Al Blades adjusting to safety role at Miami: "Making this move I won't say was hard, coaches made it easy"

If you want to talk about a true Hurricane, you probably don’t need to look much further than Al Blades, Jr. And it’s not because of his family history with Al Sr. and Bennie and Brian Blades former Canes.

You can just look at the trials and tribulations for the fifth-year redshirt junior Miami DB. He’s lost significant parts of the last two seasons due to injury, but just keeps on chugging along with his head up, working to serve as a leader on this defense.

The next step in his journey? The former cornerback has spent much of the fall working at a new position, safety.

“I feel like as far as learning curve, defense is defense,” Blades said. “I feel like I know defense. Making this move I won’t say was hard, coaches made it easy.”

In 2020 Blades played in eight games at corner and made seven starts before getting sidelined due to a complication of COVID-19, namely the heart condition myocarditis. Then last season Blades saw action off the bench in three of the first four games before undergoing surgery for a sports hernia.

It was frustrating, to say the least.

Blades has 14 career starts for Miami at corner, and in the spring he also learned the STAR position.

“If you know defense, wherever you go on the field you know (what to do),” Blades said.

He also is certain to be a fixture on all special teams because of the passion he brings to the table.

“The thing about me, I feel I can play anywhere on the defense, and coach (Jahmile) Addae feels the same way,” Blades said. “I’m smart enough to learn multiple positions, I just let coach Addae and the coaches handle where they put me. I just learn the defense and play ball.

“I love football no matter where I’m at – safety, corner, nickel, put me at D line, I don’t care. Just being out there, it feels good. To me personally, put me anywhere and I’ll compete.”

He adds “I’m fast enough to play corner, smart enough to play safety.”

Blades is part of a secondary that has a lot of weapons. At safety the team has arguably the most talented trio in the conference in James Williams, Kam Kinchens and Avantae Williams. Starting cornerback Tyrique Steenson returns and is an NFL-caliber player, and UM also added West Virginia starting CB Daryl Porter, Jr. in the portal. DJ Ivey’s also stepped up this spring, as has Isaiah Dunson and Te’Cory Couch.

So it’s a very deep group that will also benefit from having a healthy Blades.

And Blades’ role isn’t just on the field. He also tries to be a leader and mentor younger players.

“I consider myself someone that’s trying to mentor people to be better than me,” Blades said. “I (want to leave UM) better than I found it.”

* Asked about fellow safeties James Williams, Avantae Williams and Kam Kinchens and how they compare to past safeties he’s seen in his time at UM, Blades said, “We’re all in a class of our own. A lot of guys in the secondary really take pride in building their own repertoire, being their own self and building their own game.”

* Blades said the WR unit “is going really hard,” and he pointed to Xavier Restrepo as the leader of that group.

“X is trying to take that leadership role, same thing with Key’Shawn (Smith),” Blades said. “Everyone is trying to bring each other up, the standard is trying to be raised.”