As he enters his 18th professional season, Calais Campbell is flirting with two decades spent in the NFL.
It's only right he spends his age-39 season with the team that made him a second-round pick way back in 2008.
Campbell is back with the Arizona Cardinals, the club that employed him for his first nine NFL campaigns before he left for an opportunity to make a difference with a contender in Jacksonville in 2017. Campbell made his name in the desert, earning two Pro Bowl nods and two second-team All-Pro honors in his final three seasons with Arizona before departing, beginning a journey that has taken him to Jacksonville, Baltimore, Atlanta and Miami.
Along the way, Campbell chased Super Bowls (and fell painfully short with the Jaguars and Ravens), latched onto a Falcons team in need of a veteran, and completed a homecoming by joining the Dolphins, returning to where he spent his college years at the University of Miami.
His latest chapter makes for yet another homecoming, but of a different variety.
"It means a lot, you know. Bringing back a lot of memories, that's for sure," Campbell said of returning to Arizona. "Even just walking through the building, so many memories poured out of me. This is where I got my start, this is the team that believed in me and gave me the opportunity to live out my dream and, here we are all these years later and they believe in me, still giving me the opportunity about my dream.
"I'm one of those guys that love this game so much, I kind of have to wake up and pinch myself like, is this real? You know, I still get to play football. But I feel like I'm still good at it, still dominant, and I feel I could really help this team. A lot of talent all over the place. and I feel like the value I could bring is gonna make a big difference, at least I hope so. So, I'll roll up my sleeves and get my hands dirty and do the best I can."
Campbell isn't wrong. If he's proved anything over the last few seasons, it's that Father Time is struggling to catch him. Campbell has logged 17 sacks combined over the last three years, piling up 144 tackles and 26 tackles for loss in that span.
He's still the mountainous man who strikes fear in the hearts of opposing quarterbacks and is liable to blow up a play on a given snap. But make no mistake: Campbell isn't superhuman.
When asked if he felt as if he was entering his 18th year in the NFL, Campbell laughed while admitting, yes, the physical toll is evident. It just hasn't crept into his performance.
"It feels like 18 (seasons) because of, you know, it's a lot of time, a lot of effort," Campbell said. "But I still feel dominant. I feel like I can change ball games. I just can't play 75 plays a game, you know. First time around, I wasn't coming off the field other than a drive or two, and now I can give you 35 quality plays. Those are gonna be grade-A plays. You start getting to that 40-50 (plays), you know, still will be good, but you gotta be smart."
If Campbell is a high-leverage rotational player at this stage, he'll be among the very best in such a role. The Cardinals knew that's what they were getting when they signed him, and he'll hope to fit into a defense that has welcomed a number of additions up front, including recent Super Bowl champion Josh Sweat and defensive tackle Dalvin Tomlinson.
Above all, though, Campbell spent Thursday soaking in his new (and familiar) reality. After eight years away, he's an Arizona Cardinal once again.
"I try to stay present and not really think about things that could happen, but this place always had a place in my heart," he said. "This is where it all started nine years. It's a long time to be anywhere -- that's a career by itself. I've always, you know, had a lot of love, and I didn't really start thinking about coming back, like officially, like really let myself think about that until last year, at the trade deadline, they were one of the teams that tried to trade for me. So, I kind of get in my head like, 'That would be cool to go back to Arizona.'
"And then this offseason, a lot of teams were interested, but when we got, you know, talking about all the different possibilities and stuff this one just kept coming up. With all my like support system and family and everything else, it just made a lot of sense."
