Virginia Tech’s top tackler, Grimm revels in college life

BLACKSBURG Alizard tail is taped to a wall in Cody Grimm's apartment. So is a man's ponytail and a plastic bag with a piece of tooth in it. Grimm and his roommate, Jeremy Rudolph, call it the Wall of Fame -- a collection of the memories Grimm will take with him when he graduates from Virginia Tech in December.

Grimm is, in many ways, a regular college kid. He looks like one: 5-11, 205 pounds, buzz cut. He acts like one, charging expensive rounds of golf to his parents' credit card, singing karaoke at the bar on a Tuesday, catching a smallmouth bass at the river with his friends so they could put it in a tank in his living room.

What makes him extraordinary is his ability to play football better than almost any college kid his size. A fifth-year senior whip linebacker, he will walk on the field Saturday at Virginia for his final regular-season game as the Hokies' leading tackler, with 93, including nine for losses. His seven forced fumbles are the most in the country.

Grimm came to Blacksburg as a walk-on. But his ability to read a play, to notice tendencies that help him react, allowed him to earn a scholarship and become the Hokies' best pound-for-pound player, according to defensive coordinator Bud Foster. "I'll stand on the table for him being the [ACC] defensive player of the year," Foster said. "Why not? Has there been anybody who's done the things he's done?"

"I'm living the dream right now," he said.

. . .

The first day of his freshman year, Grimm met suite mates William Wall and Greg Boone. Wall, a hulking defensive lineman who later left the team, "looked like he could be a dad," Grimm remembered. Boone, a quarterback large enough to now play tight end, popped in his highlight tape from high school, which showed him "completely destroying people," Grimm said. He brought his tape to college, too, but after seeing Boone's, "I told the guys I didn't have one," he said.

He learned long ago that his mind made him a more impressive player than his body ever could, even before his teammates at Oakton High in Vienna nicknamed him Bird Man because his legs were so skinny.

Before Tech teammate Mark Muncey shook his hand for the first time, he looked at all 185 pounds of Grimm and thought, "Is this guy a kicker?" And certainly before his position coach at Tech, Jim Cavanaugh, mentioned what NFL scouts notice about him when they come to Blacksburg and watch film of Tech's players. "He's driving the pro scouts crazy," Cavanaugh said. "They see him making all these plays, then they see him physically, and he's got these little bird legs."

When Grimm was 4, his father, Russ, played his last of 11 seasons as a Pro Bowl offensive guard for the Washington Redskins, a career that included three Super Bowl titles. Russ brought home game tape to study at night. "Dad, what are you watching?" Cody asked. Russ explained he was looking to see how defensive linemen slanted in blocking.

After Russ retired, he became an assistant coach, first with Redskins, then the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2000, now the Arizona Cardinals since 2007. Cody and his older brother, Chad, visited Redskin Park to watch film of potential draft picks with Russ. When they got older, they went to Steelers training camp and sat in meetings and film-study sessions.

"I always felt comfortable on the football field and felt like I knew what [opponents] were trying to do," Grimm said. "As soon as a play ran, I'd be the person that saw what was developing quickest, all through little league and high school."

Still, Grimm thought he would play college lacrosse, not football. Georgetown offered him a partial scholarship. His only football scholarship offer came from William and Mary. "I probably wouldn't have offered myself either," he said. He decided to follow Chad's path by walking on at Tech. Grimm arrived hoping just to play on special teams.

Then he began surprising himself and the coaches during scout-team scrimmages as a freshman. He stuffed a fullback bigger than him, covered a faster receiver. "He just kept making all the tackles," Cavanaugh said.

Grimm redshirted his first season. Halfway through his second, when he played special teams, he called his dad. "I think I can start," he told him. Grimm played sparingly at whip in 2007, behind fellow sophomore Cam Martin. They split time last season, when a knee injury limited Martin. This season, with Martin still bothered by the knee, Grimm has played 87 percent of the snaps.

He earned the time, because, as Russ said, "He's always had pretty good instincts. That's the thing that's kind of separated him."

Against Miami earlier this season, he ran 20 yards, stride for stride in pass coverage with tight end Dedrick Epps. When Epps got to the end zone, Grimm noticed him look up for a pass. Grimm, who had his back turned to the ball, punched it out just as it landed in Epps' hands.

But Grimm picked another play that best demonstrates his instincts. Last year against Maryland, he was blitzing, and as he ran to the quarterback, he noticed a lineman veer blocking, toward the inside of the line -- a telltale sign of a reverse. Grimm changed course to prepare for that, and an instant later, receiver Darrius Heyward-Bey ran the reverse. Grimm tackled him for a 10-yard loss.

. . .

Years from now, Grimm might not remember that play. But he will remember how teammate Chris Drager's shorn ponytail graced his Wall of Fame. Or that former center Ryan Shuman's broken tooth joined it after a wild night of Shuman playfully head-butting everybody in the apartment and Grimm responding by popping him in the mouth, after which the room burst out in laughter.

And he will never forget the time his friend Taylor bit off his lizard's tail. The lizard, Tyson, was a Tokay gecko -- "the meanest son of a [gun] in the world," said Rudolph, Grimm's high school buddy and roommate.

There was also a rabbit named Patrick Swayze. And the unnamed bass they fished from the New River and dumped in the empty lizard tank with some water, so they and their friends could sit on the other side of the living room, drink beer and cast lines into the tank. "That's what I'm going to miss most, hanging out with them, probably more than I'll miss football," Grimm said.

Some of Tech's players shy away from going out in downtown Blacksburg. Not Grimm and his friends on the team: Muncey, Matt Reidy, Richard Graham -- all backup or special-teams players. They spend NFL Sundays at the Hokie House and bring a football with them so they can toss it at street signs and light poles on the walk home -- a football/golf hybrid game they created called "folf." Grimm didn't even mind former quarterback Sean Glennon bringing him to karaoke night at Top of the Stairs last year so they could belt out Backstreet Boys songs.

Grimm seems secure enough in his own regularity that after a game earlier this month at East Carolina, he gave media interviews with a plug of chewing tobacco in his lower lip.

It is fitting, then, that Grimm's favorite moments from this dream semester came not from the football field, but from the parking lot of his apartment, where he and his teammates gathered with their families after Saturday afternoon home games to eat, drink and play cornhole. "You don't have a worry in the world," he said.

And before they go to sleep many nights, he and Rudolph look around their apartment, at the wrench they use to turn on the shower and adjust the thermostat, at the lizard tank now filled with an old backpack, empty beer cans and Skoal tins.

Then Grimm and Rudolph look at each other and say, "We're doing all right."