Rooted in music, Arizona Cardinals rookie Elijah Jones forges own identity through football

Elijah Jones' left arm is covered in tattoos paying homage to something he is passionate about: music.

The Arizona Cardinals rookie cornerback, a third-round pick out of Boston College in last month's NFL draft, comes from a place known for music — New York City's Harlem neighborhood. Jones' father Keith was a producer for the hip-hop group Brand Nubian, and he still listens to their big hit "Punks Jump Up To Get Beat Down" from 1993.

Jones has a pregame playlist that includes Bob Marley, Lil Wayne and DMX. He always enjoyed his father cutting music samples for rap tracks, and as a youth on his way to AAU basketball tournaments, was quizzed on what sample was being used in a particular song. He's a fan of old school rhythm and blues from several decades ago; two of his favorite songs are by LTD and Earth, Wind & Fire.

There were perhaps thousands of vinyl records and a few gold records in his home.

"Music is through my veins. Like, through my veins," Jones said.

After football, he might end up doing something in the music industry. But now there is football, and Jones is in Cardinals rookie mini-camp with the team's draft picks and undrafted free agents this weekend to start learning the defensive scheme.

"I feel like a lot of times there's three or four plays in a game that really could just change the outcome of the situation. Understanding those moments and understanding how to be able fix those mistakes, because they could end up coming up later in the season and a lot teams try to attack the thing you messed up on," Jones said.

New York City isn't known as a hotbed of football, but Jones grew up in an athletic and successful family. He's the youngest of three brothers. The first time he ever played football, he was a two-way lineman.

At the park as a kid, Jones was running circles around other kids with a football and couldn't be tackled. Football became the way to create his own identity, with his parents already having achieved a lot in life and his brothers being great athletes.

Jones credited his dad for not trying to push him into basketball. The 6-foot-2, 184-pound former guard played all through high school, but also played wide receiver and defensive back at Cardinal Hayes Memorial High School in the Bronx.

"I kind of always knew for myself that football was the route that I wanted to go," Jones said. "Once I actually started getting into DB, it's harder to find a DB like me than it is to be a receiver. There's a dime-a-dozen (basketball) guards in New York."

Jones is glad to have Jonathan Gannon, himself a former defensive back in college, as his head coach. Gannon said all the coaches want to accomplish this weekend is get the players acclimated to how he wants things done from practice to the weight room to health and nutrition and team meetings.

Come Monday, the rookies will be in a team meeting with the entire team, Gannon said.

"It's going to take them some time. But the guys that will end up catching on pretty quick, they'll catch our eye quick. We give a little tolerance for performance with these guys. We don't give any tolerance with behavior," Gannon said of the rookies. "We've got a bunch of serious people. The amount of detail and the questions these guys were answering Day 1 was impressive."'

Gannon also said the players were drafted by the Cardinals because of who they are as people.

"The really good (cornerbacks), when they get a ball caught on them, the difference between those guys and the guys that aren't as good is the guys that are really good get the ball caught on them, get in the huddle, get the huddle call, break the huddle and say this guy's not going to catch another one on me, " Gannon said. " The guys that aren't that caliber of player get a ball caught on them, get in the huddle, get the call, break the huddle and say 'I hope this ball doesn't come to me.'"

Draft pick signs

Tight end Tip Reiman, one of the Cardinals' third-round picks in the draft, signed a four-year contract Friday. Reiman is the fifth draft choice to sign, with seven more to go.

This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Arizona Cardinals' Elijah Jones chose football over basketball and landed in NFL