Guts vs Glory Read Free Page B

the
football, we were unable to move until the ball was snapped.  But with all the
excitement and adrenaline going on, I found it hard to wait patiently.  That
was clearly my biggest struggle and was addressed promptly.  The line coach
figured out a great way to help me.  Every time I jumped early, our entire
group would have to do push-ups.  As much as I hated push-ups, I hated letting
down the group even more.  It didn’t take long for me to break that ugly habit.
    Mike had an ugly habit to break of
his own.  While we were working on our drills, we all stopped suddenly when we
heard a loud pop.  Looking around, we saw a coach yelling at Mike with a
football laying his feet.  He later told me that as he was running a drill, the
running backs coach calmly walked up to him and was able to punch the ball out
of his hand.  As fast as he was, Mike struggled to hold onto the ball.  He
wasn’t used to carrying things while he ran, so he simply wasn’t paying
attention to the ball.  The coach made it very clear that even though he was
the fastest player on the team, he was a liability if he couldn’t hold onto the
ball.  That meant that until he could learn to hold onto the ball better, he
wouldn’t be able to play during the games. 
    His bad habit was corrected the
same way mine was.  He was also worried about letting the team down but his
biggest motivator was being able to play in the games.  There were four other
guys trying out for the starting running back position.  With that much competition,
he would have to be nearly perfect to stand out.  We were already informed that
we wouldn’t be able to start in the game coming up, so we both made it our goal
to stand out and become starters the following game.

Chapter 9
    As the weeks progressed, we eventually
noticed that our Monday and Tuesday practices were days dedicated to working in
our small groups, allowing us to work on drills and correct mistakes from the
previous week’s game.  Wednesdays were dedicated to big group days, so we could
work on our plays as a team, while preparing to defend against our opponent’s
plays.  Thursday was a light day dedicated to special teams.  On those days, we
didn’t wear pads or make serious contact because the coaches didn’t want anyone
getting injured the day before the game.   Obviously, Friday was the big game
day.
    My big moment finally came when we
got into our big group on Wednesday during our first week of practice.  After
our first water break, we were told by the coach that we would be put into game
situations.  Our starting offense would run their normal plays, while our
second-string defense would run the plays used by our opponent’s defense.  Our
second-string offense would then run the plays of our opponent’s offense, while
our first-string defense tried to defend against those new plays.  The best
part was that we were allowed to go full contact.  That meant I would get my
first chance to hit someone.  Even though I would be pretending to be a
defender from the other team, the tackle would not be a pretend hit.
    When one of the defensive linemen
on the second-string team was asked to come out, I was told to go in and take
his place.  I was positioned at the end of the defensive line, known as a
defensive end.  Our defensive captain told us that we would be defending a
running play.  My job was to stand across from the offensive tackle.  As soon
as the ball was snapped, and not a moment before, I would have to get around
the tackle and hit the guy holding the ball.  I must not have been taken very
seriously because they decided to execute the play on my side of the line.  The
running back must not have taken me very seriously either, because after I
crashed through the offensive lineman, he looked very surprised to see me.
    There was no one between the two of
us.  Even though the entire moment took seconds, it felt like minutes.  I can
still remember every detail.  I was well