Bragging Time

My son went out for football this year.  He's beginning his freshman year (and yeah, makes you feel old) so for the first time ever, he tried out for a football team.  Before official practices started though, they had the "voluntary" pre-season workout camp.  Yeah, voluntary as in "don't even bother if you don't come to these".  So I gave up 2 of my weeks of summer vacation (and several weekends of visitation) so he could go to those, and ultimately practice in the 2-a-days that followed.

So they practiced for most of August and had their first game this past Saturday.  My son wasn't starting but they had him slotted in at LG.  He would grumble just a little on the phone about having to play the scout team on both offense and defense instead of practicing his own school's plays, but I reminded him this was a great opportunity.  First of all, it was the first time he played organized football and he was doing great.  He had received compliments during the pre-workouts about his attendance and his work habits while there, and that was from the varsity coach.  The guy even called my son by name, so now the coach knows who he is...and in a good way.  Then his freshman coach had told him that if he kept working as hard as he had been in practice, the coach would make sure he got playing time.  Really, can you get a better compliment than that from a coach?

Secondly I reminded him that while he wasn't starting, he was lining up against those starters in practice.  There's your opportunity...show what you can do and keep working to beat them.  Like I told him, thats a win-win situation: it made him better, and it would push his teammates to be better as well.  Then he recalled that scene from Rudy where the starters told him to lighten up in practice and he got in their faces about playing harder.  Yep, pretty much the same concept.

So they had their first game this past weekend, and it was a rout in favor of my son's team.  I will say that its a well-coached team, there was a lot of discipline on the field and some good athleticism.  My son finally got in during the 4th quarter, beginning with kickoff coverage.  He played in the 11 slot and it looked to me like he filled in his lane well and tailed around the play.  Then he went back to the sideline but left his helmet strapped on.  I was getting all excited because it looked like he was going back in, and sure enough he did.  But then they had too many guys on the field so my son came back out (no penalty for it, just some kids came in after and my son went back out).  Bummer.

But then a couple plays later he was back in, lined up at defensive end.  First play in he got an assist on a tackle.  Ha, I was going nuts.  Then I was watching him out there, and yeah...I'm biased.  But damn the kid looked good, looked like he was really aware of everything going on.  He was playing the end that lines up over weakside every time, so there he was switching around the line before the snap showing good hustle.  Next play the offense had a false start.  Two plays later he got a QB hurry as he came in clean from the left side and forced the QB to get rid of the ball immediately or suffer the consequences.   Finally they held and forced another punt, and their offense ran out the clock to end the game.

So yeah, I was so proud of him.  He came back up with me since its my Labor Day weekend this year, but he had practice Monday morning so he had to go back Sunday night.  We talked a lot and I told him how good he looked and how obvious it was he was putting in the work and to keep it up.  So he called me last night and told me he had been officially promoted to 2nd string defensive line.  Wow, that was so good to hear.  So obviously I wasn't imagining all the good stuff I saw from him on the field.  I told him this was a good lesson in hard work paying off.  The coaches didn't know him at all, he never played ball before.  No relatives in the system, no older brothers playing for the coach in years past.  This was it, everything he would get he would earn himself through hard work and hustle.  So I told him to use this as a stepping stone and just keep working hard.

I fully expect there to be more brag blogs in the future.