Slow Getting Up: A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile (7 page)

A wide receiver can only catch what is thrown to him. And it’s never up to him. He must run his route and hope. My time spent in the NFL will be full of this hope. I will run every route with gusto, expecting to turn and see the ball spiraling toward me. But it will rarely happen. And with every route I run, beating the world-class athlete being paid to cover me, and being rewarded only by the defeated look in his eyes, a small piece of my football idealism will die. I want the ball. Always. An effortless harmony of quarterback and receiver is a beautiful thing. All is right in the world with Greg Zolman at the helm.

A few days later, after a month of training camp, we have our last team meeting before packing up and heading to Germany. Coach goes over everything again: Ze food, ze buses, and adapting to ze unknown. Then one of the few returning players from the previous year’s squad speaks up.

—Yeah, fellas, real quick. Just want to let y’all know, they ain’t got no Magnums over there so bring your own rubbers. And bring a lot. You don’t want to get caught up.

Advice well received by the team. This will be our Magnum Opus. Someone brings a duffel bag full.
Ich bin ein Düsseldorfer.

A
fter several long, cramped flights, layovers, and buses, we pull in to our new home in Düsseldorf. The Relexa Hotel. It’s a seven-story building on the outskirts of town. The hotel is nice and clean and we all have our own rooms. It’s the end of March. We have a week and a half to practice and get used to our surroundings before our first game.

A few days later there is a pep rally in the city’s main square. We pull up in our buses and parade onto a stage where Markus works the crowd of a few hundred into a polite frenzy. Frothy cups of good beer tilt at the slight angle of almost drunk and apparently happy. Their enthusiasm surprises me. I hadn’t expected the Germans to support the NFL’s attempt to make people love the
other
football. But from a dirty seed sprouts beauty. Someone hands me the microphone while we stand onstage. I do my best hype-man impersonation.

—Alo everybody! Are you all having a good time?!

—Ja! Ja!

—What’s that? I can’t hear you!

—
Ja! Ja!

—All right! When I say ‘Rhein,’ you say ‘Fire’! Rhein!

—Fye-a!

—Rhein!

—Fye-a!

Then someone snatches the mike and it’s on to the next hype man. Then we are ushered offstage and back onto the buses, creeping through a throng of boisterous Germans who have gathered to wave us on.

Our first game is at home against the Cologne Centurions. The stadium is state-of-the-art, featuring a retractable roof and a field that can be rolled entirely outside so as to receive more sunlight, or something. The Arizona Cardinals stadium has the same technology. There are twenty-five thousand fans or so and all of them wear whistles around their necks. They blow them all game, rendering the referee’s whistle mute and the concept of “play the whistle” dumb. Be flexible.

I’m on the front line of the kickoff return team. The opening kickoff of our season soars through the air. I turn and run to my landmark, pivot, size up my block, and engage him. Rober Freeman, our kick returner, weaves through the wedge and runs past me with the ball in his hands on his way to the end zone. Touchdown! Touchdown! Twenty-five thousand whistles.

After a touchdown by Cologne, we line up for our second kickoff return. This time Shockmain receives it and shoots past us all the way to the house. I leave my man and follow Shock to the end zone as twenty-five thousand Germans lose their shit, again. This is awesome! This is Germany.

After that, the game settles down. At the start of the second half I am split wide to the right. Greg is in at quarterback. He gives me a look at the line of scrimmage. I run a fade route and he lofts it up: slightly underthrown, just how I like it. I slow up and leap at the last moment. The cornerback has me covered but my jump takes away his advantage. I lose the ball in the lights. I stick my hands out where I think it will come down. It lands in my basket and I squeeze it into my body. As my feet hit the ground the free safety pops me under the chin. But he doesn’t bring his lunch pail with him. I bounce off his hit and gather myself, then head up the sideline. The cornerback dives at me. I pirouette and shake him off, heading up the sideline again. The safety who missed me the first time catches me from behind and latches on to my waist. I drag him another ten yards before his buddy jumps on my back and drops me at the five-yard line.
Ja! Ja! Ja!
We score on the next play.

