The Legend of Kiko Alonso

[Tailback U]

22 tackles for the rookie today. Again just flying all over the field all game.

 

[DDRGuido]

Kid is a stud. I hope he wins Defensive ROTY.

 

[Tailback U]

Out of the country right now and haven't been updating this but he's starting to get a lot of attention. It's too bad his effort and talents don't really seem to be helping the Bills defense all that much.

This article has a fun little video in it that I can't directly link to:

http://espn.go.com/nfl/story/_/id/1...acker-kiko-alonso-makes-impact-rookie-starter

Bills rookie Kiko Alonso has arrived
Middle linebacker emerges as tackling machine after taking rocky road to NFL

http://espn.go.com/video/clip?id=espn:9921384

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- When naming the NFL's best middle linebackers over the past decade, two stand out: Ray Lewis and Brian Urlacher.

Both were fiery and passionate, the vocal quarterbacks of their respective defenses. Neither was ever at a shortage of words, on or off the field.

Buffalo Bills middle linebacker Kiko Alonso is different.

One of the most quiet and reserved players in his team's locker room, the 46th overall pick in April's draft has let his play speak for itself. Staying on the field for every snap this season, Alonso is the NFL's second-leading tackler and is among the favorites to win the defensive rookie of the year award.

It has been a quick ascent, one that would have seemed unlikely just a few years ago.

[+] EnlargeKiko Alonso
AP Photo/Bill Wippert
Kiko Alonso arrived at the Bills' bye week with 112 tackles and four interceptions through 11 games.
In February 2010, Alonso was arrested for DUI and suspended for his entire sophomore season at the University of Oregon. That incident preceded a knee injury that would have wiped out his 2010 season, even without his arrest.

Just over a year later, Alonso was arrested again, charged with criminal mischief and trespassing. According to reports, Alonso pounded on the front door of a stranger's home late one Saturday night, demanding to be let in. The owner called 911 and fled. When police arrved, Alonso was inside the house.

He pleaded guilty to the charges and was sentenced to probation, community service and alcohol treatment.

Alonso was suspended again, this time indefinitely, putting his future with the team in peril until Oregon coach Chip Kelly decided to reinstate the linebacker for the 2011 home opener.

Given a second chance, Alonso made the most of it. He tallied 46 tackles as a junior and was named defensive MVP of the Rose Bowl. That led to a senior season in which he notched 81 tackles -- including 14 for loss -- four interceptions and two forced fumbles.

"I take extra pride in that I got the opportunity to coach Kiko," Kelly, now the Philadelphia Eagles' head coach, said this week. "Extremely dedicated, driven person, both academically and athletically."

Alonso played his final college game in Glendale, Ariz., on Jan. 3, a Fiesta Bowl win for Oregon. Four days later, at a news conference more than 2,000 miles away, the Bills introduced Doug Marrone as their next head coach.

The road to Buffalo
The Bills, fresh off their eighth consecutive losing season, had become the NFL's latest rebuilding project. Marrone quickly reeled in New York Jets defensive coordinator Mike Pettine for the same role in Buffalo, and the search began to fill a void in the middle of the Bills' defense.

As the Buffalo winter howled outside, Marrone played the role of scout, reviewing Oregon game film.

"All the sudden, my eyes kept going to the middle linebacker because he made so many plays," Marrone said last week. "Not to say that [Alonso] was the best on it, but it was just someone where you said, 'Wow, this guy is productive on the football field, making play after play, sideline to sideline, downhill.' So now you become interested."

[+] EnlargeKiko Alonso
AP Photo/Dave Martin
Alonso made a favorable impression on the Bills' contingent at the scouting combine.
The Bills flagged the 6-foot-3, 238-pound Alonso as one player they wanted to interview at February's scouting combine. He quickly impressed Pettine, who had risen through the ranks while coaching some of the NFL's best defenses in Baltimore and New York.

"You could tell that the football aptitude wasn't commensurate with how he presented himself," Pettine said. "He didn't wow you from a communication standpoint, but you could tell that the kid knew football."

