|
|
 |
|
|||
|
|||
|
|
Rams RB Brian Leonard Talks about Pop Warner Days
By: NBCSports
Updated: 05/22/2007 at 7:51 AM
 I've been dreaming of this day since I was a little boy, playing for the Mini Giants, my local Pop Warner team up here. I have a picture of myself in that uniform, wearing my Dan Marino jersey -- at least the number -- and doing the Heisman pose. I took a couple to the house in Pop Warner and thought I'd be playing for my team, the New York Giants someday. I guess everyone in Pop Warner thinks they'll be playing in the NFL.
That's why I cannot believe that this day's actually here. I'm back home in our little town in upstate New York, almost a six-hour drive from the Rutgers campus. There are about 20 people over at my parents' house up here in Gouverneur. Family and friends hanging out. I wanted to stay outside mostly, barbecuing and doing yard work. It'll be grilled chicken for me -- burgers for everybody else. I'm trying not to get too caught up in the hoopla. I heard that Joe Thomas was going fishing on a lake but was allowing the cameras to come film that. Joe's a great guy -- we roomed together in New York City in December for the Draddy Award (it's known as "the academic Heisman") -- but I didn't want any cameras up here today. Just my family and friends. Like I said, this is a dream come true. Growing up, all I ever wanted to be was as good as my older brother, Nate. We didn't know how good you'd have to be to get a college scholarship -- the competition up here wasn't all that demanding -- so we just worked our hardest every day. Then Nate got an offer from Rutgers. Unfortunately, Nate suffered some devastating knee injuries early on in his college career. He tore the ACL on the same knee twice and on the second one he crushed the bottom of his femur. But Rutgers never gave up on him -- he was always around the program. So that made it easier for me when I got offered by Rutgers a few years later. I wanted to come to there and help turn the program around. It's funny. When I arrived I just hoped that I'd get on the field for special teams situations. Next thing I know I'm carrying the ball 25 times a game.
That's why I feel confident that I can contribute on the next level. At the NFL Combine, I bench-pressed 225 pounds 28 times, which was the most of any running back. At Rutgers, I played tailback for three seasons, but then last fall I switched to fullback so that both Ray Rice and I could be in the game at the same time. I guess you could say it paid off. I graduated from Rutgers in December. I'm still living around campus, but I spent two months working out at the Athletes' Performance Institute in Tempe, Arizona, this winter. That place was amazing. I was hanging out with guys such as JaMarcus Russell, Brady Quinn and Paul Posluszny. People ask me who was the most off-the-charts physical specimen of the group and honestly, it was Brady. Plus, whenever we went out to eat he was the guy everyone recognized. Not kids, adults. I ran routes a lot for Brady this winter to work on my receiving game. See, there's two kinds of shape you need to work on following your last college game. The first is Combine shape. That's all about strength and short bursts of speed. At the Combine you never do anything over 40 yards, so your whole focus up to that point is explosiveness. Football shape is nothing like Combine shape. To get into football shape Brady and I would run simulated drives. For example, I'd run a route as if it were a play. Then I'd jog back to our huddle. Within 25 seconds, we'd run our next play. And so on for about 10 to 15 plays. And there are no TV timeouts when you're doing that. I'm going to miss Rutgers, but I'm really proud of what we accomplished. I was at the spring game last week and there were 12,000 people there. Now, New Brunswick isn't Tuscaloosa --yet--but that was a record for us by far. I think that was about the number of people we had for games when I first got there. I hear they actually have people on hold for season tickets there next year. Can you believe that? That's what I wanted to do by going there. The NFL doesn't need me to help fill a stadium on Sundays, of course. I'm just eager to contribute to the team. And Nate, he's totally fired up for me. He sells commercial real-estate in Metuchen, N.J., now, but this dream, it's sort of his and mine both. We're both living the dream through me. Speaking of dreams, I've been dreaming a lot lately. In the dream I go through the first, second and third round. Nobody picks me. And then, whatever team I go to -- usually it's the Giants, they're my favorite team -- I get there and there are 30 running backs ahead of me. Maybe that's not a dream but a nightmare. But I don't have to worry about that any more. Today, my dream came true.
|
Don't forget to check out our calendar of events and news stories. Join us on Facebook We are proud members of:  
|
