Two for a Nickel: Friends Battle for a Primary Secondary Job : Aztecs: Williams and Griffith fight to fill the huge shoes left by John Wesselman.

It is not exactly what you would call a bitter rivalry.

Sure, Derrick Williams and Robert Griffith go out to the San Diego State football practice field for a few hours every day and play their hearts out, each hoping that he will be the man to start at the Aztecs’ version of nickel back in the defensive secondary.

At night, their friendship resumes. They talk football and occasionally listen to music. Once or twice a week, they get together and catch a little television. They watch The Cosby Show or The Simpsons and try not to have a cow, man, about who will win the position.

On most of these nights, they sit around chatting and drinking milk. Chocolate milk.

Chocolate milk?

“Derrick loves milk,” Griffith said. “He has 30 empty milk cartons around his room. See, look over there.”

Over there, Williams is walking across the quad in the Aztec football operations complex. He has a pint-sized paper container in his hand.

“He’s drinking milk right now.”

This is a rivalry?

Well, yes. The nickel back position in the SDSU defense is a little blurry these days because, according to Coach Al Luginbill, Williams and Griffith--the two prime candidates--are having trouble staying focused.

“That’s the big word right there,” Griffith said. “Focus.”

Williams, a junior, was the favorite as SDSU came out of spring workouts, but Griffith, a sophomore, has made up so much ground since practice started Aug. 16 that Luginbill and his staff are no longer sure which will take the field to start the Aztecs’ opener in Oregon Sept. 8.

“It might go right up until the day of the game,” Luginbill said. “Their effort and production will decide that. It’s a very key battle for us. We have to get consistent production from that spot.”

Williams and Griffith are playing under a pretty big shadow. They are vying for the position played by John Wesselman last year, and as defensive backs coach Ron Mims said, maybe it will take both to replace him.

Wesselman was SDSU’s Superman. He led the team in both tackles (124) and interceptions (six). Most impressive was the tackles, because he had 43 more than the next player on the list, Tracey Mao. If you didn’t know any better, you would have sworn that there were three or four Wesselmans running around at any given time during a game. Not surprisingly, he was on the All-Western Athletic Conference team.

Part of Wesselman’s impact was the result of his superb football sense, and part was the position. In SDSU’s scheme, no other position changes as much from down to down as that of the nickel back.

Basically, it is a combination of linebacker and defensive back. The nickel back has to be able to cover a wide receiver and then be able to move up into the linebacker position when the opponent is in a two-back running formation.

“You’ve got to have the ability to play at the line of scrimmage, from tackle to tackle, and play in space against a true wide receiver,” Luginbill said.

The ideal player for the position, Luginbill said, is someone with the speed and quickness of a defensive back and the size of a linebacker.

Said Mims: “The position lends itself to a great deal of versatility. If it’s not the most important position in our defense, it’s a pretty important position.”

So the Aztecs run through two-a-days knowing that their defense allowed their opponents to gain 20 yards or more on 65 plays last year and that they can’t relive that nightmare. And Williams and Griffith go at it each day under the glare of the hot summer sun.

Both are from the area, Williams (6-feet-2, 215 pounds) a graduate of Carlsbad High and Griffith (5-11, 185) from Mt. Miguel. They met just before their freshman years at SDSU, during the summer of 1988, when they were teammates in a game matching San Diego County All-Stars vs. a team from Los Angeles. They have stayed close as each has struggled to find his niche.

Williams has bounced around at SDSU from outside linebacker to inside linebacker to defensive end to, finally, nickel back. He had 33 tackles last year, third among SDSU defensive linemen. Griffith, meanwhile, has had his share of problems. He redshirted during his freshman season and then broke his left arm last year in a scrimmage two days before school started.

“August 26, 1989, at 1:30 in the afternoon,” Griffith said. “The scrimmage was over at 1:45.”

The break was so bad it required surgery, and Griffith still has two serious scars, one on the outside of his wrist and one on the inside.

Williams had the better spring and was No. 1 on the depth chart when spring practice ended. But Luginbill doesn’t think he has been “focused” during fall camp.

“It took him three weeks in the spring before he was focused,” Luginbill said. “We don’t have three weeks now.

“When he is focused, he is a great football player. When he is not, there is no in-between.”

Luginbill has the same complaint with Griffith.

“He is getting better and better every day,” Luginbill said. “He got stronger over the summer. Focusing can be a problem for him at times, too.”

Both players are aware of their shortcomings.

“Honestly, I’ve been going backward since spring,” Williams said. “I really need to focus. In the spring, I was really focused because they just moved me and I wanted to play it so much.”

He worked on his technique over the summer. Stay low to the ground. Keep the feet moving. Keep the eyes on the receiver’s hips.

“Coming into the spring, I had played a lot of basketball,” he said. “I think that helped with my hip movement. Over the summer, I didn’t play as much.”

He lines up across from his receiver, works at keeping his eyes low, and tells himself he can do better.

“C’mon, Derrick,” he says. “You’ve got to be doing better than this.”

He watches film, and tells himself Griffith is doing better than he is.

“He is doing the technique better,” Williams said. “And it psyches me up.”

But Griffith is not completely happy, either.

“When we started, yeah,” he said. “But I’m not content now. I’m striving to be better.”

Williams and Griffith. Griffith and Williams.

“One is probably better vs. the run, and one is better in pass coverage,” Mims said. “It’s kind of a Catch-22 situation for the defense right now.

“Derrick is the best against the run because he is so physical. That was evident in the spring. He can do things that we want a linebacker to do. And he’s more physical with the tight ends than Robert. But Robert concentrates better and has been the more consistent coverage guy in camp so far.”

If this takes until the opener, so be it.

“I would like to know who the No. 1 guy is, and I’m sure they would, too,” Mims said. “But we need a competitive situation. If one comes out on top right away, the other might get into a comfort zone.”

So the battle rages on, each of them chasing Wesselman’s ghost. They know that each day and each play is more important than the last.

Sometime soon, one of them is going to win the job. The other one will stick out his hand, offer congratulations, and say something simple, something like, “Nice job.”

And they will have a swig of milk.

Aztec Notes

At nickel back, freshman walk-on Marcus Preciado has also gotten SDSU Coach Al Luginbill’s attention. “That young man, if he continues to play like he is, will earn a scholarship,” Luginbill said. “He has a tremendous future. He works hard.” Preciado, 6-2, 185, is from Santa Barbara. . . . Injury report: Sophomore quarterback David Lowery missed practice for the second day in a row, He has the flu. Linebackers Lou Foster and Sai Niu, both of whom have pulled right hamstrings, are expected to return to practice Monday, as is linebacker Andy Coviello, who has an injured left hip. Freshman linebacker Jamal Duff has a bruised right shoulder but is not expected to miss any practice time. . . . Luginbill said the Aztecs will spend 30 to 40 minutes on special teams during this afternoon’s practice, but he still plans to give the team Sunday off. “We’ve been at this for a long time,” he said. “I don’t want our coaches or players anywhere near the facility Sunday.”