"When we put the tape on, [we asked Alonso] 'What were you thinking here?' 'Why did you do this?'" Pettine explained. "[And Alonso said] 'Hey, I did this because I saw the small split by the guard and the tackle was sitting light, and I knew they were going to run overhead.'"

Although Alonso could prove his football knowledge, he still had to answer for his two arrests.

"I just said that I made mistakes," Alonso said last week. "I just moved on. I'm not going to make that mistake again. I'm just smarter, and I know I have to be smarter."

The Bills scouting staff, then led by general manager Buddy Nix, had already developed a profile of Alonso's character, so when the Bills interviewed Alonso in Indianapolis, his off-field missteps warranted only a brief mention.

"I don't know if it was at the beginning or the end [of the interview]. It just was asked in passing," Pettine said. "I think we had already had a detailed report from Oregon. I think everybody felt comfortable with those issues."

"I personally didn't call Chip [Kelly], but I [would] say there was a thorough process," Marrone said. "I don't want to say 'investigate,' because it's almost like you're trying to find bad things about people, but we do a background check. Our scouts talk to the coaches, the weight coaches and people like that."

Two months after interviewing Alonso in Indianapolis, the Bills made him their third pick in what would be Nix's final draft in Buffalo.

The Bills had their guy.

Rookie in the middle
Two weeks later, Pettine flew to Philadelphia for the NFL's Career Development Symposium, an internal networking event at which Kelly was a speaker. The former Oregon coach, then settling into his new position with the Eagles, let Pettine know Alonso wouldn't disappoint.

"He said to me, 'Hey, listen, you guys have the real deal on Kiko now,'" Pettine recalled. "I knew he was high on their draft board. … [Kelly] spoke very, very highly of him. He said that we would be very pleased with [Alonso], and he's obviously been dead on."

The next challenge for Pettine was to gauge how Alonso would fit into his system, a complex scheme that uses multiple defensive fronts and pressures to keep opposing quarterbacks on their toes. Helping Alonso's cause was his background at Oregon.

"You could tell at Oregon that he was really well coached. They did a lot defensively, and they weren't just sort of playing one front and coverage," Pettine explained. "Scout some of these kids, and they just play a four-man front and quarter coverage behind it, and that's it. They've never really been exposed to much, whereas [Alonso] had been exposed to a lot.

"So he was a guy that we felt was ahead of the curve coming out."

[+] EnlargeKiko Alonso
George Gojkovich/Getty Images
Alonso is excelling as a middle linebacker, but his defensive coordinator says the rookie has the ability to play all over the field.
The Bills needed to find out, however, if inserting a rookie into the center of a complicated defense and having him wear the helmet communication device was another risk they were willing to take.

"In the spring, we were like, 'Hey, let's try it.' That would be the time to do it. And we felt the plan would be, hand it to him, see if he could do it,'" Pettine said. "If he could, he could. Great. If he couldn't, we would have plenty of time to find option two, option three down the road."

It would be the first time Alonso, who communicated with the sideline with hand signals in college, would use the helmet with the radio, a critical role within any NFL defense.

"Very, very important position. He has to get 10 other guys correctly aligned, and then if there's checks that need to be made, he needs to know those checks and make those checks," Bills linebacker Manny Lawson said. "And then, as far as when things do start to break down or things don't go your way, he has to be that guy who everybody looks to."

As it turned out, the transition wasn't difficult for Alonso.

"It's easy," he said. "I mean, [Pettine] just gives me the call in the headset and I echo it. It's actually easier than the hand signals. But they're both easy."

"That was never an issue from day one," Pettine said. "Never an issue."

The final hurdle for Alonso to clear would be winning over his veteran teammates, including Lawson.

"My first impression of Kiko was that he was very soft-spoken, not really understanding his role. Didn't want to step on anybody's toes," Lawson said. "Granted, he was in a position that he was, the center of the defense, the spotlight of the defense, the head guy of the defense. He didn't really know how to take that role, especially coming in as a rookie."

