CINCINNATI — Every parent owns the activity mat. A circular pad on the floor and your infant lay on its back and bats at a collection of animal toys hanging from above off a padded overhang.

Courtney Britt had one situated in the middle of her house in Montgomery, Ala., back in 1999.

Her son, Cam, would lie underneath it. She would watch, as only a mother of a firstborn can, soaking in every movement analyzing meticulously for progress and wondering who he’d be and what he’d do.

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Only, before too long, she would watch and wonder something else: what’s going on with this boy?

“There was some music playing in the background and this kid was like he was paddling in the water,” Courtney said. “The name rings true, he was an Energizer bunny. He started walking at nine months and has not sat down yet.”

She learned right then about the energy that would become a defining characteristic for the Bengals’ second-round cornerback Cam Taylor-Britt.

“As an infant,” she said. “Seriously.”

Others would find out later.

The Bengals are banking on it now.

An ACL injury to starting corner Chidobe Awuzie combined with an improbable run of the best quarterbacks in the NFL on the schedule put Cam right in the pressure cooker. He’s the unknown variable. On a team with 21 of 22 starters from opening day expected to take the field on Sunday, he’s the one. He’s the exception in a defensive unit overflowing with continuity and championship experience.

A stretch run featuring Josh Allen, Tom Brady, Deshaun Watson, Lamar Jackson and, this Sunday, Patrick Mahomes, will take the field with an obvious objective: target the kid. He’s a 23-year-old with 272 career snaps who entered the starting lineup last month, has already been Moss’d twice and is yet to be tested against the league’s best quarterbacks.

Nobody can know for sure if he’s ready to handle this next level other than the fact he’s dreamed about the moment since first suiting up in little league and relied on his freakish energy ever since.

“Every time I line up, I’ll think the ball is coming to me,” he said. “I feel like that any time I line up that the ball is coming my way. But who doesn’t want the ball thrown their way? Give me an opportunity to go get it, I’ll change the game.”

Darrell Britt learned about Cam’s energy as a youth football coach in Montgomery, Ala., when this bubbly 12-year-old entered his life carrying packs of Skittles and Starburst.

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“He used to bring me candy every day to practice,” Darrell said. “He always saw me eating candy at practice because it would boost me up. It went from there and we got real, real tight. That was it. I loved it.”

Darrell coached defensive backs for three years at Prattville High School and another seven at Park Crossing, but was always around the game at the younger levels. He loved football and what it offered. Little did he know how much love it would give back to him.

The relationship with Cam would lead him to Courtney Edwards and her two younger children, Danielle, 21, and Jaden, 19. They’ve been inseparable ever since. He entered their life, eventually married Courtney and took on the role of father figure. Cam even recalls Darrell whisking him off to bad neighborhoods around the city he calls “Da Gump,” quickly understanding why some friends opted for “Da Dump.” Teaching hard lessons about what to be, what not to be and where you don’t want to be.

It all kept Cam’s energy pointed straight toward the football field. That’s why it was only fitting for the kid who came up as Cam Taylor to pay it back to Darrell through the game.

During his sophomore year at Nebraska, he secretly had the name on the back of his jersey changed to Taylor-Britt as a way to let Darrell know he was taking his name on for good.

“I said, ‘Mom, do you think I should do it?’ He’s been there for us when we didn’t have anybody,” Cam said. “He showed me a lot of things growing up. He taught me a lot that I didn’t think I would learn until later on in life. I’m just glad I learned it early. To give him that honor and me having his last name, because he didn’t have any kids. He treated us literally like his own. He would die for us, honestly. The most I could do besides money here and there buying this and that, that wouldn’t add up. Adding the last name and carrying it on and doing the great things I’ve been doing, that’s the biggest thing I could have done.”

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The back of Darrell’s Bengals No. 29 jersey now reads “PopsJuice,” as a nod to Taylor-Britt’s “Cam Juice” nickname. But he says every time he sees Taylor-Britt above the 29 he still brings back all the feels and takes him back to that day.

“Cam ran out of the tunnel and we were able to see the back of his jersey and saw the Britt on it,” he said. “I shed some tears. I was speechless after that. I couldn’t say much. I was in a daze.”

The daze faded because now Darrell rips off every last detail of an unforgettable day when Taylor-Britt had a sack-fumble for a touchdown and interception in a victory against South Alabama.

“It was amazing,” Darrell said.

