Insider: Nick Cross met Rodney McLeod 9 years ago, now they compete for Colts' safety job

WESTFIELD — The veteran has always been there for the rookie.

Long before they were teammates, long before the rookie could know for sure that he had a chance to follow in the older man’s footsteps.

From the time Nick Cross was in eighth grade, Rodney McLeod has been there, even though they didn’t talk all the time.

A shining example of what might be possible.

Of the reward at the end of the road Cross was traveling.

Twelve years apart in age, the two men are both part of the DeMatha Catholic High School brotherhood, a family that has sent a couple dozen of its best from Maryland into the NFL. Fiercely proud of his DeMatha heritage, McLeod has long been one of the family’s most faithful, returning every summer to hold a football camp at his old stomping grounds.

Cross first met McLeod at that camp.

“He was real mild-mannered, a real nice guy, so down to earth, out there with the kids, running back and forth,” Cross said. “It was good to be able to see somebody who went to my school do what I wanted to do on the biggest stage.

Cross was a defensive end back then, a kid coming out of the eighth grade and getting ready to join the DeMatha juggernaut. McLeod remembers that the kid was an obvious talent, kept hearing good things about Cross as the younger man developed into a star.

There was no way McLeod could know they’d someday play on the same team.

But the veteran knew Cross was headed for the NFL.

“I expected all the things I’m seeing from him.”

'They felt very good about Nick Cross'

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DeMatha is a juggernaut.

An all-boys preparatory school with an enrollment of 800 in Hyattsville, Md., famous for its long history of producing champions in the highly competitive Washington Catholic Athletic Conference — the schools in the conference do not compete for state titles — and nationally-ranked high school teams, particularly in basketball, a sport where the Stags have been named national champions six times.

Not that anybody should call DeMatha a basketball school around McLeod.

“Nah,” McLeod said. “That’s what some people say, but a lot of guys came out there for football, too. All sports, to be honest.”

Truth be told, the school’s athletic tradition began on the basketball court.

A legendary basketball coach, Morgan Wootten, won 1,274 games over 46 years, built the Stags into a national powerhouse — a program that produced players like Adrian Dantley, Victor Oladipo and Markelle Fultz — and set a template for the rest of DeMatha’s sports to follow.

Head coach Bill McGregor took over the football program in 1982, borrowed from the culture built by Wooten and built the football team into a powerhouse that has won 24 WCAC championships. A dozen or so DeMatha players each season sign scholarships to play at the college level; the program’s NFL alums include former Eagles star Brian Westbrook, former Dolphins pass rusher Cameron Wake, current Commanders defensive end Chase Young and Patriots linebacker Ja’Whuan Bentley, among others.

The bond between DeMatha players is tight-knit.

“We’re an all-boys school, and I think it helps foster that brotherhood,” McGregor said. “Guys, they go to class together, they eat meals together, they practice together, they play together. … I don’t know what it is or exactly why it happens, but it’s there and it’s real.”

Few have given back as much as McLeod, who has held his football camp at DeMatha in every summer since his second season in the NFL and hands out a scholarship to the school each year.

“It does an awful lot for (the kids); they want to be like Rodney,” McGregor said. “I did his camp in June, and there’s probably 200 kids there, the kids love seeing him and getting his autograph. The guys on this year’s varsity — we’ve already got 10 or so guys committed this year — Rodney walks in, and all of a sudden, everybody hushes up.”

McLeod first met Cross at his football camp.

His involvement with the DeMatha program kept the two men in contact. McLeod has long trained with Tobe Stephens, the performance enhancement specialist at DeMatha, and Cross sometimes found himself training with a starting NFL safety during his high school years.

Their training stints together didn’t often last all that long.

But Cross made the most of them.

“I would pick his brain a little bit,” Cross said. “Questions about being in the NFL: What’s it like, how he got there, and all that stuff.”

Cross channeled the advice, moved from the defensive line back to safety and transformed into a star. McGregor was no longer the team’s head coach — he’d return the year after Cross graduated — but former DeMatha assistants like Elijah Brooks and Deno Campbell were still around, and they’d keep McLeod up to speed.

“You’re going to hear about it when you go back,” McLeod said. “The coaches there are going to make sure to say ‘Hey, look, Rod, you know, I like this guy. He reminds me a lot of you,’ or somebody else I might know. … It was evident, talking to guys who coached me, they felt very good about Nick Cross.”

