A Football Life

A Football Life

Being an adult, my childhood memories escape me. It is almost as if they, the memories, tease me. When they resurface not only do they bring pictures, but they fire an onslaught of smells and sounds so instantaneously that one simply cannot harness the remembrance. However, I defeated the fleeting memories and can remember the day before I first played tackle football for Orange Park Athletic Association. I remember, because this day was the paramount of my childhood. I see a seven year-old boy in a town home in Eagle Harbor, preparing for the upcoming days of football camp. I smell the biting blades of St. Augustine grass as the boy in the memory practices his “up-down” conditioning drills. I see an empathetic mother smiling at the boy as he yells his quarterback cadence in the house, but she doesn’t stop him, because she feels his excitement. I feel the rug burn from the carpet on my small finger tips from practicing “stance and starts” with my father. I hear my father’s words of encouragement and critique, forewarning me about the difficulties of football. This day was the beginning of a football life, a life that constructed the framework and scaffolding for the man I am today.

Personally, there has not been a stranger, more unique relationship than my relationships with coaches. Throughout my 12 years of playing, I have had over forty-eight coaches, and all of them communicate in their own genre styles. This vast variety and variance of coaches, and their means, or genres, of communication is a vital piece that contributed to my formative years. As a football player, one must analyze their coach’s non-verbal modes of communication to understand what they really mean. This is essential, because coaches unfailingly say one thing, do one thing, or act a certain way and mean something completely different. Some coaches dwell in silence and just stare at their athletes, communicating absolute disgust through body language. Some coaches shatter clipboards over their knees. Some coaches do nothing, which is extremely effective. A former coach of mine, Coach Springs, elegantly named this strategy the, “Oh shit” complex. The coach knowingly abstains from re-correcting a mistake by the player so the athlete learns the exigence why doing something a particular way benefits the team. Examples of this are so simple, but have such a tremendous impact on the game. Little techniques like addressing blockers from the outside in allows the team to work efficiently and prevent a touchdown, and tackle whoever has the ball. Playing football, if my teammates are all to my left, and I am the closest to the ball carrier, I must keep the runner to the left to allow my teammates to stop him. I cannot be selfish and attempt a dangerous solo tackle. Being selfish by trying to make a solo tackle, instead of forcing the runner back in for help, can lead to an easy touchdown. My coach allowed me to make this mistake my senior year, and it cost the team greatly. I never made that selfish mistake again. Some coaches laser their focus on a certain player because he feels the need to better their skill set or attitude. He might silently observe a player, then, like a cannon, explode at him for not performing adequately or misbehaving. Punishment usually ensues which can include but is certainly not limited to; knuckle splintering bear crawls, suicides, wind sprints, and squats to failure. The activity itself doesn’t break the player, it is the sheer volume of the punishment fused together with degrading spit filled phrases, of what seems to be hatred, spewing out of the coach’s mouth. This is when athletes usually begin quitting, because they lack mental fortitude, they lack a sense of future driven purpose. Quitting because a coach is hard on a player is ignorant on the athlete’s behalf. The coach doesn’t yell or punish because he dislikes the athlete, the coach does this because he cares for the young man’s well-being and future. The coach wants to raise the player into manhood, and harden his personality for the unforgiving unfairness life has to offer. Athletes steadily misunderstand this non-verbal genre of communication by coaches and give up, when all the coach wanted was to assist the player’s growth. Another reason players quit is because they are not strong enough to trudge through the brutality of camp. Camp is essentially a two week period of relentless hell, entailing physical failure formulated with merciless mental preparation of the playbook. Although camp seems like a herculean task, players quit with a misunderstanding that this is how football will always be. Without telling their athletes, coaches make camp incredibly arduous to weed out the weak. After camp concludes, athletes actually get to play football and enjoy themselves. Coaches make camp difficult because they want “foxhole guys” on their team, guys that have each other’s backs in the face of adversity, guys that are unselfish. Coaches do this because the hatred of camp actually unifies the team. There is a strange, undeniable bond that formulates when a group of individuals conquer a task together like camp, which inversely builds team chemistry. Coaches practice distinct methods of leadership without actually communicating their intentions. It is imperative for a football player decode the non-verbal tendencies of his coaches, failing to can result in missing one of the most fulfilling experiences life can offer.

Now, football is over. The scaffolding that football built around my life has been demolished, and has displaced different characteristics and qualities into my personality that no other experience could possibly build. I say this, even after having football ripped away from me due to a back breaking injury in my freshman year of college. The potency of my first football memory is just as ripe as my last. In a crescendo like manner, I hear footsteps of a heavy-set man echo off of empty white walls. My mother sits adjacent to me and I see my father, back turned, as he stares into those same white walls that omit the ominous footsteps. The door opens. I understand by the doctor’s empathetic face what the news will be. The doctor approaches my family and bluntly states, “Son, you won’t play football again.” The door closes. A lot of guys would brew in anger about this, but the only emotion I wish to convey is gratitude. I am thankful for the lifelong relationships I have with friends and coaches who will always be there for me, the foxhole guys. I am thankful for a father who worked three jobs for me to play, and a mother who made me a priority in her life by coming to every game, practice, and scrimmage wearing the number 10 jersey on her chest proudly. I know that life isn’t fair, it is not just, and it is cruel. Above all, I know that what I learned as an athlete is more valuable than being able to play. Practicing respect, commitment to excellence, and a relentless hunger for success outweighs running through the tunnel. I know that football has shaped my personality, and now it is my responsibility to take what I’ve learned and apply it to real world scenarios. I am thankful to have lived a football life.