Bickley: Special bond links Cardinals' Patrick Peterson, Tyrann Mathieu

Dan Bickley | azcentral sports

Patrick Peterson and Tyrann Mathieu are more than longtime teammates. They are like brothers. They are bonded in triumph and tough times.

They share something special, and they knew it from the first moment they met in Baton Rouge, La., when Peterson hosted Mathieu’s official campus visit to LSU.

“I’ll never forget what he told me,” Peterson said. “He said, ‘Hey, man. Are you Patrick?’ We had just met. And then he says, ‘Man, I’m going to be better than you.’ “

Peterson laughs hard at the memory. Mathieu smiles sheepishly, attempting to crawl inside his skin.

“I don’t know what made me say that,” Mathieu said. “He was the Number 1 recruit coming out of high school. I wanted to be just like him.”

The gap has never been closer, and same goes with the friendship. Peterson is now 25, a polished Pro Bowler with a big contract and a new daughter. He’s a shut-down cornerback in the mold of Deion Sanders, in the midst of a tremendous season. He has corrected health issues that marginalized his transcendent talent, and the results are obvious.

You don’t see quarterbacks testing him or fellow competitors taunting him anymore.

“He’s that premier cornerback that everybody hopes they have,” Mathieu said. “He’s been showing that since high school, showing he’s the best player on the football field. He makes my job easier because I’m not chasing the best receiver.”

Peterson also has a stronger locker room presence in 2015, assuming a more forceful brand of leadership. He even cancelled Victory Monday for all defensive players following a win against the 49ers, and nobody said a word.

“He’s definitely more vocal this year,” Mathieu said.

Meanwhile, Mathieu is fulfilling his own prophecy of a “savage season." He is a tenacious force on the field, liberated from that balky knee brace he was forced to wear last season. He has successfully flushed his addiction problem, becoming the gold standard of discipline, drive and accountability. Once, Peterson had to vouch for Mathieu, putting his professional reputation on the line for a player who had been kicked out of college. Mathieu is proof that second chances can work in the NFL.

“Ty is a great person,” Peterson said. “A lot of people have this guy misunderstood. That mistake he made at LSU, in the media’s perspective, made him what he was. But that wasn’t Tyrann. I knew he was a great kid at heart. I knew he always meant well. It’s just that some of the decisions he’s made have haunted him.

“By me standing on the table for him, I knew he wasn’t going to make that mistake anymore because he didn’t want to miss football anymore. I knew he wanted to be back in the spotlight again, and have that 'Honey Badger' type of year he had in 2010, going out there, taking the ball away, just being so focused on football. It was just about getting his head on straight.”

Challenges are nothing new for Mathieu. Growing up in New Orleans, he was picked on because of his diminutive size and for the lighter tone of his skin. His biological father is in prison, while his biological mother recently pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting a case of Medicare fraud in New Orleans.

At his very lowest, Mathieu lived with Peterson’s parents in Florida, where he reconfigured his life.

“My biological mother, who is a great woman, we still have a relationship,” Mathieu said. “It just isn’t a motherly-son relationship. I’m adopted by my uncle and aunt, who I look to as my parents and people who really did everything they could to put me on the right path. I’m really grateful to them. I don’t think I’d be here without them, Patrick and a lot of other people.”

Yet it’s also evident that both players are tired of the mentor-protégé narrative. They are less than two years apart in age, and more like contemporaries. And truth is, Mathieu has done most of the heavy lifting, reclaiming his beloved status in the sport.

“It’s his size, his attitude, the Badger-hawk (haircut), the way he attacks the game at all times,” Peterson said. “He plays with such a high energy at all times. No matter what point in time it is during a ballgame, you know what you’re going to get from Number 32. And I believe that’s what the world likes.

“He really resembles the Honey Badger, flying around the field, taking the ball when he wants, getting a thousand tackles, and he’s always on TV. So what do you not like about him?”

Peterson even liked how Mathieu approached him in 2010, when Peterson was the big man on campus, often asked to host the really important recruits. That’s when Mathieu threw down a competitive gauntlet, and almost six years later, life has come full circle.

Mathieu has been mentioned as an NFL Defensive Player of the Year candidate. Except some think Peterson is the Cardinals’ defensive MVP. So who is better than whom?

Someone’s going to have make a very tough call.

“We knew one of us was going to be up for (the award),” Peterson said. “Back in February, we said it’s going to take both of us to get where we needed to be. We set the goal for one of us to have the opportunity to hoist that defensive MVP trophy. He’s doing a great job. I’m doing a great job … but I’m definitely pulling for Ty to win.”

Said Mathieu: “It doesn’t matter who wins. We’re both going to share anyway.”

Like brothers.

Reach Bickley at dan.bickley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-8253. Follow him at twitter.com/danbickley. Listen to “Bickley and Marotta,” weekdays from noon-2 p.m. on Arizona Sports 98.7 FM.