The leader of the group with a tinge of gray in his mustache and a new number on his chest always sits up front in the Cleveland Browns’ safeties meetings. He often stands up front, too, relaying assignments, counter moves and general life wisdom to his younger teammates.
Those younger teammates love Rodney McLeod Jr. Because they love him, they mock him a little bit, too, calling him Grandpa and reminding McLeod that some of them watched as middle schoolers when he was playing for the Rams.
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“St. Louis Rams,” Browns safety Grant Delpit said with a chuckle. “That’s not even a team anymore.”
McLeod turned 34 this week. Last spring, he announced that the upcoming season, his 13th and second with the Browns, would be his last. McLeod isn’t sure of his future plans. He said he’s “at peace” knowing his football career is almost over, “but still driven” to make his final season fulfilling. McLeod played in 10 games and made five starts for the Browns last season before suffering a biceps injury that he initially feared might end his career.
In March, McLeod signed a one-year deal to return to the Browns and wrote on social media that he was “grateful to run it back for one last lap.”
Beyond grateful to run it back in Cleveland for one last lap!!! 🤞🏾 #DawgPound https://t.co/hwvFet8fQC
— Rodney McLeod (@Rodney_McLeod4) March 25, 2024
He chose those words carefully. McLeod has always viewed his path from undrafted player to Super Bowl champion as a race — to earn a job, keep a job and stay ahead of the younger players coming for his job. But to also help prep those players for their marathon. For McLeod, the run-up to his final season is not a celebration as much as it’s a confirmation that he’s in the right place, physically and mentally. And if it adds to the sense of urgency that McLeod has been stressing to his younger Browns teammates since he arrived 14 months ago, that’s just a bonus.
“I just want to enjoy the moment,” McLeod said. “I’m not here to make the moment about myself. I know at the end of the day what’s on the line for me, (that) this is the last run that I have and there’s only one answer to the way I really want to go out. So that’s my focus, trying to go out holding that trophy up one more time. But in order for that to even happen, it starts with myself being healthy, being durable and being available for my team in order to make the plays that I envisioned myself making and being a factor for this defense.”
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McLeod stayed around last season after the injury, continuing to attend meetings and serve as sort of an extra coach during games. His favorite motivational sayings stayed on the board in the safeties room. McLeod was there, too, continuing to participate in weekly game prep. After one December win, the players were given Monday off as extra rest for a pivotal stretch ahead. McLeod called for (and led) a 9 a.m. Monday defensive backs meeting, and all attended.
Among McLeod’s favorite sayings on that board were constant reminders of the way he pushed his teammates to establish work-day routines and double-check their assignments in various defensive packages. Among them:
1. “Are you committed? Or are you interested?”
2. “Do the little things in an extraordinary way.”
3. “How you do anything is how you do everything.”
“There are different ways Rod phrases things,” Delpit said, “but most of it comes down to, ‘If you just do the simple s—, the rest tends to fall your way.'”
McLeod has changed his number to 12 for his 13th season. He’s never worn No. 12 at any level before, but he said the change is “symbolic of new beginnings, completion and walking in God’s purpose.” He recently became a first-time father, and he said he spent the offseason rehabbing his injury with a focus on being able to play a full season. Last year marked just the second time in his career that he played in fewer than 13 games. He didn’t miss a game over the first five years of his career.
“Being available start to finish, that’s so important to me and I hope important to this team,” McLeod said. “I want to be able to look back on this last ride fondly. I just recently saw a picture of myself in No. 12 for the first time and I think it looks good, so we’ll see if I can go out and make the last one a pretty good one altogether.”
Ahead of 2023, the Browns made major staff changes highlighted by the hiring of Jim Schwartz as defensive coordinator and Bubba Ventrone as special teams coordinator. McLeod tied a career high with three interceptions for the 2017 Philadephia Eagles that won the Super Bowl with Schwartz as defensive coordinator. In 2022, McLeod made 15 starts and played 183 special teams snaps for Indianapolis, where Ventrone led the special teams units.
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With the 2022 Colts and 2023 Browns, McLeod was often the personal protector — the first upback — on the punt team. That’s generally where special teams coaches put their smartest player.
“It’s not just brains, it’s instincts to read the rush and know that your guys have their assignments right,” Ventrone said. “A coach’s dream for that spot is someone who puts in the work, who has the feel. Rod is a consummate pro and a great teammate. If someone’s out of place, he doesn’t just scream at the guy. He coaches him all the way through it.”
In 2020, McLeod was the Eagles’ nominee for the prestigious Walter Payton Man of the Year award. In 2021, he won the Alan Page Community Award, the NFL Players Association’s highest honor for community involvement. The Alan Page award brought a $100,000 donation to McLeod’s Change Our Future Foundation, which he and his wife, Erika, co-founded in 2020. In December, the Change Our Future Foundation provided 20 Northeast Ohio families with a $500 pre-Christmas shopping spree.
McLeod serves on the boards of DeMatha Catholic High School in Washington, his alma mater, and also the Community College of Philadelphia, where he and Erika make their full-time home. Though he’s open to opportunities both in coaching and in football media, McLeod is “completely undecided” on what’s next, with his “total focus” on fatherhood and the season ahead.
