Big Kat Bryant truly the Biggest Kat on the field

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Big Kat Bryant truly the Biggest Kat on the field

By Giana Han

6-8 minutes

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With a grin and a chuckle, Marlon Davidson used to call Markaviest “Big Kat” Bryant, a 6-foot-5, 250 pound defensive lineman, “Kitty Kat.”

Sirad Bryant found Davidson’s nickname for his older brother “hilarious.” Bryant acknowledged it’s humor as well.

“But I don’t think anybody can call him that now,” Sirad Bryant said. Because Bryant is the “big dog” — or cat — on the field now.

Bryant was a key contributor on Auburn’s defensive line in 2019, but Derrick Brown and Davidson stole the spotlight with their highlight reels. As one of two returning starters on the line, Bryant has a huge weight on his shoulders. Since returning to practice, he’s played three positions — buck, defensive end and defensive tackle — while preparing the young players for Auburn’s high expectations of the defensive line. In his senior season, Bryant wants to carry on Brown and Davidson’s legacy while making his own mark.

“He wants to leave as good as they did,” said Shelton Felton, Tennessee’s outside linebackers coach and Bryant’s high school coach. “He just wants to be great. Be the best leader on and off the field, just be Big Kat and show people why he’s a top recruit.”

Bryant wants to be a dominant pass rusher who can make the play on every down. He’s hesitant to set specific goals with the uncertainty surrounding the season, but he said he wants 10 sacks. Last year, Bryant was just a step away from making big time plays, and it showed in his stats. While Bryant only had 1.5 sacks, he recorded nine quarterback hurries, the most on the team.

As Bryant prepared himself for the season, finishing those hurries was one of the biggest conversation topics between him and Felton, the man who first dubbed him “Big Kat.” Bryant treated the quarantine “like a pro” as he worked toward that goal, Felton said.

In the spring, Bryant went to work out with NFL players where he learned more about his footwork and how to use his hands. Bryant found a trainer during the quarantine to help him with “shaving off that tenth of a second.”

“He invested in himself,” Felton said, and it paid off. “He’s got himself quicker. He got himself leaner.”

Over the summer, Bryant continued running the drills he learned from the NFL players. He ate right, worked out, watched film and studied different pass rushing moves and techniques. Every time Sirad texted or called him, Bryant was doing something productive to better himself.

“I just try to take care of the little things, man, because I feel like the little things that I didn’t do is what kind of stopped me from getting or prevented me from turning my hurries to sacks,” Bryant said.

Felton has seen Bryant successfully make a big jump from one season to the next. Before Felton arrived at Crisp County High School in 2015, Bryant was focused on basketball. Once Felton got him locked into football, Bryant had a “good” junior season. But after putting in work over the offseason, Bryant became “great” his senior year, and Felton reminds him of that, saying that he can do the same thing again.

During that senior season, Bryant also learned leadership skills that will be necessary during Auburn’s upcoming season, Jeff Kent, Bryant’s former position coach, said. Just as Bryant will be one of three returning senior starters for Auburn, he was the only returning senior starter in the box for Crisp County High School. He knows what it’s like to anchor a position group, and now Felton is encouraging him to expand that and anchor the Auburn defense as a whole.

While in high school, Bryant was what Felton described as an “emotional” leader. Kent said he led by example, but when the time came to speak up, he never hesitated.

”He leads in a way of showing others they can be just as great as him or even better,” Sirad said. Because of his leadership, people looked up to him with respect, almost as if he were a coach.

Bryant took the younger players under his wing, something he has continued to this day. Kent, who is now the defensive coordinator at Valdosta High School in Georgia, said whenever he tells Bryant he has a young player he wants him to talk to, Bryant always takes the time. He’s even stepped out of the Auburn coaches’ offices to give a young guy a call.

At Auburn, Bryant has tried to help younger players learn the defense and the different positions. He shows them the methods he used to learn quicker, and he gives them encouragement as they adjust to coach Rodney Garner’s “tough love” coaching style. This year, Bryant said he’s been harder on the younger players than usual since “times are uncertain,” but no matter how hard he is, Bryant would never steer someone wrong Sirad said.

“If there was a player that you wanted every player to mimic in a sense... Big Kat would be that,” Kent said.

As Bryant heads into his senior year at Auburn, he has one play in his career that stands out above the rest: his fumble recovery in Auburn’s season-opener against Oregon. Sirad enjoys joking with Bryant about how he should have scored, but, after seeing his brother’s physical preparation and mental approach to the season, Sirad said Bryant has the ability to make a play that will outshine that one.

Bryant has already made it onto the Nagurski watch list, so people around the nation already expect a certain level of play out of him. Bryant is going to live up to every expectation people had for him when he first arrived at Auburn, Kent said, so Auburn fans should start getting excited.

“I think that they’re going to see a player that takes on the role of being a leader and is able to carry that weight on his shoulders,” Kent said. “I don’t think that any job’s too big for Big Kat.”

As Bryant’s coach and mentor, Felton said he might be biased, but even as an opposing SEC coach, he thinks Bryant has the ability to “set the SEC on fire.”