METERI, Los Angeles — New Orleans Saints defensive end Cameron Jordan, the longest-serving player on the roster, isn’t sure when he started thinking of his younger teammates as “babies.”
But he thinks it was around 2015, when Jordan was 26 and in his fifth season.
Jordan and a crew of rookies smashed and burned that season with 30 sacks (10 of them, tied for 28th in the league).
“We had a full shift in the locker room,” Jordan recalled. “We had six or seven beginner D-linemen that I had to deal with, and I was like, ‘At this point, you guys are kids! I was raising the kids while we were gone. Since then, it’s been a lot easier.”
As Jordan approaches his 34th birthday in July, he’s at another crossroads. Many of his peers are gone, and the defensive line group is once again facing a major turnover, with part of the group made up of starry-eyed rookies.
“A whole new line of defense,” he said, shrugging and grinning. “We don’t have a single rookie back from last year but me.”
The father-of-four joked that “raising” two rookies — second-round pick Isaiah Foskey, who said he wanted to be the next Jordan, and first-round pick Brian Pressey — would be a piece of cake compared to the group he had earlier in his career.
“I think if you were to try to learn from someone, [Jordan] Saints coach Dennis Allen said it would be a good thing to learn from him.
The biggest change in Jordan’s life over the past decade, aside from his growing family, has been his work off the field. In the off-season, he served as a sideline reporter for the XFL and most recently an analyst for the USFL. He was recently involved with the NFL and NFLPA as a spokesperson for NFL Rivals, the NFL mobile video game.
A casual conversation would give no hint that he’s different from the 21-year-old that Saints general manager Mickey Loomis recently recalled speaking to him on draft night, describing him as “talkative and all over” with a “high-pitched” voice. “
In the first round of the 2011 draft, Jordan was unchanged, including cracking barbs at the expense of NFC South rivals.
But the league has changed around him. He remembers being a rookie himself, trying to make his father Steve proud. It was Steve, a six-time Pro Bowl tight end for the Vikings, who dropped Cam off at eighth grade football practice when Cam was convinced he was going to be a basketball player.
Jordan’s competitive juices were flowing as he reluctantly prepared for his first game after weeks of training under the sweltering Arizona sun. He got two reps that night and cooked on it. He didn’t let that happen again.
“My competitive engine in me doesn’t allow for just two or three actors,” Jordan told ESPN. “I’m doing all this work, I’m doing all this gas… all this conditioning, I’m still hitting people and not getting any reps. Nah, from now on, I am. So you’ve been my own worst enemy.”
“You may still be my own worst enemy, but now I use it as a catalyst.”
This drive carried him for years, with football being his entire focus. Rookies are now more polished and understand the business side better.
Sometimes, a 10-year age difference makes it seem like decades.
“These kids born in the late ’90s and early 2000s are a little different,” Jordan said. Combining social media as well now, guys coming from NIL (Name, Photo, Likeness) are doing different deals too. Likes. When I first got into the league, I was like, “I just want to be good at my position.” Guys come in, they’re like “Hey, I started this business, I’ve got a music artist, I’ve got something.” Multiple ways, and I don’t knock, I just say what my dad always told me: “Keep the main thing the main thing.”
“When you’re in school, make school the most important factor. When you’re out of school as an adult, you’re recruited by a team, and they invest money in you, invest opportunities in you, and do what you can to make the most of the opportunity.”
How does the 34-year-old relate to teammates who are less than a decade younger than him?
“They’re still men at the end of the day. At the end of the day, we don’t change much at our core,” Jordan said. “Whether you have a family might be the only difference, but you still love sitting around and chopping things off and talking about music and video games.”
Jordan could walk away now and be inducted into the Saints Hall of Fame in five years. He passed Hall of Famer Rickey Jackson last season to set the franchise sack record (115.5) and miss one career game after breaking his orbital bone in November.
He’s been to eight Pro Bowls (including last season), and other than a championship, he has nothing left to prove.
That drive is still there, and Jordan sees it in new quarterback Derek Carr. In his inaugural press conference as a Saint, Carr spoke about winning the Super Bowls in New Orleans. Jordan can relate.
“[Carr] He was talking about winning and, beyond that, trying to get the Super Bowl. “Besides, that’s all you can really ask for,” Jordan said. “I’m trying to win a Super Bowl. I don’t have 12 more years of playing. I don’t have 10 more years of playing.”
“We don’t know these things, but we do know we have an open window.”
Some veterans choose to skip OTAs and wait for training camp. Jordan, despite spending time taking his family to Spain in the off-season before joining the team, said he didn’t want to do that. He believes team bonding should start as early as possible, a sentiment shared by 34-year-old Pro Bowl quarterback Demario Davis. Davis contacted Jordan several times before the OTAs to organize off-season outings—go-karts, bowling, and even a trip to Dave & Buster’s—for the team.
“I love being with my teammates, and honestly, it’s a lot easier to buy back when you don’t remove yourself,” Jordan said when asked why he appeared in the off-season. “I’m in it because I love being here. My kids are homeschooled now, so if I didn’t, I’d probably be in Arizona now. But the physical location isn’t what’s holding me back, it’s the fact that we were able to work as a group, to relate as a D-line.” .
“You love it, and you love seeing everyone get along together. There’s a reason I feel like the difference between a good team and a great team is how close you are in the locker room.”
Jordan knows the years are drawing to a close. He doesn’t know when that might be, and his opinion of him changes every week.
“If we do make a deal, these will probably be the last years of my career here,” Jordan said last week at the Saints Hall of Fame golf tournament.
“I don’t know if there will ever come a time when I say I’m done with football or football is done with me. … But we’ll deal with that as the time comes. Right now, I’m enjoying playing football and the way we do things.”