I also like looking at old tape of the people who, when it comes to technique, we might as well call the Magnificent Seven: Warren Sapp, Alan Page, John Abraham, Justin Tuck, Dwight Freeney, Richard Seymour, and Shaun Ellis. I love watching tape of those guys playing. I don’t even care about the score of a game or where the ball is on the field. I just love studying them and their instincts. Most fans and a lot of sportswriters just look at the stats. But players know that stats don’t tell the true story. I study players like Brandon Graham, a defensive end for the Philadelphia Eagles. Fans outside of Philly barely know who Brandon Graham is because he never had double-digit sacks, but I think he’s one of the better defensive ends in the league.
We talk about game planning, training, and study; no doubt all of that matters. But instincts are a massive part of this game, case in point Malcolm Butler making that interception in the Super Bowl. The greatest players are the most instinctual players. There have been outstanding physical specimens who break all the combine records, but they don’t have instincts and are first-round busts. They might have the skill, but they don’t know when to strike. They’ve got no cobra in them. They might make all the textbook movements, but because they didn’t set up the kill in the right way they can’t finish. They can’t deliver that moment when you knock your blocker off balance and make the play. I live for the setup: that coiled moment before it’s time to go cobra. Sometimes you get into a game and you can just feel where the ball is going and whether it’s going to be a run or a pass. You then slide off the lineman and no matter how good he is, he becomes just a big dude with his hands on his hips, explaining to his quarterback how he just got played.
Instincts for a lineman, at least on Seattle, matter so much more than whatever scheme we might have cooked up. Cliff Avril and I sometimes improvise our plan of attack and speak to each other on the spot, from play to play, about what we want to do. Those of us up front develop a feeling for the offensive line over the course of a game that coaches don’t get. That’s when the instincts take over. I’m always focused on the six inches in front of my face and beating that one offensive lineman right in front of me. If you aren’t in my face, my ass isn’t thinking about you. It’s why I can say I’ve never been scared of any quarterback or offensive lineman, and I’ve never been scared of any running back. Of course, I never had to play against Marshawn Lynch. Tackling him might change my mind. As far as offensive linemen go, Walter Jones, who played his whole career with Seahawks, is the only person who’s really ever blocked me. I thought, “That man is too strong to be human. I’m so happy he’s on my team!” But no one I play against makes me nervous.
I love my team. I’d love it even if I were on the practice squad. So it blows my mind that “undrafted me” is on the short list of top NFL defensive linemen, according to NFL.com. To me, J. J. Watt, Cliff Avril, Von Miller, and Gerald McCoy are the best at what they do up front, and it’s an honor even to be mentioned in their company. I try not to think about it, because I worry that if I bask in the praise I’ll lay off the hard work, so I try to keep my mind on my roots. When I’m lifting weights and training, if I said to myself, “Life is beautiful. Hey, who’s in the mood for pie?” I’d tap out in ten minutes. Instead, I crunch my jaw together and say, “I’m undrafted. They don’t care about me. Fuck this system.” That helps me get to the next level. It also pushes me to look at tape when I’d rather be watching Proud Family with my youngest.
I know I’ve been doing this a long time because now, when I work out, the best part is finishing. The hardest part is to continuously dedicate yourself. It’s not age. It’s because the more successes you have, the more you hear a voice suggesting sweetly and seductively to rest on those laurels and just skip it or dog it, go half-assed. That voice asks you, “Why are you working that hard? You got it!” But to be great, you have to continuously put yourself in the mind-set where you don’t got it. You have to think about the times you were hungry, you were struggling, you were a kid being pushed around. You have to come up with the darkest thoughts possible—I think about almost dying from my ruptured appendix and blood poisoning—and then use that to motivate yourself, every day. Every weight room should have a psychiatrist, because people dredge up traumatic stuff just to keep going. That’s how I motivate myself. I get traumatized and go to the gym with the attitude that the gym owes me something, like it’s my enemy. I speak to my body like it’s a separate person from the voices in my brain. I say, “Body, you’re going to do exactly what I want you to do, every single time I get in the gym.” That’s the kind of mind-set