Lawson has already established a level of comfort on the field with Alonso despite the 23-year-old rookie having played in only 11 games for the Bills (4-7) to this point.

"I can take a chance on really extending myself -- diving to go make a tackle -- because I know Kiko is going to be somewhere around if I don't make it," Lawson explained. "Having that extra blanket of security really motivates not only the individual on the field or the other 10 guys that are on the field, but it motivates the entire team."

"Kiko's a special player. When you watch him on film, it's Kiko see ball, Kiko tackle ball," Kelly said. "We saw that at Oregon a lot, and I think people in Buffalo are seeing that right now."

While Alonso has manned the middle of the field for the Bills, Pettine hinted last week that the Bills might eventually decide to tap his versatility.

"To me, you don't even know if [middle linebacker] is his ideal position. It's more of a necessity here with him. But he can play a lot of spots. He's a football player. He could probably play strong safety, defensive end," Pettine said. "He can play. Loves football. That's one of those things where we can move him around and put him in some different positions. He's fine with all of them."

No matter what position he plays, Alonso may never be the Bills' version of Ray Lewis or Brian Urlacher in the locker room or in the pregame huddle.

But on the field, the Bills believe they have something special.

"There's really not a ceiling for him," Marrone said. "Playing every snap, a guy that doesn't come off the field. Obviously, he has the communication that he has to get done. When you look at what's going on and how he's producing, in my opinion -- and, obviously, that's biased -- he's an outstanding football player. Not just as a rookie, but just as anyone at that position."

None of this comes as a shock to Alonso's college coach.

"He made a couple of missteps early in his career and really changed," Kelly said. "I think he understood the opportunities he had in front of him and everything that's happening to him now -- I don't know if it surprises other people. It doesn't surprise me."

 

[Tailback U]

One of the best all around articles that I've read about Kiko:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nfl/bills/2013/10/18/kiko-alonso-legend/3009183/

Legend of Bills rookie Kiko Alonso grows - even if he won't talk

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — There have been numerous times over the past six months when Buffalo Bills defensive coordinator Mike Pettine wondered whether middle linebacker Kiko Alonso understood what he was being told.

They'd be on the field, or in the meeting room, or even at the lunch table, and Pettine would look into Alonso's brooding eyes and he just wasn't quite sure if the rookie second-round pick was all there.

"I've had conversations with him and afterward I was like, 'I don't know if he heard a word or truly comprehended what I said,' " Pettine recalled the other day with a smile. "There are times I've talked to him about things and he tilts the head and has this 'why are you saying this to me' look; like the dog with the high-pitched sound."

But in his somnolent way, Alonso disseminates the information like an Intel chip, then does exactly what he was told to do, better than Pettine or anyone else could have possibly imagined for a first-year player, and Pettine is left to shake his head in amazement.

WEEK 7 PICKS: Bills or Dolphins?

"We use the term 'pitch count' around here a lot and it's like he has a pitch count with his words; only so many he can use in a year," Pettine said. "He doesn't talk a lot, but underneath all of it, he's very intelligent. Soaks everything in, and the proof is what happens. You wonder if he really got that, and then he goes out on the field."

Apparently, he's getting it.

Alonso, picked with the Bills' second pick in the second round of the 2013 draft, has taken the NFL by storm. Six weeks into his NFL career he leads the league with 66 tackles, is tied for the lead with four interceptions, has become a trending phenom on Twitter, and already has his first honor as he was named NFL defensive rookie of the month for September.

Yet in those six weeks, as #thelegendofKikoAlonso has spread like a California wild fire, barely a peep has come from the laconic Alonso. He's a perfectly nice kid, but he just doesn't have much to say, the ultimate example of a guy who lets his play speak for itself.

"Nothing changes in what I've got to do," he said, softly downplaying all the attention he has garnered. "I don't think much of it. It's great, but I know I just have to get a lot better."

Anyone who truly knows Alonso isn't surprised by his attitude.

