Opportunity knocks for rookie Eagles linebacker

At first, Keenan Clayton's path to success seemed clear.

As a child, he was the fastest one on the flag football field. He went on to be a high school star in Sulphur Springs, a rural town in football-hungry East Texas.

Recruited by football powerhouses, including LSU, he won a starting safety job at Oklahoma as a redshirt freshman. Then, one play into his second game as a starter, Clayton's career was redirected by a missed tackle. Benched for nearly two years, he considered quitting.

By now, it's obvious that he didn't: Clayton was an Eagles fourth-round draft pick and at a minicamp last month was practicing with the team's second string as a strong-side linebacker, a position of need on the defense. But lessons from those years on the bench and a watchful father are still with Clayton, shaping how he is approaching his shot at the NFL.

"Who knows where he would have been if he hadn't missed that tackle?" said the linebacker's father, Quon Clayton. "But you learn from [your] mistakes."

The primary lesson that seems to have come from Clayton's benching was to work. When Clayton arrived at Eagles minicamp, he said, he had been asked to learn the strong-side linebacker position but was planning to study the weak side as well - just in case.

Asked if he needed to add bulk to play in the NFL, he said, "If it need be for me to pick up weight, got to get to the table."

And when it came to special teams, an unglamorous job that may provide opportunities for rookies, Clayton said it just takes effort to make the difference between springing a big play or missing a block and getting "cussed out."

"I'd rather just put the effort in and get the job right the first time than sit back and let somebody yell at me," he said.

A jagged path

Practicing in the Eagles' winged helmets might not have been the exact dream Clayton had as a young man. Growing up about 80 miles east of Dallas, he spent Sundays cheering on the Aikman-Irvin-Smith Cowboys. When he went to Oklahoma, he wore No. 22 out of respect for Emmitt Smith.

His allegiances abruptly changed with a phone call from the Eagles on April 24, early on Day 3 of the NFL draft. The call woke Clayton up in his family's home.

"You know how family reacts. Everybody's in there shedding tears and slinging snot," Clayton said, a Texas drawl still detectable.