Courtney learned about Cam’s energy as an infant, but she was impacted by it on the day her name changed, too.

When he first started playing football in little league, Cam told her what the future would look like.

“I said, ‘Mom, I’m gonna buy you a house,'” Cam said.

From that point forward, she was no longer Mom. She was the Momager.

“She said, ‘All right, that’s good and all, but we have to make sure your money is good, I’m going to be your Momager then,” Cam recalled. “I signed an agent and assistants and all that stuff, but she’s the Momager. They go through her.”

Courtney remembers it a touch differently.

“At first, he said he wanted to be a comedian because he said he was so funny,” Courtney said. “I said, you are funny, but I need you to get a job.”

But as every coach at every level referenced Cam would be playing on Sunday, she knew the possibility of football as a job wasn’t just dreams and childhood naivety. That’s why she took the role of Momager so seriously.

She was the first stop when major college coaches came to visit. And she had spreadsheets and lists of questions.

When an attitude needed checked or a tough conversation was necessary, especially after a game, she sent the message.

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“I didn’t know what I was signing up for when I said I was going to be a Momager,” she said. “It’s been a pretty fun ride, but it’s been a lot of work.”

All that is why Cam has another moniker for Momager.

“My mom is my A1 Day 1,” he said. “She can call me out on anything. Just because I have grown up with her basically, we just got that close relationship. Her being honest and straightforward and telling me how everything is and how everything will be.”

That’s why when Cam went down with a core muscle injury in training camp, just a week after he fell out of favor with coaches ceding important reps to undrafted free agent Allan George, Courtney and Darrell were regulars in Cincinnati. They came to the games even when he wasn’t playing.

They were needed.

“I love my family, man,” Cam said. “They came up here and made sure everything was OK, especially mentally. Coming in being a rookie and wanting to make an impact. They kept me level-headed.”

They’d been here with injuries before. Cam tore both ACLs in high school — where he played quarterback at Park Crossing (and later played scout team version of Lamar Jackson in his first practices off IR with the Bengals).

“We felt it was necessary to do those mental check-ins,” Courtney said. “Just to make sure he’s still in a good head space and still focused on his goal.”

Once Cam did make his NFL debut against Atlanta, surprisingly playing 28 snaps in a rotation with Eli Apple one week before Awuzie would go down with his ACL injury, the postgame scene turned.

Courtney calls him her “most emotional child.” Cam only needed to take one look up and spot his namesakes looking down on him, knowing what was said on those youth fields of Montgomery and sacrifices made along the way, to let it all out right then.

“I look up in the stands and she gave me those watery eyes,” Cam said, recalling his emotions pouring out. “I was like, oh man, yeah. We are really here, mom. We are really doing this.”

"Feels good, man."

My favorite shot of the day.

Cam Taylor-Britt was very emotional postgame celebrating with his family after his first game with the #Bengals. @fox19

— Jeremy Rauch (@FOX19Jeremy) October 23, 2022

The Bengals learned about Taylor-Britt’s energy upon first evaluating him as a cornerback at Nebraska. Their sources called him the most relentless player in the Big Ten during his time at Nebraska, the school literally trademarking the nickname “Cam Juice,” while he earned a spot on the illustrious Terez Paylor All-Juice Team.

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They then witnessed at the Senior Bowl Cam bust a tooth out on the first day, popping a little too hard on a leverage drill. He placed a call to the Momager and she lined him up to go see a dentist overnight. He was told he couldn’t practice the next day. He didn’t listen and showed up at 5:30 a.m. for interviews and a full day of practice anyway, numb mouth and all.

“That is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity — to miss it because of a tooth?!” Cam said. “I’ve been losing teeth my whole life since I was a kid.”

This was the energy the Bengals were buying when they traded up three spots to No. 60 overall then placed a call to Cam, sitting on his couch at home between Courtney and Darrell. Physicality and relentlessness would blend in ideally among a group that was defined by those traits on the way to the Super Bowl.

Those have played in his early returns. Chasing down Derrick Henry to force a fumble in Tennessee was Exhibit 1A for how his primary weapon has translated while he learns the intricacies of the game on the fly.

“Never giving up, that’s just an example,” Bengals head coach Zac Taylor said. “When he’s on the grass, he’s on the ball. He’s an extreme competitor and you can feel that energy.”

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Here’s the thing about energy and dreams and mental check-ins and desire. When you’re built like Cam, they can be enough to get you to the show. What defensive coordinator Lou Anarumo knows as he’s managed an unpredictable rookie amongst his stable of reliability, is those traits won’t be enough going forward.

