In their corner: the Bears feel blessed that they wound up with cornerback Charles Tillman, who will be in the Pro Bowl before long - Football Digest's 203 NFL Awards: Defensive Rookie of the Year

IN HIS FIVE SEASONS AS DEFENsive coordinator of the Chicago Bears, Greg Blache never hid his disdain for playing rookies. "They have no experience, they have nothing to draw on, and rookies generally know more about GameBoy than game plans," he said.

Enter Charles Tillman, who proved to be an exception to Blache's rule in 2003. The second-round draft pick from Louisiana-Lafayette earned a smiting job by the fourth game of the season and then quickly emerged as one of the NFL's top young players.

Tillman exceeded all expectations by developing into a lockdown corner. He stabilized a Chicago defense that improved as the season wore on, tied for the team lead in interceptions with four, and produced one of the most memorable plays of the NFL season when he preserved a victory over the Minnesota Vikings by snatching a pass out of Pro Bowl wide receiver Randy Moss' hands in the endzone. For his efforts, Tillman is FOOTBALL DIGEST's 2003 NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year.

"If he continues to come, the sky's the limit for him," says Blache, whose tenure in Chicago ended when head coach Dick Jauron was fired after the season. "He's been blessed with a lot of talent, and he's got the demeanor to handle it. He's got a lot of poise for a young kid."

Tillman was surprised to be drafted as high as he was (35th overall), but the personable 6'1", 196-pounder never doubted that he belonged in the NFL.

"I'm not saying that I thought I was going to be a great player immediately, but I knew I could come to this league and make a little contribution [as a rookie]," Tillman says. "I know I can play in this league. I'm not saying I'm one of the best because that comes with years and years of experience. I'm just saying that I know I can compete with the other top guys that are in this league, whether it be corners, receivers, or whatever. I feel that I'm a pretty good competitor, and I like competition"

After playing at unheralded Louisiana-Lafayette, Tillman--whose childhood nickname "Peanut" remains with him to this day--had to prove that he could perform at the NFL level.

"I knew coming from a small school I had to do the little things that made up for it, like making plays on special teams," he says. "I think that once I made my plays on special teams, our coaches felt comfortable with me and they put me in on defense.

"When I was making plays in the nickel [defense], they let me start a couple games, and from there I made more plays. Each week of the season, I got a little bit more comfortable and a little bit more relaxed."

Tillman learned of his promotion to the starting lineup in a meeting with defensive backs coach Vance Bedford. When Tillman was summoned to Bedford's office, he initially feared the worst. "I thought I was in trouble," Tillman recalls. "Coach said he wanted to talk to me, and I was like, 'Oh, what did I do? I did something wrong.'"

On the contrary, Tillman had impressed coaches while playing as an extra defensive back in the first three games of the season. Alter facing the San Francisco 49ers' Terrell Owens and Moss in his first two professional contests, Tillman was unfazed about making his starting debut in Week 4 against the Oakland Raiders' Jerry Rice.

"That's just me," Tillman says. "He is one of the greatest receivers that's played the game, but he's dropped balls, too. He puts his pants on just like me. He makes mistakes, and I'm out there covering him. That's how I looked at it. I was trying to be like, 'Look, I'm sure other people have shut him out, and I'm going to try to do what they did.' I respect him, but I don't fear him."

The rookie cornerback recorded six tackles and broke up one pass as the Bears beat the Raiders, 24-21, for their first victory of the season. Rice and fellow wide receiver Tim Brown, another future Hall-of-Famer, combined to catch just five passes for 90 yards after each had posted 100-yard games, a week earlier against the San Diego Chargers.

"He showed no fear," Blache says. "He jumped on them, put his hands on them. He got up and pressed. He didn't care whether the guy was going to the Hall of Fame or not. He was going to cover him, and I was impressed by that."

Tillman's sudden emergence enabled the Bears to commit more defenders to stopping the run. A defense that had permitted an NFL-worst 183.7 rushing yards per game the first three weeks of the season yielded just 86 and 80 yards on the ground in back-to-back wins over the Detroit Lions and Chargers in Weeks 8 and 9.

The defense was especially stellar against the Chargers, limiting all-world running back LaDainian Tomlinson to just 61 yards on 16 carries. The Bears shut down Tomlinson by stacking eight defenders near the line of scrimmage and relying on Tillman and fellow cornerback Jerry Azumah to lock up receivers David Boston and Tim Dwight in man-to-man coverage.

"We played 'cover three' and kept eight guys in the box," Pro Bowl middle linebacker Brian Urlacher said after the game. "As long as our corners played good, we could keep doing that, and they did a good job."

Tillman showed a nose for the ball, with three interceptions in a four-game stretch that coincided with the team's mini-resurgence. The Bears won five of eight games after a disastrous 1-5 start.

His most remarkable play came December 14 against the Vikings at Soldier Field. Minnesota trailed 13-10 and faced second-and-goal from the 10-yard line with 1:11 to play, when quarter-back Daunte Culpepper fired to Moss in the right corner of the endzone. The instant the ball arrived, Tillman tipped it out of the wide receiver's hands to secure the victory. The play aired on highlight reels from coast to coast--and a star was born.

"Every kid dreams of being in that situation, and I was in it," Tillman said after the game. "I just tried to take advantage of it. He had one hand on it, then I just kind of yanked it out of his hand, and that was pretty much it. I wanted it more than him on that particular play."

No one appreciated Tillman's game-saving play more than Jauron, who played eight NFL seasons as a defensive back with the Lions and Cincinnati Bengals. "Charles' play was a terrific play by a real good athlete," Jauron said. "He had good coverage, but [Moss] is very difficult to cover even when you're on him. He's caught a lot of jump balls, so that was a huge play. A turnover is [always] a great play for us, but that was a particularly good one considering who it was against, the time of the game--all those things."

It's become the play that keeps on giving. "I hear about it every day," Tillman says. "Now that I'm back home [in Texas] and I haven't seen my friends since I got drafted, all they want to know is, "Wow, what was it like? What did he say?'

"I'm not taking anything from Randy Moss because he is one of the [top] receivers in this league right now. He's a very talented athlete--I respect the man. He didn't say anything. It was just a play that I got him on. Maybe next year he'll get me on a play. We were just competing on that play, and I got him that one time."

Tillman is happy he landed with the Bears, whose new coach is former St. Louis Rams defensive coordinator Lovie Smith. The cornerback was born in Chicago, attended kindergarten at Horace Mann Elementary School on the South Side, and still has some relatives in town. But as a military brat, he lived in several different locations, including Louisiana, California, Texas, Kansas, and Germany. That type of background helped ease his transition into the NFL.

"Having done all that travel, I kind of adapted and said, 'OK, I've got to go to Chicago,'" Tillman says. "Whether it had been the Raiders, the Cardinals, the Buccaneers, or the Giants, it wouldn't have been anything for me to get on a plane and take all my stuff and move because I've done that, like, 13 times.

"I know what it feels like to move to a whole new state, where you don't have any friends and you've got to start from scratch like you're in the Witness Protection Program."

The Bears had a strong crop of rookies in 2003, but general manager Jerry Angelo was most impressed with Tillman. After a series of pass interference penalties early in the season, Tillman hung tough and ultimately came on strong.

"He's shown resiliency," Angelo says. "Let's say he's got the God-given traits, which he does. But at that position, he's got to be a tenacious competitor, and he's got to have thick skin and a short memory because he's going to see the worst before he sees the silver linings. In his case, he has. He has kept playing aggressively, and that's good to see."

The Bears will be seeing plenty more of it in the coming seasons.

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