DENVER -- Denver Broncos cornerback Aqib Talib craned his neck, patiently scanned the options and trusted his instincts when pondering the choices before him. He didn't have much time for lunch on this spring afternoon, so Noodles & Co. would have to do for a man who had recently signed a six-year, $57 million free-agent deal. As Talib stepped slowly toward the cash register, he continued contemplating the various pasta selections when an unassuming gentleman tapped his right shoulder from behind. "Don't worry about this one," the man said. "I'll take care of your lunch today."

Talib couldn't help but smile at the gesture. The last time somebody bought him a meal, he was standing in line at a Dunkin' Donuts outside Boston last fall, waiting for 25 breakfast sandwiches that a New England Patriots fan was eager to purchase on his behalf. The difference then was that Talib was already deep into his first full season with the Patriots after being traded from the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. This time, before even lining up in a game for the Broncos, Talib was feeling instant love from the Mile High City.

The takeaway for 28-year-old Talib was that new beginnings can trump old baggage. For a man who has been suspended or involved in a legal run-in at every level of his career, Talib is out to prove something critical in his first year in Denver: that the Broncos made a sound investment.

Fans have embraced Aqib Talib during his first season in Denver, and he wants to justify the Broncos' investment in him. John Leyba/The Denver Post/Getty Images

"When you've been around the NFL long enough, you hear about the A-1 franchises," Talib said. "I was lucky to be with one in New England, and now I'm with one here. You're talking about being around people like Peyton Manning, John Fox and John Elway every day. It doesn't get much better than that."

Sitting in a folding chair outside the Broncos' locker room after an August practice, Talib talked passionately about his new team. He fidgeted with a pair of cellphones while answering questions, and he joked with teammates who walked by. In many ways, Talib appeared to be a man eager to put his best foot forward. At his best, he's funny, personable and candid.

But Talib didn't pretend he didn't know what was coming in that interview -- especially at a time when player conduct is under the microscope. If his story really is one of redemption, it won't just revolve around all the abilities and skills that earned him his first Pro Bowl selection last season. It also has to be about the issues that left many observers questioning Talib's decision-making and his future.

The fights with teammates. The arrest for slugging a cab driver. The ugly tussle with his sister's live-in boyfriend three years ago that led to an indictment for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon -- although charges were later dropped because of insufficient evidence. Talib drew so much negative press in his first five NFL seasons that the Broncos must have been holding their breath in June when Dallas police erroneously named Talib as someone who had been arrested when, in fact, older brother Yaqub Talib had been picked up for public intoxication.

But as the NFL struggles with an assortment of criminal issues that have made people question the state of the league, Talib feels as if his ability to avoid trouble since being traded out of Tampa Bay midway through the 2012 season indicates that he's on the right track.

"I feel like I have grown a lot," Talib said. "When you're young, you start off wanting to go to the NFL. Then you want to be a first-round pick. After that, you want to be a starter, and then a Pro Bowler and then a guy who plays in playoff games. I'm at the stage now where I want to be recognized among the best at my position."

• • •

As for most players with baggage, Talib's story is complicated. He spent the first 11 years of his life in rugged East Cleveland, an area, where Talib said, "You saw gangs, drugs, shootings, people getting jumped and girls fighting each other." Talib became so used to his rough surroundings that he was hardly fazed when his mother, Okolo Talib, spent eight months in prison after being indicted for felony assault for attacking another woman with a knife in 1996. He and Yaqub spent that time with their father, Theodore Henry, who lived in Trenton, New Jersey, after he and Talib's mother divorced.

Talib helped Kansas go 12-1, including an Orange Bowl victory, in his senior season. Jim Barcus/Kansas City Star/MCT/Getty Images

As bleak as Talib's environment was, there was no questioning his athletic ability. When neighbors dumped old mattresses on the street corners for garbage pickup, a young Talib performed cartwheels and backflips on them, leaving his mother wondering how an 8-year-old could be so nimble. When she moved her family to the Dallas area before Talib started sixth grade, that athleticism became even more obvious when he started playing organized football. He became a standout at Berkner High School in Richardson, Texas, and an All-American at Kansas after that.

But Talib also had red flags hovering all around him. The Tampa Bay Times reported that Talib received two years' probation toward the end of his senior year at Berkner for breaking into a house. He also garnered multiple suspensions in his first two years at Kansas and admitted to testing positive three times for marijuana during his college career.

