What did Marlon Humphrey learn from Nick Saban?

“I picked the University of Alabama because I knew specifically I’d be getting coached by this guy,” Humphrey said during an appearance on ESPN’s “This Is Football” podcast. “The guy that’s recruiting me is the guy that’s going to be coaching me. …

“Every single meeting, every single time I ever saw him in a meeting, he had a pen pad. He had a pen, and he was taking notes on whoever was talking. It didn’t matter who it was. It could be a whatever. It didn’t matter. It seemed like it’d be a, like, ‘OK, we’re just kind of you got to do this every year.’ Whatever it was, he was always taking notes.

“And I sat one row behind him. And that’s probably the biggest thing. He always just kept trying to build, kept trying to build. There’s always something to take, and that’s kind of an approach I take now. Whenever there is a meeting, no matter how long or whatever it is about, I try to just take one thing from any time somebody gets up and talks in front of me -- just one thing. It might be an hour long. If you can just try to strive for just one thing, it can take you a long way. So that’s probably one of the biggest things that I kind of learned.”

On the field, Humphrey said the lesson from Saban that has served him best in the NFL is: “You can’t do anything without your feet.”

“Biggest thing is just balance,” Humphrey said. “I think there’s so many times when it’s just really leverage versus leverage and just the balance of how your feet are. Some people want to get outside of your frame. You really can’t do anything when you get outside of your frame. And that’s really for every single position. It doesn’t really matter how strong you are up top, without the balance of your feet, equalness in those two feet, it’s just limited what you can do.

“And I remember one of my first times meeting Saban as a recruit, he gets up in his slacks and starts doing DB, like sliding side to side. And I’m just like, ‘He’s in a full suit, some slacks and loafers.’ And I’m just like, ‘All right, I mean, there’s no better way to teach than to just get up and do it. Hopefully, I’m doing it a little faster than you.’ But that was one of my first meetings. And he just got up out of his seat and just step, step, step, step, step, step, and that’s the biggest thing I got.”

Although he became “obsessed” with golf during the offseason, Humphrey said he’s ready for training camp.

“As you get older, you do have to train a little bit harder to get similar or better results,” said Humphrey, who turned 29 years old on July 8. “You got to be a little bit more efficient. That’s the biggest thing I’m focusing on -- the efficiency of my movements, the efficiency of what I eat. I can’t do the things I was doing when I was 22, 23. You got to be a lot smarter. I was just riding a four-wheeler, and I was like, ‘Oh, let me not get hurt on this thing.’ And that’s something that I would not have thought about when I was 22 out here at my place. So you think a little bit smoother, you think a lot more wiser as you get older. And how much longer can you play? How much longer will this team have? And, you know, you want the ring. And that’s the biggest thing.”