Personal Narrative: Football

Well for me, football is my top favorite sport. When I was in school, I had a problem with authority, and teachers would often make me mad. I tried hard to control my aggression, frustration, and anger. I jumped into drugs and cigarettes to fights and gangs. Because nothing I tried worked, I went to football tryouts. I felt happy and excited for the first time in a long time; I eventually got on the field and ran and ran.

September 20, 2011 was the day that everything changed. Practice that day was long and excruciatingly hot. My coach did not let me take a rest as I was the only full back we had at the time. Hit after hit, it started to add up and my world was spinning but coach told me to keep going, so I did. The very next snap my world got wrecked. My form became lazy because I was beyond exhausted and dehydrated, my head lead my attempt to break the tackle and the kid making the tackle lead with his head as well. Just like that my body went numb, everything was dark, my eyes were open but I could not see. I had no sense of where I was and where I was going. My name left me. At this point I did not know if I was dead or alive. This was the last time I was ever able to strap up and play the game of football. This is what happens to the millions of kids who play football on a daily basis. Somebody was there telling them to go back in even when they were showing early signs of a concussion. The athlete takes one more hit straight to the head out of poor form or exhaustion and then everything goes from bad to worse. These events take place at such a young age that the long term side effects can be fatal.

Football is a game of passion, a time when nothing else matters and the only thing that matters is going out there having fun and fighting for the guy next to you. Football has always been something that I loved and had a wild passion for. I’ve made friendships and memories to last a life time and I can always be grateful that football did that for me. Now of course I’ve had some bad memories during football as well, I remember walking out of the film room on the last day of spring ball and having Coach Antle grab me and say “Gage, I think I want to try you at a new position, I want to put you at defensive end. We need you more there and we think you can really excel there.” I remember being so furious, I had played linebacker ever since I could remember and now the last day of spring ball my senior year everything was about to change.

So I was basically on my own. I edited a highlight real, sent it out, and began to try to get in contact with coaches. I had been quite successful in high school, earning All-State awards for both offence and defense, but had no idea how I would compare to football players at the collegiate level. I would come to find out that I was very behind in the recruiting process. Most school had already handed out scholarships and the ones who hadn’t were not interested in me. With no offers, I was very discouraged and felt like giving up on the thought of playing in college. But rather than give up, I branched out and began to try to get in contact with schools out of state. I looked as far away as Montana, to Connecticut, to California. I truly had nothing to lose in my pursuit of my dream. I began to focus more on California schools, because of how much I loved California.

Have you ever felt like you’re not good enough, not knowing just how much potential you have? One of the most salient experiences of my life was making the Island Coast High School football team, because it taught me that to succeed you must be confident in yourself. The old me would have thought, “ I’m not good enough,” because I never thought that I could compete with kids that already played football. I suppose that I always felt like i couldn’t compete with football players because whenever I would play football in eighth grade, I would not be able to keep up with them. Little did I know, all of that was about to change the day I made my way to the middle of the humid, scorching fied, staring into the eyes of North Ft. Myers Highs’ freshman football team.

Nothing means more to me than spending quality time on Sundays with my family, sitting on the couch and watching football. Even as a young kid, before I knew the names of the teams my Dad would say, “We’re rooting for the blue team!” I had no idea what was going on but I was so interested by the game that I would cheer and yell whenever my Dad would. This natural attention to this great game gave me the desire to prepare myself to eventually join a team. I learned how to motivate myself to workout, study plays and annoy my Dad enough to throw a ball with me in the backyard. I felt it was my purpose in life to become a professional and play football as

Football is back as the first preseason game was played last Thursday. With football coming back, so does fantasy football. Like a lot of people (myself included), you’re scouring the internet for rankings. There’s plenty of rankings out there, but none of them tell you where to take a defense. I am going to present my strategy.

His little legs churned as fast as they could driving him straight at his opponent. I sensed Matthew wasn’t too sure of himself since he had never expressed any confidence playing our football games or in practices; but this time, the young defender responsible for guarding him was smaller, and Matt had the advantage. He staccato stepped and faked running to the right just as we had planned. His opponent accepting the feigned shift, ran in the misdirection. Suddenly, Matt was all alone in the end-zone; and the football, a perfectly thrown pass designed for Matt, was spiraling toward his small opened hands. The ball hit his palms and bounced skyward, but Matt quickly reached up and grabbed the football securing his touchdown. The families in the stands cheered, and Matt returned to the sideline with a smile and a little more confidence. I coach Matt’s third grade 7 on 7 football team, and this is my third year of competitive football league coaching. Coaching is a luxury I afford myself with my limited free time, and it brings me a lot of satisfaction.