The Buccaneers, nevertheless, selected Talib at No. 20 in the 2008 draft. In 2010, he received a one-game suspension for punching a cab driver in St. Petersburg, Florida, the year before. Later, he was indicted in Garland, Texas, for the 2011 incident in which police alleged that Talib had assaulted his sister's live-in boyfriend after the man hit Talib's sister. The case was dismissed before going to trial.

Despite Talib's having intercepted 17 passes in his first four seasons with the Bucs, most people knew him because of his behavior off the field.

"I was putting myself in bad situations," he said. "I wasn't thinking about the consequences. I would know I wasn't supposed to be in a place, and I decided to go anyways."

Added former Bucs general manager and current ESPN analyst Mark Dominik: "If you look at everything that's happened to Aqib, he's had a lot of incidents where there wasn't sufficient evidence to have charges [stick]. He found trouble sometimes, and sometimes trouble found him. But I do know he was a great teammate. The guys he played with loved him."

Some of Talib's issues in the NFL might have been influenced by personal problems. Talib moved his father to the Tampa area after being drafted, but Henry developed serious health issues within a couple of years of relocating. Doctors worried about Theodore's high blood pressure and a lung disease known as sarcoidosis. He grew so ill that he couldn't walk 20 feet without grimacing and gasping for air.

Jon Gruden and the Bucs looked past Talib's red flags to make him their first-round pick in 2008. AP Photo/Chris O'Meara

"Aqib and his father were very close, but there were times when we would go two days without ever seeing him because he couldn't leave his room," said Talib's wife, Gypsy Benitez. "I would get concerned about Aqib because it would affect his job at times. His anger would boil over. I think his father being ill was very hard for him to deal with."

Things didn't get any easier for Talib when the NFL suspended him four games for violating the league's banned substance policy in the 2012 season. Talib thought he was getting off to a good start with his new coach, Greg Schiano, at the time of the suspension. But on Nov. 1, 2012, as Talib talked to his wife about a home they were looking to purchase in Dallas, Schiano called to say the Bucs had traded Talib and a seventh-round pick to New England for a fourth-round selection in the 2013 draft.

"Aqib was surprised when we told him [about the trade], but he also knew that was the last straw," Dominik said. "Even when we told him the news, he had that cornerback mentality. He wasn't going to show you how much it hurt him."

Said Talib: "When a team trades you, they're basically saying they don't need you anymore. It definitely made me want to never be in that situation again."

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The people who've spent time around Talib argue that, even with his issues, there is ample reason to believe in his maturation.

"With some of the things that have happened off the field, Aqib is more worried about his reputation," Benitez said. "He's always loved football, but he's so dedicated to it now. When he's home, we hardly get any downtime with him because he's always studying or watching film. He really wants people to know he's a good guy."

Seattle Seahawks defensive end Michael Bennett played 3½ seasons with Talib in Tampa Bay and said, "I don't know anybody who's still talking about his off-the-field issues. I think he's really grown as a man." Added Broncos cornerback Chris Harris, who played with Talib at Kansas: "He was wild when he was young, but he's totally different now. A lot of guys go through some things and never learn. I feel like he's learned."

Talib didn't waste much time making an impact for the Broncos in their 31-24 season-opening win over Indianapolis. When Colts quarterback Andrew Luck fired a pass deep up the seam late in the first quarter, Talib darted in front of tight end Dwayne Allen and deflected the ball into the hands of Broncos safety Rahim Moore for an interception. After the Broncos secured the victory on the Colts' final drive, Talib jogged off the field with admiring fans cheering his name near the tunnel. Unlike his teammates -- some of whom stopped to toss wristbands and gloves into the stands -- Talib kept running right into the tunnel with a focus in his eyes that suggested this was just the start of bigger things in Denver.

Talib's tipped pass in Week 1 resulted in a Rahim Moore interception against the Colts. Jeff Gross/Getty Images

At 6-foot-1 and 205 pounds, Talib is exactly the kind of rangy, athletic cornerback who can be a cornerstone for a Broncos team looking to return to the Super Bowl. Colts wide receiver T.Y. Hilton said Talib "is long and he can run with you and he's physical." Miami Dolphins wide receiver Mike Wallace added that Talib is so intense that "he takes it really hard when he loses a rep, let alone a game."

