Most people know Anthony Adams today as a social media star with a bevy of different, hilarious characters he portrays. They don’t remember that he actually played football in the NFL for a long time. Most see that as merely his stepping stone to bigger things. It is true though. Adams played the game for a long time and was actually pretty good at it. Maybe not prolific in terms of sacks, but a man who did the dirty work.
One of the big qualities that the Bears coveted about him when he was signed as a free agent in 2007 was his size and strength. At 310 lbs he had the sort of lower and upper body power to hold his ground against the run. With his help, Chicago finished with a top five run defense three times in five seasons. Being surrounded by so much star power though made it difficult for him to get any credit.
There was also a bit of an adjustment period to embracing the team culture. Specifically in regards to conditioning. Former head coach Lovie Smith dropped the hammer on him hard his first year when he reported to training camp overweight.
“I didn’t know coming from the 49ers. It was just, like, if you made plays they didn’t really care how much you weighed. So when I got here, I think I was maybe five pounds over or eight pounds over. Something like that and Coach Smith made a big deal about it.
Like he came into our defensive line meeting room and, ‘Hey guys. We don’t play with fat guys. Alright? Just want to let you know.’ And AB, Alex Brown, of course. He’s looking around like, ‘Aw! Who’s fat? Somebody speak up now!’ And I’m just like oh okay. This is how ya’ll are doing it? I didn’t know. Okay.”
Anthony Adams learned that Lovie Smith had serious standards
Smith gets a lot of heat for decisions he made as head coach from his offensive coordinator carousel to his inability to manage quarterbacks. However, when it came to operating a defense he was among the best of his time. He had a standard and expected every single man to adhere to it. Otherwise, he’d find somebody who would. It took Adams a couple of years to fully embrace it, but he eventually did.
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In 2010 he had his career-best season. He made 37 tackles, 2 sacks, 9 tackles for a loss and 5 quarterback hits. The Bears defense finished with the 2nd best run defense in the league. This should be a reminder that for all the laughs “Spice” brings these days, there was a time when he was a pretty good football player. Not to mention an unselfish one who didn’t let a little criticism stop him from doing his job.
