply rapid reinforcement on the spot and tackle runaway tight ends without getting trampled.
Free safety Bhawoh Jue led the Chargers with three interceptions last season. Strong safety Terrence Kiel, a former second-round draft choice, made 59 tackles. Neither man is a lock to last atop the depth chart.
“I would have liked to see a little more playmaking going on back there,” Chargers General Manager A.J. Smith said yesterday of his defensive secondary. “We bring in guys for open competition to play football, and the best guy is gonna play.”
Since Marlon McCree signed a five-year, $16 million contract in March, it is reasonable to conclude that Smith sees him as an upgrade. Since McCree has been studying Chargers' video since March, it is reasonable to expect him to hit the ground running – that is, reacting rather than ruminating.
“I think everybody has to be a fast learner,” he said, “because it moves fast and if you can't keep up, you get left behind. Sometimes I'll turn the TV off (at home) and quiz myself over everything that I've studied. I look at the coverages and go through formations in my head. I'll say, 'OK, the tight end goes in motion, what's the call?' I'll say the answer, then I'll look at the answer and see if I was wrong or if I was right.
“Sometimes, when I start making more wrong than I do right, I keep score. I'll start circling the ones that I got wrong. Then I go over those (until) I get it, and then I can move on to something else.”
Though he reached the NFC Championship Game with Carolina last season, McCree says he is already convinced the Chargers' intensity and defensive talent “surpasses anything that I thought I was around last year.” The speed of the Chargers' run defense, he says, should free him to play more aggressively against the pass.
McCree is still feeling his way, to be sure, but he is growing surer with every step. He is one safety who desires to live dangerously.
“You find out who your soldiers are,” he said about bonding with new teammates. “Everybody's got a strength. One guy likes to shoot with an AK. One guy likes to shoot with a double-barrel shotgun.”
One guy, it appears, is inclined to shoot off his mouth from time to time.
“I'm like Rambo,” Marlon McCree said. “I've got everything. I've got all kinds of bullets across my chest. I've got grenades. I've got hand guns. I've got assault rifles. I've got everything, man. I'm just ready to go to war.”
Tim Sullivan: (619) 293-1033; tim.sullivan@uniontrib.com
