First, can you let me know what you’ve been doing with yourself since the NFL?
I’m doing full-time ministry now. I started off in banking and finance after football but was very active in the church at that particular time. So it seemed like a natural progression.
In the mid-80s everyone stayed with their company forever. It’s funny, when I told my best friend I wanted to talk to him about a change in career and told him I was going into the ministry, he wasn’t surprised. He thought I was going to get into coaching or something. That he said would have been a real surprise!
Was faith a big part of who you were as a player?
Ultimately I think being around some of the players on the team that were big on faith had a later impact on me. But at the time I wasn’t one of the guys going to Bible study – not like Merriweather, Shell, Dungy – guys like that. I think they were planting seeds that didn’t take root until after I left football.
Was the adjustment to post-NFL life difficult?
I was there such a short time so it wasn’t as big of an adjustment. Losing the team comradery was hard. But missing football wasn’t that big of a deal for me. I was more of a basketball junkie. In my mind I was a basketball player! So I played on local league basketball teams and that helped me find the competitive void piece of things. But losing the team comradery was the biggest adjustment.
Looking back – why did you sign with the Steelers?
This is an interesting story. I was actually drafted by the USFL’s New Jersey Generals. I was a decent player – not terrific but decent. But back then the USFL would draft guys to protect them from other teams and wouldn’t necessarily sign you. It was a territorial type of thing. They wanted you to come in to camp but it was more like being a glorified free agent.
I never heard from them after being drafted – I didn’t get any calls and didn’t hear from my agent about anything. At that time I talked to my college friend who was also drafted by the Generals, and he shared with me that our college coach said we should think about moving on from football. So, I figured football wasn’t in the cards for me.
So what happened after that?
Well, my college coach called me. He asked who I ended up signing with. I asked him what he was talking about. He told me he had gotten a lot of calls from teams and forwarded them all to my agent. I never heard from my agent about any of them.
I told my coach what my friend had shared with me as well – he told me that wasn’t meant for me. That he thought I could play in the NFL. He asked me if I still wanted to play and I said “Yes!” So he said he’d see what he could do.
Then 15 minutes later he called me back and told me to get on a plane to Pittsburgh – they wanted me to go in for a tryout. I went out there the next day with one bag of clothes. It was like a pro day – it lasted most of the day – over Memorial Day weekend.
And it went well?
I hadn’t practiced in weeks. Maybe I was just fresh – but I ran my best 40 and blew it out of the water.
They signed me then – I think it was Dick Hoak and Dick Haley who were there. It was just me – I didn’t have an agent there after everything that happened. I was a 21-year-old and didn’t know if I was supposed to negotiate for a better deal or what. So I called my college coach and asked him. He told me “You better just sign whatever they put in front of your face!”
So that’s what I did – and I stayed there for mini-camp with just one bag of clothes!
Did anyone take you under their wing when you were there?
It was just the rookies in mini-camp at first. My saving grace that two of my Rutgers teammates – Andrew Baker and Alan Andrews – they were there too. We all worked out together and toured the city the weekend before camp started. Andrew and I were roommates at Rutgers and were again in mini-camp – I just remembered that. We all supported each other.
We all went back to camp in Latrobe in July. Then you were just trying to survive. The running back room was great – Pollard, Abercrombie, Erenberg were all helpful.
Unlike other teams, the Steelers only kept 10-to-12 running backs. They’d end up keeping four or five on the roster. So that was a smaller crew of running backs in camp then – you knew you’d stay around before they’d start cutting guys. We knew eight of us would be cut eventually, but we all supported one another.
Did anyone help you more once training camp in Latrobe started?
Frank Pollard – he and I developed a relationship – he took me under his wing. More as an everyday friend. Once I made the team I was on their version of the practice squad. You realized still that you could be cut at any time, so I was very frugal about spending money. Or as my wife says, “I was cheap!” I was afraid to buy a car. Frank had a Honda Accord, but a dealer gave him a Mercedes to drive around as a promotional car. When I told him I walked to camp from the Allegheny Center where I was staying, he asked me why. When he learned I didn’t want to buy a car, he tossed me his keys and told me to use his.
Any good stories from your time there?
I remember one practice – it was nearing the end of the practice. We were practicing at the “Thud” level, which is like halfway hitting. I was running a pass route on a short pass – I was the primary receiver and was running full speed across the middle. Well, David Little was running full speed from the other direction and took a weird angle. We were both looking back at the quarterback and we ran full speed into each other. Well, David got up and was furious. He was going off, saying we were supposed to be going at thud level and said he knew I did it on purpose. He was threatening me and the other backs after that during the drills – saying if that’s the way we were going to do things, he was going to get us back.
Well, now all the running backs were afraid to run the drill against him. We were all lining up and pushing each other in line to avoid rotating in when he was in. I remember Todd Spencer and me pushing each other, and me telling him Little was only mad at me, that he shouldn’t worry. But he wasn’t having it!
Well, I finally went in but then they had me pass block, so happily I didn’t have to face him. After the drill I ran up to him – I didn’t want this to carry on after practice. I explained to him what happened and that it wasn’t on purpose. He finally understood and was ok.
Any other good ones?
One other I still laugh about. People said I was cheap but my camp roommate was Russell Holmes and he was worse. He and I are still good friends.
Back then a whole pizza was five dollars. We ordered one and he was at his desk studying his playbook when the pizza guy knocked on the dorm room door. Russell just reached over his shoulder and gave me a $20 bill. I took it and gave it to the pizza guy and jokingly told him to keep the change thinking Russell was going to say something, But Russell didn’t say a thing, so I let the pizza guy go with the $20 then went to the bathroom down the hall.
When I got back Russell asked me for the change. When I told him I gave it to the pizza guy after he didn’t say anything, he told me he thought I was kidding. Then he ran down two flights of stairs and chased the pizza guy’s car down the street as he drove away trying to get his change back! He never caught up to the guy – in fact he told me he thought the pizza guy saw him and sped up to get away!
Now when I talk to Russell, he still asks me for that $15 back!
Read more by former Steelers via the book Steelers Takeaways: Player Memories Through the Decades. To order, just click on the book:
