mana greig oregon ducks ucla.JPG

Starting Oregon left guard Mana Greig (63) blocks against UCLA as quarterback Marcus Mariota (8) -- who went to Greig's high school in Hawaii -- hands off to running back Thomas Tyner.

(Bruce Ely/The Oregonian)

EUGENE -- As his uncle whispered in his ear, a teenaged Mana Greig watched the linemen take the field and made a mental list.

Down the line the incoming high school junior went, matching the names, recruiting rankings and reputations his uncle told him to each elite defensive lineman. He took special note of the height and weight difference in each defender’s favor -- at 5-foot-10 and 280 pounds, there always seemed to be one -- and calculated how much attention he’d earn from a victory in the one-on-one drills from the college coaches in attendance.

This was how Greig, now Oregon’s starting left guard, spent his high school summers. At 16 and 17, he traveled from Hawaii to a circuit of the west’s top college camps trying to make a name for himself and earn a return ticket to the mainland in the form of Division I scholarship.

In each matchup, the intensely reserved Hawaiian -- who calls himself “just a boy from the rock” -- saw the most effective way to set himself apart among an ocean of recruits, one in which his stature didn’t break the surface.

“Regardless of what they say about my height, or arm reach, too short, not strong enough, whatever, I feel like if I put my mind to it I can get it done,” he said. “That was my mind-set, I guess: I just wanted to be the best lineman.”

Even as the seasons and settings have changed for Greig, his mind-set and goals have not. He is a not-so insignificant cog in No. 2 Oregon’s offensive machine whose averages of 331.5 rushing yards and 632.1 total yards per game rank second nationally.

On a program whose relevance was built on look-at-me tactics, uniforms and victories, Greig arrived in Eugene as a walk-on from rural Waimanalo with next to no attention and a personality unwilling to fill that void with his own braggadocio.

“I tried to let my film say that,” he said.

He is the only starting offensive lineman in a BCS conference listed as less than 6 feet tall this season.

The magic is in his piston-like feet and hands that compensate for his literal shortcoming ever since seventh grade, and the peerless technique he’s honed from it. Together, they’ve earned him a scholarship, a starting job and deep admiration from teammates and coaches who say he’s become one of the team’s rocks of stability.

“He's a reject in the computer so to speak as far as height,” said offensive line coach Steve Greatwood, who noticed Greig while scouting another St. Louis High of Honolulu player. “When he decided to walk on it was like OK, what am I going to do with a 5-foot-11, and that's probably being generous, guard? As he progressed in his career he just kept showing up. Through his study habits and his attention to detail and technique, the kid was always in the right place at the right time.

“You notice guys like that. I can't say enough about him.”

***

Some offensive linemen are born to become prototypical prospects with a long reach and quick feet.

Not Greig.

Mana Greig (63), seen before playing USC in 2012, wasn't even rated out of high school by recruiting services, but now is a starter for Oregon.

At age 8, said his mother, Cynthia Su’a, her middle son weighed 145 pounds and well exceeded the Pop Warner weight limit. Without weight limits, soccer, basketball and baseball, which he excelled at, became his new sports. But he never got over football. He tagged along to local football practices coached by his father, Kimo Greig, and observed intently.

“He always seemed to have a knack for watching and saw how things were done,” Greig said.

Rarely would someone get things done before him, either. His drive to seek something first -- whether opportunity, an edge or contact -- allowed him to thrive well before his attention was on run blocking and pass protection.

“At a young age he was one of those kids that responded rather than reacted,” Su’a said.

It also aided his recovery from a massive knee injury in 2012 -- when his MCL, PCL and hamstring tore around his right knee -- to start every game of 2013.

Teammates say Greig’s locker is like a mountaintop where uncertain blockers come to ask advice from the guru after practice, and are never turned away. But even three-year starting center Hroniss Grasu says: “I look up to Mana.”

“I’m like Mana, what the heck does this mean?” said Johnny Mundt, a freshman tight end whose locker is next door to Greig’s. “He’s like ‘this means they’re going to go here and you get this guy.’”

