Raiders’ Carrie: Switch from cornerback to safety mostly mental

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TJ Carrie’s move from cornerback to safety last week for the Raiders was no big deal, it turns out.

He played it a little in high school.

“It’s a little different in high school to this level,” Carrie said Wednesday, laughing.

No, the real reason Carrie was confident was because he had some good advisers in teammate Charles Woodson and assistant coach Rod Woodson, two Pro Bowlers who made the transition at one point themselves.

The coaching staff’s decision to move its top cornerback caught him off guard, and the elder Woodson pulled him aside when he saw some hesitancy in Carrie’s face.

“The biggest thing is he told me, ‘Understand that you’re capable of doing it,’” Carrie said. “He quieted my mental doubts. It allowed me to understand that they believed in me and trusted that I would get the job done.

“That’s the most important thing going into every game, having the mental capacity that you can get something done.”

Carrie said he wanted to make sure he had the fundamentals of the position down. So he got in the video room to understand what he was supposed to be doing

“What you’re reading is a lot different than corner, what your angles are,” Carrie said. “How far your depth needs to be. … The staff has given me my keys for improvement if we plan to put that package in again versus another team.”

Carrie handled himself fine when he was at safety, even breaking up a pass on the Browns’ last drive. The coaches haven’t said if they will use the package again, but one has to figure they would repeat a winning formula against other pass-heavy teams.

“They made it a simpler package for me so I could play at a faster pace,” Carrie said. “It’s kind of cool when you go into the game-planning meetings and know anything is possible. Whatever it takes, let’s draw it up and see if we can beat this team.”

Del Rio feisty: Chicago head coach John Fox is an old friend of Raiders head coach Jack Del Rio — Del Rio was his defensive coordinator last year in Denver — and that gets Del Rio smelling blood a little bit.

“You want to beat the guys you know really bad. That’s just how it is,” Del Rio said. “I want to beat him real bad. He wants to beat me real bad.

“I wish it could be him and I wrestling on the 50, but it won’t come to that. Foxy is pretty tough and he might still take me. In seriousness, it’s going to be our two teams going at each other. It should be a good battle.”

In what might have been a long-distance wink to his friend, Del Rio said he thinks Jay Cutler will start for Chicago at quarterback. Cutler missed Sunday’s 26-0 loss to Seattle with a hamstring, and was expected to be out two weeks.

“I don’t think that it’s going to be a backup quarterback,” Del Rio said. “I’d be shocked if it is, but we’ll see.

Cutler was a limited participant at Chicago’s practice Wednesday and most Bears insiders think he is out there only to cause the Raiders some planning grief. Jimmy Clausen would not cause them much, based on the result against the Seahawks.

Vic Tafur is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: vtafur@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @VicTafur