“I hope Rodney stays involved in the game,” Schwartz said. “Whether he does media, player engagement, maybe high school coaching … he has a lot to give the game still. Speaking as a parent, I’d want my kid to play for a guy like him. He certainly has the intellect and the feel to coach. If he does get into NFL coaching, he’ll be one of those fast-rising stars. He might be a head coach in five years.”
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Before it became obvious that then-21-year-old safety Ronnie Hickman was making a real push to make Cleveland’s roster last August, McLeod already saw a little of his younger self: an undrafted player who had shown he could play but was guaranteed nothing — and needed to adjust to the uncertain life of someone who might be solely on special teams one week but starting on defense the next.
“I think right away, Rodney was telling me that I had the talent and I was going to write my own ticket if I really loved the game,” Hickman said. “We had so many conversations about mental toughness, focus, working every day. He’s living proof that it doesn’t matter how you get to the NFL. You can stay if you’re willing to earn it.”
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In discussing his 13th and final lap, McLeod said he learned the importance of practice and preparation habits from longtime NFL defensive backs Quintin Mikell and Cortland Finnegan during his rookie season in 2012. He added that he’s “never been content,” whether he was a starter, part-timer or a bottom-of-the-roster player looking to stick.
“A lot goes into making it 13 years — and a lot of that is health, luck, just generally timing being on your side,” McLeod said. “But I have always believed it started with work ethic. There are so many talented individuals, so how are you going to outlast them? It’s almost always going to start with being willing to do the work a lot of people won’t. I think contentment can really knock a lot of us off our path, in football and in life, and in this league every year there’s a new group of hundreds of guys who want to have NFL careers and probably have the ability to do it. So how are you going to stay on the right side of that? You’d better stay hungry and always be willing to work.”
Said Schwartz: “Playing 10-plus years in this league doesn’t happen by accident. With Rodney, it’s a combination of perseverance, talent and character. And it’s his willingness to work and to share. Why did we want him here? Because we knew he was going to come in and share what he’s seen, connect with players from a lot of different backgrounds and always put the team first.”
Ventrone cited McLeod attending every special teams meeting last season as an example of his leadership. At least one of those meetings provided a forum for the players who take so much from McLeod to fire some old-man jokes at him.
“I showed film of me playing against Rod when he was a rookie with the Rams and I was with the 49ers,” said Ventrone, whose eight-year playing career ended in 2014. “The guys really got a laugh out of that. I think some of the young guys needed a minute to process it.”
When it was revealed inside the Browns’ facility in the spring that McLeod had taken his retirement plans public, Schwartz wondered aloud, “If we were gonna push him around in a wheelchair, let him get one last round of cheers.”
Hickman said the team’s safeties call McLeod “Gramps, O.G., Triple O.G., sometimes just Old Man Rod … but it’s all out of love. Whether it’s football, financial stuff or just general life stuff, we go to Rodney. He’s got a lot of wisdom to share.”
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McLeod said he’s “blessed” to be able to declare his plans to play one more season because so many careers end unexpectedly, and prematurely.
“I went from always being healthy to really climbing the ranks to all of a sudden I had a torn ACL, a torn rotator cuff, all sorts of uncertainty with my body and what my football future was going to be,” McLeod said. “After Year 11, I just knew I wanted to keep playing but I didn’t know where or if that opportunity would come. To be able to come to Cleveland with such a talented team and be in a position to have my voice and my experience help younger guys and help try to push everything forward, it was really ideal.”
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When the Browns open McLeod’s final training camp next month, he said he’ll feel “no extra pressure because it’s the last, but pressure on myself to just be healthy and be available.” Schwartz said he let McLeod know at the end of last season that he wanted the veteran back as long as McLeod was healthy enough to play.
“I know this: Whether he’s on the field or not, he’s an extremely valuable resource to me and to all the other players just from his experience,” Schwartz said. “He’s an easy guy to (approach) and ask questions. He’s seen a lot. He’s a really calming influence. Some guys are high-energy guys and get guys all hyped up, but Rod keeps guys calm and there are moments where that matters.
“When we’re talking about Rodney McLeod, we’re talking about one of my favorites. And I could talk about his character and his brains and his selflessness for hours, but he can still play. He was an extremely valuable part of our defense last year. We really took a step back late in the year when we lost Rod and Delpit to injury. We don’t beat San Francisco (last season) without Rodney McLeod because of how well that (49ers) team uses motions and different formations … we don’t stop them the way we did without Rodney playing how he did.”
When camp begins, McLeod said he’ll be in the meetings and in the drills “demanding excellence, like always.” He said the Browns’ big goals for 2024 are realistic because the team has the talent to play with anyone. Though he acknowledged he can envision “holding that trophy one more time” as part of the ideal ending, he said his focus in July and August will be on the little things that will help Cleveland’s defensive backs in the season ahead — and not at all on what lies ahead for McLeod personally.
“The journey continues,” McLeod said. “Just not in the helmet and shoulder pads.”
(Top photo: Nick Cammett / Getty Images)