“People started to believe in him at Baylor — believing what he was saying about turning it around,” his mother, Jacqueline Griffin, said. “And that’s what he knew he was going to do in Washington.”

‘Every day is a game day’

As the first Redskins players boarded the team bus at their Buffalo, N.Y., hotel on Aug. 9, on their way to Ralph Wilson Stadium for the team’s first preseason game against the Bills, they were met by a solitary figure in the front row. It was Griffin, and as each teammate walked past, he looked them in the eye, nodded and held up his fist for a fist-tap.

By this point in training camp, Griffin had become well known around Redskins Park as the first to arrive each morning and the last to leave each evening.

“I made sure I showed up early. I stayed late. I worked hard in practice,” Griffin said. “I brought a different type of attitude to practice than they were used to, [a feeling that] every day is a game day. There were some feisty practices between the offense and the defense — just a lot of chirping and a lot of intensity, which is something [teammates] said they hadn’t experienced before. So I just tried to bring that attitude, and then let the game play speak for itself.”

“His will to win,” said tight end Niles Paul, “is never-ending.”

The first major benchmark in Griffin’s ascension to the Redskins’ leadership throne may have been the win at New Orleans in his NFL regular season debut. It was one thing to make jaw-dropping plays in practice, or even in the preseason, and yet another thing do it in games that count — especially in a notoriously difficult place to win such as the Superdome.

“I think I earned their belief after the first preseason game, and I think I got their trust after the first regular season game,” Griffin said. “Because your work and your work ethic can only speak so much, but once you go out and do it in a game and you perform in the clutch, and you win a big season-opener like we did against the Saints, that’s when you can really earn guys’ trust.”

A week later, at St. Louis, Griffin led the Redskins on a potential game-winning drive in the final minutes that flamed out when wide receiver Josh Morgan threw the ball at opponent, drawing a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. As the final seconds counted down on a crushing loss, Morgan sat alone on the Redskins’ bench, with his teammates staying far away — until Griffin came over, patted him on the head and whispered something in his ear.

“He just told me to keep my head up and keep going,” Morgan recalled. “Yeah, it did mean a lot to me. He didn’t have to do that. With all the hype and anticipation, you think one thing about him. But then you see him, and he’s a normal kid — a normal kid with a big heart.”

Griffin didn’t do it to prove his leadership skills. Few people even saw it happen. He did it because he thought Morgan could use a lift, because he would need Morgan’s confidence again later, because it felt like the right thing to do.