It’s a tight game. On our first drive of the fourth quarter, I’m split wide right from deep near our own end zone. I run a five-yard hitch and wait for the ball. Chad Hutchinson is in at QB. He throws the ball over the middle but loses control of it and it dribbles off in front of him. No one knows if it is a fumble or an incomplete pass. And the whistle won’t tell us. I run toward the rolling ball and pull up when I realize the play is dead. But not everyone gets the memo. A defensive lineman flies in, overshoots the ball, and lands on my good knee. Pop. No more good knee.

I fall to the ground and grab my leg. It’s such a loud pop in my head that I expect a bone to be sticking out. I pull down my sock.

Nothing. Clean leg.

I stand up and walk to the sideline. I tell my trainer something popped in my knee. I try jogging around to shake off whatever just bit me. Unshakable is the phantom of truth. It’s no good. I sit on the bench and seethe. We win the game by a point. Afterward I go to the hospital for an MRI. According to the German doctor who reads the MRI, my medial collateral ligament is torn.

—Zat pop you heard vas your ligament tearing, right here.

He points to the apparently abnormal image on his screen, string-cheese-splayed fibers.

—Ze recovery depends on if your doctors decide you need surgery.

—My doctors? You’re not my doctor?

—Nein.

—I have nine doctors?

This will apparently fall to HealthSouth. I’ll wait until they confer. I go back to the Relexa Hotel and flop onto the bed. It seems that every time I get hurt it’s on a play that feels wrong from the start. The finger, the bursa sac in my knee, and now this one. All of them flukes. And my two shoulder dislocations in college were the same: stupid plays that never should have happened. Either I’m rehabbing here in Germany, watching my teammates play, or I’m getting back on a plane to Alabama. Neither appeals.

I pick up the phone to call Alina back home. I need the reassuring voice of my woman to tell me everything is okay.

—Hello?

—Hey.

—Hiii.

—What are you doing?—Me.

—Uhh, nothing. I’m in a cab.—Her.

—Going where?—Me.

—Going home.

—Huh? Home from where?

It is Sunday, 10:30 a.m. in California.

—Ugh, you don’t want to know.

—Ugh, yes I do.

— . . . Vince Vaughn’s house.

—Vince Vaughn? Why?

—I don’t
know
. I’m
so
annoyed right now.

—You slept there?

—Yes. On the couch. Amy hooked up with him.

—Why were you there?

—We were hanging out with him at a club and he said he was having an after-party at his house so we got in his car with him and went back to his house and no one ever showed up. It was just me and Amy and Vince.

—Great party.

—I’m sorry, babe. I didn’t know.

—You didn’t know what?

—I don’t know. It was just stupid.

—And you slept on the couch?

—Yes, baby. I promise.

—Whatever . . . I tore my MCL.

—Aw,
baby
!

(Fuck Vince Vaughn.)

T
he next day I’m back in Birmingham and back with Mayfield.

—Well, Nate, you want the good news or the bad news?

—Isn’t it all bad news?

—Oh c’mon, Nate. Don’t get down on me now.

—Bad news.

—Okay. Bad news is, you’re gonna be here for a while. We gotta get that thing right and it ain’t gonna happen overnight. Good news is, you don’t need surgery. That thing’ll heal on its own, but we gotta stay on top of it. And the harder you work, the faster you’ll get your ass out of here. You look around while you’re here, Nate. You’re gonna notice some things real quick. One is, there’s some sorry sons of bitches around here feelin’
extra
sorry for them
selves
, moping around, going through the motions and ain’t gettin’ shit done. Shit, Nate, there’s players that’s been here for over a year. Imagine that, Nate. A
year
! They get so down on themselves that they can’t heal. And you know you can’t leave until I clear you medically. Make sure you ain’t that guy, okay? I know you ain’t that guy, Nate, but make
sure
you ain’t, you got me?

—Yeah, I got you. I love it here and all, but I gotta get back to Deutschland.

Inordinate pause.

—Germany.

—Shit, I know that, Nate.

I
love Mayfield’s enthusiasm. And I promise myself I will adopt his approach: Stay positive. Stay motivated. Every day has a purpose. But it’s easy to start feeling sorry for myself in Birmingham. We stay at a Shoney’s Inn in a nondescript commercial neighborhood south of the city, across from a U.S. Treasury office, a Dollar General, a handful of other depressing hotels, and an animal hospital. Unlike most Shoney’s this one doesn’t have a restaurant attached. Instead we have a shuttle service to take us to our meals. Breakfast and lunch we eat in the hospital cafeteria.