They must match with understanding what to do — and more importantly, not do — when forced to cover. Twice this year, Anarumo says he’s given Cam the clearest possible talking point coming off the field after allowing a big play.

“Don’t ever do that again,” Anarumo said.

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The first play was an unsuccessful dive for a potential deflection against Cleveland and the other was a hit without wrapping up against tight end Pat Freiermuth in Pittsburgh.

There will be more mistakes. Coverage wasn’t Cam’s top trait coming out of Nebraska. It was the area that needed the most work. He checked the other boxes as a strong tackler with 4.38 speed.

His exposure could be shaded against quarterbacks like Marcus Mariota, P.J. Walker, Kenny Pickett and Ryan Tannehill, the majority of those games well in hand in the final quarter. Even they were able to pick on him for big plays at times. Carolina receiver Terrace Marshall went up top over Cam in the second half for a touchdown and what he says he instantly knew was his Welcome-to-the-NFL Moment.

Against Pittsburgh, a miscommunication on a dig-go concept left George Pickens running free deep. Kenny Pickett couldn’t connect and Jessie Bates offered some corrective language in the aftermath. Taylor-Britt was welcomed to the NFL yet again by Treylon Burks leaping over him for a 51-yard reception in Tennessee. Overall, he viewed the first three games prior to the bye as his preseason. In coverage, specifically, he played like it.

He’s allowed a passer rating of 127.9 when targeted.

“Every snap for him is a new world,” Anarumo said following the Pittsburgh victory. “He made errors, like a lot of guys out there, where right now we’re able to fix these errors while we’re winning. He’s got to continue to step his game up in terms of pass coverage.”

Pro Football Focus gave Taylor-Britt the best grades of his five-game career against the Titans and the first time he’d ranked above their average grade of 60. The first tangible signs of needed improvement.

Breakout game for rookie CB Cam Taylor-Britt on Sunday against the Titans!

🐅 79.7 PFF Defense Grade
🐅 81.2 PFF Tackling Grade
🐅 78.7 PFF Coverage Grade
🐅 8 tackles
🐅 1 Forced Fumble

Only 5 games into his #Bengals career, CTB looks like an absolute haus in Cincinnati.

— Willie Lutz (@willie_lutz) November 28, 2022

Enter Mahomes.

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Anarumo’s message for his rookie starter this weekend was one of weathering the storm.

“You just can’t get flustered,” Anarumo said. “They’re going to complete balls. They’re the best offense in the league for a reason. He’s one of the best quarterbacks in the league for a reason. Yards don’t equal points this week. Get the points off the board.”

After wins against the Steelers and Titans, the Bengals social media team has posted videos from an iPhone of players dancing in the locker room. Most are still in pads and the postgame victory vibes are high. Courtney laughs at what she saw. Unsurprisingly, there’s Cam, front and center, surrounded by veterans, dancing, joking and laughing.

Currently

— Cincinnati Bengals (@Bengals) November 21, 2022

“That’s him all the way,” Courtney said. “He’s high-energy but he is so loyal, has a heart of gold and does not meet a stranger. He’s always been like that.”

It’s held true among his teammates in the locker room even if still a work in progress in other areas. Learning curves at cornerback have always been steep, even for the great ones. Few current rookie corners have a greater opportunity than the one he was given just two months removed from wondering if he would even play this season at all while lingering on IR.

“I told all my friends around the league, I wouldn’t switch positions with any of you,” Taylor-Britt said. “I’m sorry, but I wouldn’t.”

Ever since the first step at nine months, more people have learned what Courtney did watching her son on the activity mat. This energy is rare. On the football field, it can be a weapon.

Now, starting Sunday, it will be Cam’s turn to truly learn about himself. He’ll learn just how far his energy can take him against the best in the world.

“I view it as I have to do my job to the best of my abilities because I trust the guys that are on the field with me and I know for a fact they are going to do their job,” Cam said. “They are looking at me as the rookie and they are just saying just do your job. That’s all they want from you.”

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Succeed or fail, in the eyes of Courtney and Darrell, their son will be doing what he was born to do.

“He has been wanting this for as long as he could walk,” Courtney said. “To see him living out his dream, we say this to him, ‘Cam, you are living out your dream. Can you believe it?'”

(Top photo: Andrew Nelles / USA Today)