Zach Thomas, Ray Lewis, Brian Urlacher have forged Hall of Fame-worthy friendship

Sometimes in the late afternoon, when Zach Thomas is taking out his garbage or tending to something in the front yard of his beachfront home, he sees Ray Lewis riding past on his bicycle.

“He rides quite a bit so he texts me,” Thomas says. “But he texts me in the afternoon, usually it’s last second, saying ‘Hey I’m going to ride, you wanna ride?’ And I tell him, ‘If you ever ride in the morning, I’m in. We’re going together.’ But in the afternoon and evenings when he’s doing it, I’m out doing my daddy duty type stuff, so I’m missing out on that.

“But I’ll be taking my trash out and he’ll ride past and be, ‘Yo!’ and I’m like, “Hey!’ and he turns around and comes back. He’s usually riding with somebody else, too. And he always gives me my respect when he’s introducing me to the other people in his group.”

This is where greatness recognizes greatness because in his introduction, first-ballot Pro Football Hall of Famer Ray Lewis makes certain to let his fellow riders know his feelings about Zach Thomas.

“He’ll tell them, ‘This is the legendary Zach Thomas’ or something,” Thomas says. “That’s Ray, man. He’s the best.”

Thomas tells anyone interested he believes Lewis was the greatest middle linebacker in NFL history.

“No ifs, ands, or buts about it,” Thomas adds.

And with another Hall of Fame selection meeting looming Tuesday, at which the Hall of Fame class of 2021 will be selected, Thomas will have a shot at joining Lewis among the game’s greats.

This is a distinction selectors believe Thomas is close to because this is his second consecutive year as one of 15 modern-era finalists. Those 15 finalists will be trimmed to 10 and then five, who will be inducted into the Hall.

And it stands to reason if Thomas is to eventually make it, he must compare with some of the great linebackers already in the Hall. And it would be especially notable if Thomas could compare to Lewis and former Chicago Bears great Brian Urlacher, another first-ballot inductee, because all three were contemporaries.

So does he?

Compare?

“You talk about Urlacher, I played against Urlacher, I played against Ray, I played against all of them and the best of the best, and Zach is in that same category,” former Indianapolis Colts six-time Pro Bowl center Jeff Saturday says.

“All three of those guys played exactly the same style. Ray never ran you over — ever. I blocked that dude a ton. He never came downhill. Everybody talks about him like he’s this bear of a guy who’s running through your facemask. That was not him, and neither was Urlacher.

“All three of these guys are speed-and-avoid guys who outsmarted you.”

Lewis and Thomas were rookies together in 1996, and Urlacher came into the league in 2000. And throughout the 2000s those three were the standard for great middle linebacker play.

“I think about that era, I think about myself, Zach and Ray,” Urlacher says. “We battled it out every year. It was us three for All-Pro. We battled it out those years to try to get on the All-Pro team. The Pro Bowls, those in your conference, those are going to come. But All-Pro is what you wanted to get.

“And in four, five, six years there it was always one of us three.”

Lewis was All-Pro seven times and Urlacher four times.

Thomas was All-Pro five times.

The three men knew of each other, competed with and against each other and forged a kinship founded on mutual respect.

“You know how Ray was,” Thomas says, “he was not just a great player and playmaker but he was a great leader, too. And that’s what you respect. He put as much energy into that leadership as he did his play on the field.

“He had some great defenses, and I respect him a lot. And, yeah, we were always keeping up with each other, trying to be competitive, because we came out together and knew each other. We respect each other, I know that.”

That respect eventually led to a friendship.

Thomas and Urlacher met before either reached the NFL. Thomas was at Texas Tech and Urlacher was at the school for a football camp before his senior year in high school.

“He was working out in the weight room at Texas Tech, and I was at their football camp,” Urlacher recalls. “He worked out for like four [freaking] hours. Who does that?”

Urlacher watched Thomas and Lewis before he got into the NFL. So he’s more than familiar with what Thomas did during his career.

“Zach made a lot of big plays,” Urlacher says. “He got picks, he got fumbles. He’s not big, we all know that. But that dude was always around the ball. What amazed me about Zach was how good his pass defense was. He understood routes. He understood concepts. He obviously understood their defense as well. Zach made a lot of big plays in the passing game.”

If this sounds like a ringing endorsement of Thomas by Urlacher, it’s not.

This is: The younger linebacker wore No. 54, as did Thomas. And one year when Thomas visited Chicago on a business trip, he played in a charity basketball game Urlacher organized. Urlacher supplied everyone with jerseys for that game.

Urlacher wore a jersey with the inscription “The Fake 54” on the back.

He gave Thomas a jersey with the words “The Real 54,” on the back.

“I thought that was funny,” Thomas says.

“He’s the real 5-4. I’m the fake 5-4,” Urlacher says. “It was just a something we came up with. It was a game, but it was also serious, you know? Another stupid game we came up with was punching each other in the jaw for no reason.

“That was real fun, but that little squatty bastard punched me in the face. So, yeah, real fun.”

The relationship between Thomas and Lewis started when both were premier high school recruits and blossomed as both were candidates for the same college awards.

“I first met Zach as a friends,” Lewis says. “Then I met the warrior.”

Lewis is not being literal. This friendship did not include punching each other in the face. But it did include trying to beat each other.

“When we played, man, we all kept up with each other. I promise you that,” Thomas says. “Ray set the bar, you know, and so I would always keep track of that. That’s the benchmark pretty much, what you’re shooting for.

“That’s what motivated me. I wanted to outplay Ray. And the same with Brian. Even though we’re good friends, we’re all competitive. So you wish each other well, but you don’t want to wish them better than you. That’s how competitive we all are.”

Lewis agrees. And, as Thomas says, Lewis pays respect to the way his friend played.

“Year after year Zach showed the world how to play the middle linebacker position,” Lewis says. “He wasn’t the biggest or the fastest, but his instincts, his passion and his knowledge of the game always impressed me.

“Sideline to sideline, there are not many linebackers that I have ever seen better than Zach.”