"This is exactly how he was in college," said Alonso's teammate at Oregon, offensive lineman Mark Asper, a 2012 draft pick of the Bills who recently rejoined the team. "He'd come smashing in there and make a big play and he has no emotion. He just goes back to the defensive huddle, and we had to trash talk for him. Our big line was 'Kiko Smash.' He'd come through and blow everything up like the Hulk and then just walk back and it was like he was saying, 'Next.' "

And to think, 10 years ago, Alonso had never played a down of organized football. He was a baseball player, and a really good one, perhaps even better than his older brother, Carlos, who currently is an infielder in the Philadelphia Phillies' farm system.

"I started playing baseball at a young age and that was really my sport," said Alonso, who was born in Massachusetts, then lived half his life in Texas before moving to Los Gatos, Calif., where he attended the same high school as former Bills quarterback Trent Edwards. "I played year round, I guess I was pretty good. I loved baseball and I had goals to play baseball when I was older, but then I started with football."

Freshman year at Los Gatos High. That's when it all changed. And while he continued to play baseball for a couple more years, football quickly became his passion.

"I just loved everything about football," he said. "I loved being able to run around and hit people."

Yes, Bills fans have noticed.

By the time he was a senior, he was a one-man wrecking crew. That year he made 150 tackles and 27 sacks, and even found time to play wide receiver as he caught 35 passes for 559 yards and seven TDs.

Oregon coach Chip Kelly recruited him, and then had to wait a bit for the dividend. Alonso red-shirted in 2008, played well in 2009, but then endured a miserable epoch between the spring of 2010 and spring of 2011. He suffered a knee injury, and also was suspended from the team for a pair of alcohol-related arrests.

He doesn't speak about much of anything, particularly those incidents, but he certainly gained a measure of maturity from that experience and it showed in his last two seasons. He became a full-time starter in 2011 and he earned defensive player of the game in Oregon's Rose Bowl victory over Wisconsin. In 2012 he made 87 tackles and four interceptions, and the Bills knew they had to have him.

Kelly left Oregon to take the head coaching job with the Philadelphia Eagles, and he would have drafted Alonso. But he didn't get the chance when the Bills swooped in at No. 46 overall.

"Kiko Alonso was a guy I would have loved to have," Kelly said. "I coached him and I think he's an outstanding football player. I know they got a great one in him."

The Bills knew this almost from the first practice.

"He was very well prepared for this," Pettine said. "Sometimes you get guys in shorts and you think they're going to be good players, and then the pads go on and you're like 'Ah.' We kind of knew. We had to almost tone him back in the spring; let's not be blowing our own guys up."

Pettine recalled one such day in one of the mini-camp practices. Alonso was flying all over the place, and he banged a teammate just a bit too hard.

"I remember he hit a guy pretty good and it might have been the day we had the league checker or the union here, and you kind of cringe because it's supposed to be non-contact practice," Pettine said. "It kind of looked accidental, but you had a little doubt because you didn't know the kid that well at the time."

Asper, of course, has seen that before. He went against Alonso plenty in practice back at Oregon, and it wasn't a whole lot of fun.

"He was a disruptive guy," Asper said. "I've seen him do a few things here that were identical to college where he reads a play real quick, shoots through the back side and makes the tackle in the backfield and everyone's like, 'where did he come from?' We always joked that we were glad Kiko was on our side."

Alonso was plugged into Buffalo's lineup and given the task of being the signal caller, and it's a role he has excelled in despite his lack of verbosity.

"Obviously he's communicating with the defense," said head coach Doug Marrone. "You look at a guy who is a first-year player and you look at what we put on his plate. We put quite a bit on it; he has to do a lot of preparation, probably extra preparation during the week because he is responsible for calling the defense."

As for Alonso's demeanor, well, Marrone recognizes his quiet nature, but every once in a while, he'll surprise you.

"I have had social conversations, and he's extremely bright from that standpoint," Marrone said. "We actually had a conversation one time in the hot tub; we were talking about some financial things, which all of the sudden you're like, 'Whoa.' "

Whoa indeed. It's a word that has been used often to describe Alonso's exploits this season.