Slow Getting Up: A Story of NFL Survival from the Bottom of the Pile by Nate Jackson Page A
Authors: Nate Jackson
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when the moment is big. But that’s bogus. The magnitude of a game is manufactured by those who sell it, not by those who play it. The lights are always on.
The next week we get back to work preparing for our playoff run. But in the opening round, we travel back to Indy and get rolled. Peyton’s flawless. Eddie Mac had a head injury from the Packer game so I’m suited up again. I stand on the sidelines until the last drive. We are running out the clock with some standard inside runs. Most everyone out here is playing patty-cake and waiting for the clock to hit zeroes: the Colts have another game to prepare for and we have the off-season waiting for us. Blade puts me in for the last four plays and I run around like a crazed jackal. All of them are knockdown blocks or close to it. I want blood. I want to taste the iron on my tongue as I rip the flesh from a safety’s bones and play Hacky Sack with his testicles. Everyone looks at me like I’m an idiot. The free safety yells at me after I crush him with a borderline illegal block. But I don’t care. It’s my playoffs, too. The clock empties and our season ends. And the only blood I’ve tasted is my own, in the form of two vicious carpet burns from the NFL’s last proprietor of AstroTurf hell. For the next month I wake up sticking to my sheets.
T he week of the Super Bowl, Charlie and I fly to Houston to pick up our Super Bowl tickets. NFL players have the option of purchasing two tickets at face value, but for some reason they make the rookies pick them up in the Super Bowl city. Veterans can pick up the tickets in their home cities. The markup for Super Bowl tickets is obscene, so we take a business trip to Texas to purchase our tickets at face value before selling them at a “significant markup.” The ticket scalping underworld is a breeze once you’re in. True market value reveals itself in back parking lots and dark alleys.
We go to the designated hotel and get our tickets, then we meet our handler in a different hotel parking lot. He gives us a wad of cash and we each hand over two pieces of cardboard. Paper for paper, the American dream unfolds. We book a room in a cheap motel and float from party to party, denied entry at nearly every one, and settle for a gentlemen’s club, where I fall into a deep conversation with a New Orleans dancer who has come to town to cash in on the Super Bowl muscle. I flex my practice squad muscles for her. She is not impressed.
3
Nein Lives
(2004)
M y phone rings. The caller ID tells me it’s coming from the Broncos facility.
—Yellow.
—Hey, Nate, it’s Blade. How’s it going?
—Hey, Blade. All is well. Driving through the Rocky Mountains right now.
—Ah, headed home, eh? That’s great. Enjoying your off-season?
—Yeah, so far. What’s up with you?
—Ahh, you know how it is. It’s off-season for you guys but not for us. We’re in here burning the midnight oil. Anyway, the reason I’m calling is that we’ve discussed it as a staff and we think you’d really benefit from heading over to NFL Europe next month. I know what you’re probably thinking, Nate, but it would be great. You’d get some game action under your belt and you’d have a great time out there, Nate, you really would. And you’d be back in time for our last few minicamps. We really think this will be great for you. So what do you think?
I don’t think.
—Yeah, Blade. Let’s do it.
Great. I had a feeling I might be getting that call. NFL Europe is a supplemental league owned by the NFL and used as a de facto farm system. There are six teams: the Scottish Claymores, Berlin Thunder, Amsterdam Admirals, Cologne Centurions, Frankfurt Galaxy, and Rhein Fire. The NFL’s off-season is NFL Europe’s in-season, so practice squad players like me are often sent to NFL Europe to develop. Charlie played in NFL Europe for the Rhein Fire last year and he’s told me stories. Football in Germany? Man that must suck. But he loved it. And he was
The next week we get back to work preparing for our playoff run. But in the opening round, we travel back to Indy and get rolled. Peyton’s flawless. Eddie Mac had a head injury from the Packer game so I’m suited up again. I stand on the sidelines until the last drive. We are running out the clock with some standard inside runs. Most everyone out here is playing patty-cake and waiting for the clock to hit zeroes: the Colts have another game to prepare for and we have the off-season waiting for us. Blade puts me in for the last four plays and I run around like a crazed jackal. All of them are knockdown blocks or close to it. I want blood. I want to taste the iron on my tongue as I rip the flesh from a safety’s bones and play Hacky Sack with his testicles. Everyone looks at me like I’m an idiot. The free safety yells at me after I crush him with a borderline illegal block. But I don’t care. It’s my playoffs, too. The clock empties and our season ends. And the only blood I’ve tasted is my own, in the form of two vicious carpet burns from the NFL’s last proprietor of AstroTurf hell. For the next month I wake up sticking to my sheets.
T he week of the Super Bowl, Charlie and I fly to Houston to pick up our Super Bowl tickets. NFL players have the option of purchasing two tickets at face value, but for some reason they make the rookies pick them up in the Super Bowl city. Veterans can pick up the tickets in their home cities. The markup for Super Bowl tickets is obscene, so we take a business trip to Texas to purchase our tickets at face value before selling them at a “significant markup.” The ticket scalping underworld is a breeze once you’re in. True market value reveals itself in back parking lots and dark alleys.
We go to the designated hotel and get our tickets, then we meet our handler in a different hotel parking lot. He gives us a wad of cash and we each hand over two pieces of cardboard. Paper for paper, the American dream unfolds. We book a room in a cheap motel and float from party to party, denied entry at nearly every one, and settle for a gentlemen’s club, where I fall into a deep conversation with a New Orleans dancer who has come to town to cash in on the Super Bowl muscle. I flex my practice squad muscles for her. She is not impressed.
3
Nein Lives
(2004)
M y phone rings. The caller ID tells me it’s coming from the Broncos facility.
—Yellow.
—Hey, Nate, it’s Blade. How’s it going?
—Hey, Blade. All is well. Driving through the Rocky Mountains right now.
—Ah, headed home, eh? That’s great. Enjoying your off-season?
—Yeah, so far. What’s up with you?
—Ahh, you know how it is. It’s off-season for you guys but not for us. We’re in here burning the midnight oil. Anyway, the reason I’m calling is that we’ve discussed it as a staff and we think you’d really benefit from heading over to NFL Europe next month. I know what you’re probably thinking, Nate, but it would be great. You’d get some game action under your belt and you’d have a great time out there, Nate, you really would. And you’d be back in time for our last few minicamps. We really think this will be great for you. So what do you think?
I don’t think.
—Yeah, Blade. Let’s do it.
Great. I had a feeling I might be getting that call. NFL Europe is a supplemental league owned by the NFL and used as a de facto farm system. There are six teams: the Scottish Claymores, Berlin Thunder, Amsterdam Admirals, Cologne Centurions, Frankfurt Galaxy, and Rhein Fire. The NFL’s off-season is NFL Europe’s in-season, so practice squad players like me are often sent to NFL Europe to develop. Charlie played in NFL Europe for the Rhein Fire last year and he’s told me stories. Football in Germany? Man that must suck. But he loved it. And he was
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