Years later, when I’ll close my eyes and picture this city, I’ll see an overweight woman walking slowly across a street as I sit in the passenger seat of the Shoney’s Inn shuttle and wait. At the wheel is Catman. In the back of the shuttle are seven more hungry, injured football players. It’s dinnertime and Catman is our ride. The most energetic man in all of Alabama, Catman is one of three Shoney’s Inn shuttle drivers. He’s a military veteran, maybe, in his forties or fifties, or sixties, with fading tattoos on his forearms and long gray hair slicked back. He weighs 120 pounds and has three prominent teeth, all on the bottom row, all abnormally long and knifing up toward his nose. He got his name because he meows like a cat. He brings his hands to his mouth and twirls his hips while staring down the object of his feline affection. Catman is my support system in Alabama. When things get weird, he’ll be there to let me know: That ain’t weird,
this
is weird.

—I haven’t been with a woman for so long the crack of dawn makes me horny. Meoooow!

—More, Catman! More!

He’s an old soul in a new world, a weak world, a humorless world with no sense of adventure. He’s seen things and been places. Or he’s seen nothing and been nowhere. It doesn’t matter. His spirit is on fire. Everyone knows him everywhere we ride in our shuttle.

—Hey,
Catman
.

Tension is high in Birmingham and Catman is only trying to lighten the mood. Mayfield is right. I look around and I see some sorry sons of bitches, feeling
extra
sorry for themselves. I meet a guy who’s been here for over a year. He’s still on crutches. I meet guys who are moving in on a year. All of them have one thing in common: “Fuck
this
shit.” They are folding in on themselves. Shrinking to meet their beaten wills. Injuries in football are common, but being literally shipped off to exile after being injured isn’t.

A
s the weeks pass, my knee gets stronger. But it’s still weak. I feign perfect health and pepper Mayfield with questions about my release. When, Mayfield? When? I feel great!

To fill the time, I go to an office across from HealthSouth where we’re allowed to use the computers and the Internet. I’m writing a weekly journal about my Europe experience for the Denver Broncos website (which is how I found out, in Tampa, that Ed McCaffrey and Shannon Sharpe have both decided to hang up their cleats for good). The home page today is promoting the new draft class: two new receivers, Darius Watts in round two and Triandos Luke in round six. I try not to think about it. But two drafted receivers means two less spots available for me.

Our veteran backup Steve Beuerlein has also retired in the off-season, so Coach has drafted a pair of rookie quarterbacks in the seventh round: Matt Mauck and Bradlee Van Pelt. Matt’s a cerebral, down to earth, mechanically sound, prototypical quarterback from LSU. He won a national championship a few months earlier. Bradlee’s a free-spirited renegade quarterback: a running back with a cannon and a thirst for life. He played at Colorado State and has a cult following in the area, among them Pat Bowlen, who urged Coach Shanahan to take a chance on the California hippie who rode his skateboard to class barefoot and excited the crowds with his erratically brilliant performances.

But I can’t think about those guys right now. I have to get back on the field, show my coaches that I’m better than them. Sitting in the HealthSouth cafeteria isn’t helping anything. I have week five against the Scottish Claymores in my sights. The game is in Glasgow and I have to be there.

I am Scottish. My grandfather was born and raised in Glasgow. He was a musician and had seven children: six boys and a girl. The girl, Mary, is the oldest, followed by my father and five more boys. My grandfather died of a stomach ulcer when my father was fifteen, in 1944. My grandmother raised the seven children by herself in Wenatchee, Washington. After they were all up and out of the house, she moved to Scotland alone and lived there for two years in a flat. Then she moved back to the States and settled in San Francisco. San Jose is an hour from San Francisco and we went to see her often when I was a boy. We called her San Fran Gran. She died at ninety-one, when I was in middle school.

Years later my older brother Tom and my father took a trip to Scotland together. Then Tom studied in Glasgow for a semester when he was in college. But I have never been. So I circled that game on the calendar, and when I showed the schedule to my family we all decided that they would make the trip across the Atlantic and meet me in Scotland. They planned the trip. Bought the tickets. Booked the hotels. Then I got hurt.