McClellan a linebacker, teacher and ‘demigod’
Veteran returns to roster in diverse role as team leader for defense, special teams
Nothing in the NFL is ever as simple as cause-and-effect, but for a moment Monday, the past, present and future of Ravens linebackers converged unexpectedly, a circle of life revealing itself on the league’s transaction wire.
Early in the Ravens’ Week 2 loss to the Cincinnati Bengals, three-time Pro Bowl linebacker C.J. Mosley suffered a bone bruise that could keep him out of Sunday’s game against the Denver Broncos. Rookie Kenny Young, a promising inside linebacker, stepped in and performed as expected: some good plays, a few bad reads, very much a 23-year-old in a grown-up game.
On Wednesday, Young drew a crowd of reporters to his locker inside the team’s headquarters. He talked about what he’d learned, about playing free and smart, about the challenges of the position in the modern NFL. Then he was asked about what it meant to have Albert McClellan back.
McClellan had signed with the Ravens just two days earlier, a return to Baltimore long awaited by coaches and players and
expedited by Mosley’s injury. McClellan and Young had spent just one offseason together before McClellan was released on the NFL’s cut-down day earlier this month. Outside linebacker Terrell Suggs calls McClellan a “demigod,” and Young spoke of the 32-year-old with reverence, as if he wouldn’t have played as he had without the linebacker who, for two weeks, played for no one.
“Honestly, I’ll just say this: Bert was a big part of my growing-up phase the first few weeks here, of wanting to come back here.” because I didn’t know anything,” As he spoke, passersby in the Young said. “The only thing I knew team’s locker room punctuated his was to be on time for meetings and to answers with shouts of “Hey, Bert!” have my notebook out. But him and “Talk to ’em, Bert!” Even though breaking things down slowed the McClellan missed all of last year with game down for me so much, and I a torn ACL, he needed no reintroducthink some of the things that he tion in Owings Mills. taught me on the field, I could go to There are probably other linebackhim with open arms about things off ers who, like him, have filled in for a the field and he’d give me advice. Hall of Famer (in his case, Ray Lewis) Things that all rookies go through, all and developed from an undrafted young players go through, especially rookie into a special teams captain, in this league. but how many have also played nose
“So it’s a blessing to have Bert back, tackle in their career? honestly.” How many many on-the-bubble
Ever since McClellan’s Sept. 1 veterans would willingly dispense release, it seemed to be a question of their hard-earned wisdom to youngwhen he would come back, not er players who, empowered by that whether he would. At his first news knowledge, might ultimately cost the conference after the Ravens’ 53-man older guy a paycheck? roster was finalized, coach John “Albert coaches those guys up, but Harbaugh said parting with McClelthen Albert gets let go in favor of lan was a tough decision — “We’ve those guys. Crazy,” Harbuagh said been through a lot together” — but Wednesday. “There’s a bond. There’s that they could reunite in as soon as a a brotherhood. And even if it’s going couple of days. to cost a player a spot, he still wants to
It ended up being a couple of do everything he can to help the weeks, enough time for McClellan to young guy grow as a player.” try out for the Philadelphia Eagles. Special teams coordinator Jerry But he never left Baltimore, he said. Rosburg has said McClellan’s release He expected a call to come at some was like seeing a child off to college. point this year. So he waited, passing When the two reunited this week, the time with training sessions and Rosburg’s homecoming message was broadcasts of the Ravens’ first pair of less sentimental. “I said, ‘Where ya games. been?’ ” he jokingly recalled Thursday.“Beingaroundhere,youbuild certain bonds and certain relationMcClellan’s return was such an ships that kind of stick with you a inevitability, teammates welcomed little bit,” he said Thursday, his first him back to the facility by noting interview with reporters since his their appreciation but teasing him signing. “So I kind of had that feeling that it was old news. Over his Albert McClellan is happy to be back with the Ravens. “This is where I want to be. This is my home. Glad that I can stay here and defend my home,” he said. two-game span on the free-agent market, it was as if he’d never left. He’d called his once-and-future teammates to offer pointers and encouragement, letting them know, as he put it, “I’m still over your shoulder.”
“He didn’t lose anything in his time away because when we got back to the meeting room, he started coaching everybody right away,” Rosburg said. “Heknows what to do. Wedidn’t have to spend a lot of time getting him back up to speed.”
About the only thing McClellan seemed surprised by Thursday was the size of the media contingent swarming his locker.
He said he knows why he’d been cut.
He knows the onus of replacing Mosley fell not just on him but on Young, Patrick Onwuasor, Chris Board and too many others to name. Though he didn’t say it, he also likely knows his time in Baltimore is not guaranteed long term.
Still, McClellan was happy to be back, not just for the sake of his Ravens family, but his actual family as well.
“My daughter was more excited,” he said. “She was like, ‘I don’t want to switch schools,’ once we heard I got cut. So once I told her, it was ... ‘Hey, hooray. We’re here. We’re home. I get to stay home.’ And that was my same feeling. This is where I want to be. This is my home. Glad that I can stay here and defend my home.”