TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) -The yelling didn’t bother Rolando McClain. It was the silence.
Suddenly, a week into his Alabama career, coach Nick Saban stopped yelling when the freshman linebacker made mistakes.
“When I first got here, he would always yell at me the first week or so, and then he just stopped,” McClain said. “I didn’t understand why. Then he took me to his office and he talked to me and he was like, ‘It’s hard for me to yell at you.’ I was like, ‘Why?’ It’s because I beat myself up so bad. When I make a mistake, I’m on myself worse than he can (be). It’s hard for him to yell at me when I’m yelling at myself.
“After that, he didn’t really yell at me. He’d look at me and he knew that I understood I messed up and we just went from there.”
The relationship between the two Type A personalities has worked awfully well. McClain was a third-team AP All-American as a sophomore and an eight-game starter as a freshman. And now, he’s the unquestioned leader of one of the nation’s best defenses.
hich might be why he gets along so well with Saban.
“I always put pressure on myself,” McClain said. “That’s why it’s so easy for Coach Saban to coach me.”
He’s coming off one of the better games of his Tide career: 12 tackles, an interception, a forced fumble and a deflection into the arms of a teammate against Kentucky to earn Southeastern Conference defensive player of the week honors. The numbers that were on his mind kept him from really savoring the performance.
He had two missed tackles and two mental mistakes, and “just beat myself up about it.”
“A good friend of mine, she always tells me I had a good game,” McClain said. “She (said), ‘That’s the best game you’ve ever had.’ I was like, ‘I played all right.’
“I already knew the four mistakes I had.”
Speaking of four, that’s how many qualities Saban listed in identifying what makes McClain so good. Intelligence. Leadership. Ability. Motivation.
“He’s very smart. He’s got great knowledge and understanding of football, he’s got great knowledge and understanding of what we do,” Saban said.
see in great players.”
Case in point: McClain had 15 tackles and an interception as a freshman against top rival Auburn.
The next big game comes Saturday when the Tide visits No. 20 Mississippi. Rebels coach Houston Nutt is impressed by the Tide linebacker.
“From tackle to tackle, I haven’t seen one better,” Nutt said. “And then he has skills to go catch the ball, intercept the ball, knock the ball down. He’s a big-time force. I can tell he’s a big-time leader. He’s one of the best in the SEC if not the best.”
McClain is leading the Tide with 35 tackles and has 4.5 stops for loss and two sacks.
He’s also a big guy who can run. McClain said he was timed at 4.59 and 4.63 seconds in the 40 over the summer and has about 9 percent body fat, nice numbers for a 260-pounder.
“Rolando’s a fantastic talent,” Tide quarterback Greg McElroy said. “Week in and week out, the best linebacker we go against is No. 25 on our team. He just does such a great job of getting players in position. He does a great job of encouraging players. He’s a fantastic leader. He just does so many things that go unseen.”
Asked what makes him a good linebacker, McClain said brains have plenty to do with it not just physical attributes.
issect plays and know what runs they have out of each formation, it makes you a lot better.”
His big game against Kentucky came at a good time. Fellow inside linebacker Dont’a Hightower was lost for the season with a knee injury the week before.
McClain said he can’t try to do too much to make up for the loss, and that his two mental errors came when he did just that.
He is rated as one of the top NFL prospects among linebackers, but insists the decision about whether to return for his senior season is far from his mind.
“That’s not something I’m worried about, really,” McClain said. “I don’t even really care about it. I’m not thinking about it. I haven’t thought about it. I’m just trying to get ready for Ole Miss.”
Then the perfectionist was asked if he’s ever had a perfect game. He didn’t have to pause.
“Never. There’s no such thing as a perfect game in my mind, unless I make every play, defeat every block and make every tackle,” McClain said.
Yep, sounds like Saban’s kind of player.
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AP Sports Writer Chris Talbott in Oxford, Miss., contributed to this report.
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