Career change
With his football-playing days at an end, former Buckeye Reggie Germany has found his calling helping young athletes
Saturday, July 15, 2006
Josh Moss
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
MIKE MUNDEN DISPATCH Reggie Germany caught 80 passes for 1,268 yards in his career at Ohio State before opting for the NFL.
"You have to live with the mistakes you’ve made and move forward. I had to figure out what to do with the rest of my life." REGGIE GERMANY
The tunnel inside the Columbus Fieldhouse is different from the one that empties onto the field inside Ohio Stadium. It is dark. It leads to a stretch of faded turf. When athletes trot out of this tunnel’s mouth, 100,000 roaring Buckeyes fans do not greet them. The only sound is the steady buzzing of an electrical box.
It is a Saturday morning, and this is the tunnel Reggie Germany, who once played receiver and ran track at Ohio State, is walking through. He sports a pair of running shoes instead of cleats and has traded his football helmet for a brown, fitted cap. He has not worn his scarlet No. 80 jersey in more than five years. A baggy T-shirt that reads "Reggie Germany All-Star Football Camp" completes his uniform.
After a brief stint in both the NFL and Arena Football League, a bad left knee put Germany’s professional career to rest about two years ago. Now he spends his time training about 25 clients — mostly teenagers — in whatever sport they play.
"I put in more than 60 hours every week," Germany said.
The pencil scratchings that clutter his datebook would seem to prove it.
Germany, 28, has made it through the tunnel and is ready to start a speed camp.
Three teenage girls and his youngest client, 11-year-old Darren Nettles, have finished stretching and line up at the end of a rope ladder that Germany has laid on the turf.
As the athletes shuffle through the ladder, Germany tries to motivate them.
"Faster!" he barks. "Faster! Faster! Faster! "
One of the girls, 16-year-old Kristen White of New Albany, burns through the ladder in seconds, according to the stopwatch dangling around Germany’s neck.
"Kristen was the slowest of the three girls at the beginning of the week," Germany said.
His training sessions seem to work.
Will Walker, Nettles’ grandfather, thinks his grandson is noticeably faster after five sessions.
"I really saw the results at Darren’s basketball camp," Walker said. "He was able to catch up to a guy from behind during a pickup game."
And Rachel White, Kristen’s sister who plays college soccer at Toledo, also has improved as a runner.
"I’ve never been trained in the running form before," she said. "So (Germany’s) camp has helped me with that."
Germany knows the correct form. As a freshman and sophomore on the OSU track team, he ran the 400 meters, 1,600 relay and 110 high hurdles.
He stopped running track after the 1998 season to focus on football, and he finished his college career with 80 receptions for 1,268 yards.Germany was projected to be drafted in the second or third round in 2001. The lure became too much for him to handle.
"Making that type of money and living your dream wasn’t always going to be there," he said of playing in the NFL. "I thought, ‘School would always be there.’ "
He stopped going to class, and he was suspended for the 2001 Outback Bowl because of his 0.0 grade-point average for fall quarter.
"My GPA was bad because I never attended class. It wasn’t bad because I did the work and failed," he said.
Later that year, the Buffalo Bills selected Germany in the seventh round — not the second or third. He spent two years with Buffalo, where his impact was minimal before he suffered a left-knee injury. After completing rehabilitation in St. Louis, Germany signed with the Columbus Destroyers in 2003. They released him a year later; his knee could not sustain a week of practice.
"My knee swelled and I couldn’t bend it. The doctor said, ‘You’re not going to be able to walk if you keep this up,’ " Germany said. "I don’t have kids, but I want to have them someday. I want to be able to run and play with them."
Giving up football depressed Germany, and his options were limited without a college degree.
"You have to live with the mistakes you’ve made and move forward," Germany said. "I had to figure out what to do with the rest of my life."
Germany came to realize that kids around Columbus had dreams to become better athletes, just like he did as a child growing up in Hazlewood, Mo.
Germany wanted to help those kids achieve their goals, so he started working as a trainer and holding camps a year ago.
"I wanted to steer them in a better direction than I chose to go in," Germany said.
NFL contracts do not motivate Germany anymore. Instead, he gets his inspiration from kids such as Nettles, who wears an oversized Dwyane Wade jersey and wants to play in the NBA.
"You have to start young. I want to see him get there," Germany said.
Germany also has some goals of his own: He first wants to re-enroll at Ohio State, earn his degree and then coach college football. A job with the Buckeyes would be his dream.
"If I coached at Ohio State, we would have some of the best wide receivers in the country, I promise you that," Germany said.
But for today, inside the field house, Germany is leading the four campers through a drill to loosen and warm their muscles. They run and spring off one leg while reaching for the ceiling.
Germany tells Kristen White to grab a gray I-beam overhead as she leaps into the air. The beam is about eight stories up. She tries anyway.
"You know what? She looked up and said to herself, ‘I can reach that,’ " Germany said. "That’s gratifying to me."
jmoss@dispatch.com
|
07-15-2006, 09:12 AM
WR Reggie Germany (official thread)
Linear Mode