Different journeys

The two men’s paths to the NFL started to diverge a little bit near the end of their time at DeMatha.

McLeod was a star, an excellent cornerback who landed a scholarship to Virginia, but he had to fight and claw his way into the NFL as an undrafted free agent. Cross’ physical gifts, the incredible athleticism the Colts saw in him, pushed the younger safety’s profile higher.

Cross was a U.S. Army All-American safety in high school, a four-star recruit whose talent flourished almost immediately at Maryland, allowing him to enter the NFL Draft at the ripe young age of just 20 years old.

McLeod checked in with Cross before the NFL scouting combine, and again before the draft, to offer a little encouragement and advice.

“My journey’s a little different,” McLeod said. “But at the end of the day, I think he respects that I’ve done it for so long here in the league.”

When the Colts traded into the third round to get Cross, they paired him with a mentor he’d already long admired.

“It’s nice, someone I’ve known from when I was younger, somebody who has spent a long time in the NFL, has been here for 11 years,” Cross said. “It’s good to see that, watch how he did it and kind of just follow in his footsteps.”

'He can play the game, man'

The funny thing is there was a DeMatha man waiting for McLeod when he first entered the NFL.

DeMatha alum Dennard Wilson was a quality control coach in his first season with the Rams when McLeod was a rookie, and McGregor called for an update halfway through training camp.

“You’re not going to believe I’m saying this right now,” Wilson told McGregor. “I think he’s going to have a 10-year career.”

McLeod adapted to the NFL that quickly.

And this is where Cross’s path begins to dovetail with McLeod’s again.

Cross has hit the ground running faster than any other member of the Indianapolis draft class so far.

Drafted because the Colts couldn’t ignore his immense ability, Cross’s selection became even more important when starting strong safety Khari Willis suddenly retired this summer, opening a spot in the starting lineup, and the only other obvious replacement at the spot, McLeod, had to sit out much of the summer to rehabilitate a knee injury.

Cross made the most of his time with the Indianapolis starters.

“He’s done a pretty good job of getting the information, transferring the information when we come out there in the walk-through, as well as in practice. He’s had very few mental mistakes,” Colts defensive backs coach Ron Milus said. “I don’t know if it’s going to be that big of a transition for him, because he is bright.”

What Milus is saying is remarkable, given that the strong safety position in new coordinator Gus Bradley’s defense is one of the scheme’s most complicated.

For starters, the strong safety is the player primarily responsible for making the calls and checks in the secondary, a place where communication is critical. Making matters more difficult, Cross has to be able to make those adjustments and calls while adjusting his own position on the fly. In this defense, the strong safety is often playing in the box, heavily involved in the run game, and when the offense sends players in motion, it often changes Cross’ gap right before the snap.

A tough task for any rookie, and a task Cross is passing with flying colors so far.

Cross made three tackles in his preseason debut on Saturday and denied Buffalo’s offense with excellent coverage on two snaps in the red zone, offering a taste of what he can do, and what the Colts have seen on the field so far.

“You can see that he’s a smart player, he’s instinctive, athletic as hell,” McLeod said. “He can play the game, man.”

If Cross wins the starting strong safety job, it will likely mean more of a rotational role for McLeod, who made an interception against Buffalo on Saturday.

For so many years, Cross watched McLeod mostly from afar, trying to follow in the veteran’s footsteps, and now he gets to watch him up close on a daily basis, pick his brain on the same scheme Cross is absorbing, feel a sense of home by working with another member of the DeMatha brotherhood.

“When he walks into the building, he carries himself in a high-character manner, first one in, one of the last people out, always watching tape, always taking care of his body,” Cross said. “Practicing like a pro, even in the walk-throughs, making sure it’s really game-like, make it as much like a game situation as possible.”

The veteran has always been there for the rookie.

And the rookie isn’t only watching. Cross is picking up everything McLeod is putting down.

“I have a pretty good idea of what we’re going to get out of Nick,” Milus said. “I know he hasn’t played an NFL game yet, but so far, he’s been pretty poised when he’s been out there with the first group. … We’re not anointing anyone, but he’s on track to be a good player. Let’s put it that way.”

Sounds a lot like what people were saying about another DeMatha product.

Back when the veteran was a rookie.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Colts: Nick Cross competes for starting job vs. mentor Rodney McLeod