The question, however, isn't whether Talib has the talent to be a difference-maker. It's whether he can avoid the situations that have resulted in his past problems, many of which come down to anger management. Aside from a four-game suspension for violating the league's policy on banned substances in 2012, all of Talib's issues in the NFL revolved around anger and violence. Dominik said that "if somebody confronts Aqib, he's not backing down an inch." Talib is even more direct about his aggressiveness. "Growing up the way I did, you get tested all the time," he said. "That's why I don't get nervous when they ask me to cover somebody like [Dallas Cowboys Pro Bowl wide receiver] Dez Bryant all game. I don't get scared of anything."

There is a common refrain that emerges when people talk about Talib after spending a significant time around him, an observation that comes down to one basic sentiment: He's really not a bad person. Even though Talib fought with teammates on two occasions in Tampa -- he scuffled with former running back Cory Byrd at the 2008 rookie symposium and swung a helmet at former left tackle Donald Penn during a fight in practice a year later -- Dominik spoke highly of Talib's work habits, saying few players practiced as hard or competed with as much passion.

A former college teammate said Talib routinely was kicked out of practice for fighting at Kansas, but Talib's former head coach, current Iowa State offensive coordinator Mark Mangino, remembered a player who motivated his teammates and raised the performances of a couple of underachieving teammates on a Jayhawks team that finished 12-1 in 2007.

Talib was such a rare mix of personality and unpredictability that when a KU assistant once ripped him for being suspended, the same coach went to Mangino later and said, "There's something about that guy that makes you root for him." Added Mangino: "I tell people the same thing all the time. The people who hear something about the issues Aqib had may rush to judgment about him. The people who really know him end up liking him."

• • •

Talib maintained that attitude when he arrived in New England. The new environment helped -- "I knew [Patriots coach] Bill Belichick doesn't put up with anything," Talib said -- but so did Talib's life experiences. He and Benitez already were raising two children (his 7-year-old daughter, Kiara, came from a previous relationship, and her 7-year-old son, Fabian, has a different father), and they were expecting the birth of their son Jabril (who is now 1). Talib also had more motivation than ever.

Using study habits he learned from former Bucs cornerback Ronde Barber, Talib quickly became a critical presence in the New England secondary. He settled down off the field, as well. When New Year's Eve arrived in his first season with the Patriots, he turned down a party invitation and instead celebrated with his family at home. They threw confetti at midnight, danced in their pajamas and reveled in the potential of their new life in the Northeast.

Talib felt rejected by the Buccaneers when they traded him to New England, where he would earn his first Pro Bowl berth. Jim Davis/The Boston Globe/Getty Images

Although most people didn't realize it at the time, Talib proved how much stronger his resolve had grown in a Thursday night game against the New York Jets on Sept. 12, 2013. Talib's mother had called him earlier that morning to say she'd been unable to reach Henry on the phone. A couple of hours later, Talib heard the news: His father had died in bed that morning. Refusing Belichick's offer to sit out, Talib wound up with two interceptions, two pass deflections and a forced fumble in a 13-10 win. "I kept thinking about him all game," Talib said. "I felt like I had so much energy that day. I really believe he was with me."

Henry's death is still an extremely painful reality for Talib to face -- "He hasn't been to his father's grave since the funeral," Benitez said -- but he doesn't deny the impact his dad had on his life. "He showed me how to take care of a family," Talib said. "We had four kids in our family, and he took care of us and our mother whenever we needed something. He showed me what it means to be a man."

Talib sees the value in those lessons as he contemplates his new life in Denver and the success he enjoyed with the Patriots. "Going to New England was important for him because they told him, 'You're good, and we need you,'" Okolo Talib said. "But he'd just had another son. His father was getting sicker. He had to deal with life now. He had to grow up."

This partly explains why Talib was in such a hurry to leave the locker room and join his family after Denver's season-opening win. He laughed about a couple of plays while dressing next to his fellow defensive backs, then quickly recognized his opportunity to depart as a throng of reporters focused their attention on Harris. Talib had done exactly what was expected of him after Denver signed him this offseason. His plan is to keep putting more space between the man he once was and the one he's ultimately trying to become.

"Some guys would just be happy with the money," Talib said. "I saw guys do that when they got paid in Tampa. I take the opposite approach here. When I'm done, I want people to know exactly why they brought me in. I want to make sure I earn all this money."

ESPN NFL Nation reporters Mike Wells, James Walker, Terry Blount and Mike Reiss contributed to this report.