THERE WERE TEN GROUPS of quarterbacks working with their coaches. Bo was doing his thing with video and the trashcans. Each coach seemed to have his own approach. Coach Mason took us outside. He had us in full pads; he said you don’t play in shorts and t-shirts, so you should practice in what you’d wear in a game. He was definitely old-school. It was also 91°F and it felt like 100% humidity. We were going to be sweating our butts off.
There were three fields outside and we got half of one of them. The other five halves had groups working on them, too. We were the only ones fully decked out in our gear. We met ten athletes who’d be working with us.
“These guys have volunteered their time. I do not want you killing them. There’s supposed to be only light contact, but if you lead them into a defensive back, you’ll answer to me.
“While your arms are still fresh, I’m going to teach you three ways to throw a deep route. Quaid, get in here and show them what I mean,” Coach Mason told us.
One of the receivers ran a post and Quaid put it on a rope. The boy had some arm strength. He then threw what we were used to seeing. It’s where the ball has some arc on it. Then he showed me something I had never seen before, at least not in person. He threw the rainbow, putting a huge amount of air under it, and the receiver ran under it and caught it.
“Mark, tell me when, why and what the risks are with the first pass,” Coach Mason said.
“If you have a small window in which to get the ball to a receiver, you’d need to get it there as fast as possible. The risk would be it getting picked off by an underneath defender.”
“Good! Hunter, same questions with the second pass.”
“I’d say it would be the preferred method. You keep the ball up so the underneath defenders can’t get to it and you give your receiver a chance to run under it.”
“Okay, Ridge, tell me about the last one.”
“I have no idea why you’d throw it that way,” he confessed.
“David, give it a shot.”
“I actually think it might be the safest pass. The way the ball drops down, only the receiver would have a chance to catch it. With the second pass, you can defend it if you’re close enough, whereas the last one has too high of an arc for you to get it.”
“Exactly right. Only a few coaches teach you this pass now. It takes practice but is unstoppable if you do it right. I’d compare it to the skyhook Kareem Abdul Jabbar made famous.”
I looked confused. Coach Mason rolled his eyes at me.
“Before you say anything, David, I’m frigging old. If you don’t know who that is, look him up,” Coach Mason ordered me.
Coach Mason set it up so there was one receiver and one defender. That kept them fresh because they were rotating. It also allowed us to rotate. We got a lot more reps because we would go as soon as the pass was completed.
On my first throw, he stopped us.
“You’ll be much more accurate when you hold your hands to the side, instead of at the center of your body.” Coach demonstrated what he was talking about. I cringed because Ridge had pointed that out at USC. “See how your hips work better and you get your legs into it. Also, you’re striding too long. Shorten it up a bit. Now, let’s try it.”
He had me go again.
“Better, better. Now go with Quaid and take one of the receivers, and you two work on that,” he told us.
Quaid and I worked one-on-one for the next twenty minutes until he was satisfied. We came back.
“Get in there, Dawson. Show me what you learned.”
I went next and Coach Mason was pleased.
“Good job!” he told me, then turned to Mark. “Go with Quaid and show him what I’ve been complaining about.”
He then changed things up. He wanted us to get used to avoiding pressure. He had an extra defender hold a blocking pad and take a swing at us as he rushed. Hunter went first and the defender clobbered him. Ridge and I chuckled at his misfortune.
“You couple of jokesters think that was funny? We can do this live and see how funny you think it is,” Coach challenged us.
“I’ll go live,” I shot back.
Ridge looked at me like I’d gone insane. I jumped in and went next. I probably shouldn’t have done it, but I love contact. Plus, the defender was getting a free shot at me with a ten yard sprint and nothing to slow him down. On the snap, my receiver got tangled up with the defensive back and almost went down. There was no way he would get free before the rusher got to me.
If I was going to be hit, I was going to hit back. I lowered my shoulder, took two strides, and exploded through the poor kid. The crack of pads had everyone’s head snapping around. The kid staggered backward and fell on his butt. I recovered, and my receiver was open and I hit him in stride.
“Hell, yeah!” Ridge yelled.
Coach Mason had a different take on it.
“God Dammit, David, throw the ball away. You do that in college and they will eat your lunch! I guarantee you if I can break you of just that one habit, you’ll thank me down the road.” He looked at the kid sitting on his butt. “I think we should go back to the pad.”
“You think?” the kid shot back and grinned.
I reached down and gave him a hand up.
“Get off your butt and let’s go. Ridge, get in there.”
What I liked about Coach Mason was there was no standing around. He moved practice right along. I hated our practices last year. It seemed like we were hurrying up and waiting. You could tell the years of experience he had.
I was sent to work with Quaid on my footwork. The whole Mark deal with him taking money bothered me. I needed someone to talk to about it.
“Can I ask you something and it just be between you and me?” I asked him.
“Sure,” he answered.
“Not so fast. This is serious. Once I tell you, you might not be happy,” I told him, making sure he meant it.
“If it’s something illegal, I would have to say something,” he told me.
I thought about it for a minute.
“I’m not sure if it’s actually illegal, but I do know it’s against NCAA rules,” I told him.
“Okay, just tell me.”
“I saw Mark at lunch taking money from a man who represents a university,” I said in a rush.
Quaid had us stop our drill and got serious.
“That’s a serious charge. It would just be your word against theirs. I would advise you just keep it to yourself.”
“I have video,” I told him.
“Shit, shit, shit!” Quaid said, looking at the sky.
My thought exactly. If I had even liked Mark, a little bit, I would have kept quiet, but he represented everything that was wrong with football. He was a bully, and he was a cheat.
“We’ll talk to Coach Mason after practice and see what he says,” Quaid said, not happy I had told him.
BY THE END OF PRACTICE, we were all sweating like pigs. But it was the best afternoon of practice I’d ever had. On the way into the locker room, one of the men from a scouting service wanted to talk to me. I was able to put him off until the next morning. I needed to deal with the Mark issue, and then go lift. When I was getting dressed, Quaid came and got me.
“Quaid told me what was going on. Let me see the video,” Coach Mason ordered me when we entered his office.
I played it for Quaid and coach.
“That’s ...” Quaid started.
“I know who it is,” Coach said, cutting him off. “David, I’d like to keep your name out of this if I can. This will get ugly. Can you get the video to me so I can show it to who needs to see it?”
“Do you have a laptop?” I asked him.
“You dork! I may be old, but I do keep up somewhat,” he teased me.
“Don’t believe him, David. He’s just old,” Quaid shot at him.
He put Quaid in a headlock and we were all laughing. They were obviously friends.
I didn’t want to email it to him. We were afraid they could trace it back to me if I did. I looked in my bag and found a flash drive. I made sure it was a new one that didn’t have anything on it. I copied the video and handed it to him. Quaid showed him how to save it on his hard drive.