“I’m sure the d-line coaches on other teams are preaching that this guy’s a little short but he’s a monster,” starting left tackle Tyler Johnstone said of Greig’s biggest strength -- his leverage. “The lower man wins on the offensive line and Mana’s already got a foot on people.”

As much as senior lineman Everett Benyard, who lives with Greig and safety Avery Patterson, raves about Greig’s homemade island cooking, he is even more animated describing Greig’s regimented knee rehabilitation (Greig and Patterson each rehabbed from knee surgeries at the same time last season).

“He’s a master technician,” Benyard said.

Though everyone else is happy to give Greig his due, he isn’t much for taking credit for this charmed career arc. He mentions watching a few cousins play in college, adding that facing former UO defensive end Kenny Rowe -- “who had the fastest hands I’ve ever seen” -- and current defensive tackle Taylor Hart benefited him immeasurably. They improved his rapid-fire first two steps, whose precise placement provide leverage and balance, and quick hand placement to an opponent’s chest plate. He engages a defender faster than they can reach him. Because his arms are usually shorter than an opposing defensive tackle, that quickness crucial to sealing or blowing his assignment.

When Byron Marshall broke two touchdown runs in the first quarter against Washington State on Oct. 19, Greig’s blocks made them happen.

But then he backs up the tape in his head, and rewinds to seventh grade, when he met his own offensive line guru, Brian Derby.

“He taught me everything I know.”

***

Derby, a four-year letterman lineman at Hawaii in the 1980s, assembles teens from 12 to 18 every weekend at Kaimuki High from February to July for his Offensive Lineman Camp. In its 17th year, the camp is somewhat sacred ground for a mostly forgotten position, one whose website has highlighted in red type, “It is NOT ENOUGH anymore to just be big.”

His central rule hasn’t changed: If you fail to show up just once, you’re out.

Also: If you think it’s going to be easy, you might want to leave, too.

“I ride these kids hard. When he first started he was just a young puppy trying to find his way,” said Derby, who can trace the path of multiple former campers to the NFL, including former Oregon center Enoka Lucas. After Greig played in seven games in 2010, six in 2011 and eight last season before his injury, Derby held up the too-short lineman as a model for future campers, even having him address a group of sixth-graders in the stands after UO’s victory at Virginia in September. Greig brought an autographed T-shirt for a camper with a birthday, and left only when an Oregon staffer told him the bus needed to leave.

“If coaches can get a 6-5, 6-6 kid, they’re going to go that route,” Derby said. “But Mana persevered. I always told him, nobody owes you nothing.”

He, and Greig’s mother, Su’a, repeated that saying when Greig would occasionally call to vent his frustrations about not being on scholarship. Derby reminded him that Greig turned down smaller schools to attend UO, his dream school Oregon. Su’a reminded him the sacrifice she was making to pay for out-of-state tuition, and preached patience.

Months after the 2011 Rose Bowl victory against Wisconsin, then redshirt-sophomore Greig was awarded his long-sought scholarship. It may still be one of the few times something reached him before he could anticipate it. Afterward, he called Su’a at her office, where she promptly started “screaming like a crazy woman” in celebration.

There was one more group to celebrate with.

His fellow offensive linemen, who knew he would be given a scholarship that day, waited for him to emerge from the coaches’ offices.

“We all went crazy,” Benyard said. “I think it was one of the happiest moments of his life. And, one of the happiest moments of my life, too.”

***

Before he could claim success as a Duck, Greig needed to simply make the team. Back at the summer camp with his uncle, the incoming junior -- who didn’t even receive a grade or ranking from scouting service Rivals -- found his way to stand out.

It turns out, his victories and top-five placing among that camp’s linemen impressed not only coaches, but his mother, too. And Greig and Su’a had a bet -- a turtle tattoo, on his right calf -- riding on it.

“I said if you place in the top five out of thirty-something linemen, I'll pay for the tattoo,” she said, her words slowly replaced by a laugh. “I did it thinking there's no way this kid in the middle of the ocean, against guys who are five or six inches higher than him, could do it.

“He got second. Of course I had to suck it up and pay.”

One of the first, of many, that Greig has happily proven wrong.