I was an incoming freshman, two weeks prior to my first day of high school, and I was terrified. I knew that I loved the sport of football, however I had heard stories from my brother about how tough Stepinac’s freshman football coach was. Everything that I was told was true. One of the coaches great lessons that he taught me was that a hardworking disciplined team is typically more successful than a team that has all of the talent in the world, but is not disciplined and does not work hard. That summer was the hardest that I had ever worked up to that point to start in a football game. The hard work never paid off, and I left at the end of that season defeated. I wasn’t good enough, I wasn’t fast enough, and I wasn’t strong enough. I had only played in two of the games, one, for a snap when

We left Garberville, CA at 5 a.m. We knew it would be a long haul ahead of us. I slept on the floorboard of the back seat of Holly’s truck for the first couple of hours. Holly was a funny outgoing and straight to the point person. Along with us were my Mom and Dad, Dylan(Holly’s husband) and there two kids Ashley and Clayton. Dylan was a tall red head that is always the life of the party. Ashley was a short dirty blonde girl that loves her horses. And Clayton, clayton was just like his dad a big built red hair with blue eyes and super outgoing. Finally were my parents. My Mom and Dad we both very active outgoing people who got along great with Dylan and Holly and their kids so we knew it was going to be a fun week in Winnemucca. We

Ever since I was a little kid, I have admired the game of football. When I was a couple of years old, I was photographed in the Bulldog Bark kicking a field goal because they were doing an article on my dad about football. I had the same dream that every other little kid had. I wanted to be an NFL football player. So like usual, my parents told me to work hard and it might pay off. By the time I was in middle school, I knew I wasn’t going to be a professional football player, but that didn’t stop me from working. Growing up, I was always the quarterback or fullback, so when my dad told me my junior year that he wanted me to try the line, I was a little shocked. I had come in every single day of weights since I was in 7th grade, and he was moving me to the line. At first I was hurt, but it was a great decision because I loved the time I spent with the other lineman.

Approximately 2 years ago, in the fall semester of 7th grade year, I was in the football team. It was my first time experiencing and encountering American football, but I got fond of it. It happens to be started by a friend named Chris, introduced and persuaded me into American football, who already experienced in the football team for few years. First I felt scared to play such a treacherous sport but my brother Michael, who was already active in football, asked me to play football also. Because many of my friends and people around me play football, I decided to give it a shot and later the coach was able to give me a position in the game. My position wasn’t fancy or much noticeable in the game compared to other positions such as the quarterback or running back. Even though I was

Nine years ago I watched my very first football game, and I was fascinated by the quote from Vince Lombardi, “Football is like life, it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work, sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority.”So the succeeding year, I requested if I could do football and my grandpa said to me “Son if you want to play football, play on the line, and play on defense it is going to take dedication and determination, and you have to practice every day, do calisthenics every day, and most of all learn about how to play on the line of scrimmage.”

Football in high school took most of my time. It made me put family and friend’s aside because it was a sport I committed myself to every day. I knew I was not going to be playing at the pro or college level yet I wanted to have a good high school team; unfortunately that didn 't happen. My junior year, we won two games and lost the rest. During my senior year we won four games and lost the rest, but that was two more games won than the previous year. Sometimes I felt like all that work and commitment was not worth it. During the last home game, however my team and I did something outrageous. We proved to all those newspapers, opposing teams, and loyal and un-loyal fans that with hard work and team work, we were able to achieve great things.

As I got older the more I kept chasing my dreams to become in the NFL , every year I got better I started becoming popular cause football & haven’t even made it to high school yet but that’s when it staring getting to me it wasn’t about the game anymore it started being about the fame once high school began, although my freshman year went exactly how I expected it to go I attended Auburndale high school , all year I maintain a 3.5 GPA and of course everyone known me from my great little league experience I had. Football season was great! My first high school touchdown was against Kathleen the score was 6-7 we was down 4th quarter with 5 min left into the game & we only was down 1 point, the game was already hard for me due to the fact that my uncle had passed away in Haiti the night before , So when my play got called and that pass was thrown to me I knew I had to make a statement and we won the game 13 – 7 , the next game we played was against Lakeland and I was the only person to score that game which was another big high school memory. I really started feeling special I talk to Florida state and USF my freshman year! Now there’s nothing you can tell me and there it was my nightmare slowly came and began once I started feeling untouchable.