Full speed ahead for Anderson
WESTWOOD, Calif. -- David Anderson is transfixed. The Colorado State star wide receiver has just gone through a 90-minute workout trying to perfect his stride and running form, and has now retired to the bleachers. His training session, however, is hardly complete.
The 5-foot-11, 192-pound Southern California-native, who burst onto the college football scene last year by snagging a Colorado State-record 72 passes for 1,293 yards and nine touchdowns, is trying to explain why he is at UCLA on a cloudy May afternoon, but he can't take his eyes off the track.
At first glance, Greene seems so far forward on his first few steps, he looks like he's going to fall flat on his face. To the untrained eye, Greene is just one marvelous blur about as realistic as the cartoon Roadrunner. But to Anderson, he is textbook. This is just how former NFL wideout/Olympic gold medal sprinter Willie Gault has taught Anderson the past two weeks. For Anderson, a guy who was known for having good, but not great speed (in the 4.5 range), it was like having a crash course in speed.
"Willie taught me that running fast is more about learning about your body and running properly than putting 500 pounds on your back and squatting," says Anderson. "You need to relax and just run. Don't tense up. When a person has mastered technique and learned how his body should, and can, move, they will be faster than they imagined. Listening to my body is something I never did. Feeling awkward out there was 'normal' for me because I have never been taught and hence never ran properly. I still don't, but I am trying."
Anderson hooked up with Gault through the junior's older brother Erik, a writer/producer who knew the former Chicago Bear-turned-actor through the film business. Erik Anderson and Gault were talking about sports one day last winter and the conversation meandered to David, a glue-fingered receiver, who had become a CSU favorite for his precision patterns and toughness.
Anderson asked Gault if he knew of any speed camps his brother could go to in the summer. Gault didn't, but he offered to run with David when he came home in the summer.
To get up to speed, Anderson ran with Gault and friends four times a week for two weeks. He has learned to focus on his take-off (he uses the analogy of a dragster trying not to spin its wheels), his body lean and generating power with more aerodynamic arm movement.
"Maurice spoke to me about body lean, keeping my eyes focused on one thing and keeping my head still because I had a tendency to look up and down," Anderson said. "I know this will help because as a receiver, you want to stare down a DB as you run. Maybe I put my head down, and that is how they always knew I was going deep. This all made me very much aware of what I need to do.
"Willie and Maurice both talked about relaxing my shoulders, breathing less and concentrating. They stressed to me that 'You can't run thinking about other stuff, don't waste body motion breathing really, really fast and hard,' which is something I never knew. They said they take two breaths in the 100, so I should take one in the forty or on a route."
Another big key, Gault says, is for Anderson to properly incorporate his refined technique into his routes, keeping in mind that not all routes should or can be done at full speed. Above all, though, it's a must for disguising his routes and duping DBs. Anderson says when he returns to CSU, he will examine film of himself running to monitor his form as well as tell someone the things on what to look for when he's training.
"This will make me better because speed is the game and the faster you are, the better off you are," he says. "A step here and a step there can make a world of difference on a football field."
Chatter
What's up with my boy Mike Williams??? Is he coming home to USC and will they let him play?
Lupe Gonzalez,
L.A.
Lupe,
I talked to him earlier this month and all he wants to do is play football. He said he's not big on lawsuits and courts, or raising the ire of the NFL. According to my colleagues at ESPN, his agent, though, sounds like he's going to push through with a lawsuit. I'm not sure that helps his cause to return to USC because it might push his timetable back. If Mike is to come back, I think he would need to be in summer school (the second session at USC starts in a few weeks) and I'd imagine he'd have to pay back all his pre-draft costs. For whatever its worth, the agent, Mike Azzerrelli has known Mike's family for a long time and they are friends, and I doubt he would get in the way of the receiver's best interests.
To me, this comes down to the NCAA of course. And that makes me skeptical. (Re: Jeremy Bloom) I'm not trying to portray Mike Williams as a victim in this, but what if 10 other players actually were, like him, gifted enough where they could've make the jump after the initial Clarett ruling and been selected in the first round, would the NCAA keep them all on the shelf this season? I doubt it because it's easier to push one guy in the margins. Hopefully Mike Williams will be playing (either in the NFL or at USC) in 2004 because he really didn't do anything wrong.
Enough pre-season Heisman hype, do you think Lance Mitchell can carry on the OU tradition and win another Butkus?
Alex Dickinson,
Tulsa
Yeah Alex, word out of Norman is that Mitchell has come back 100 percent, and probably even better than that since he has a better understanding of the OU defense now. He will miss not having Tommie Harris clogging things up in front of him, but Dusty Dvorcek is a load and very underrated and I think they should be fine. That said, the favorite for the award is Derrick Johnson from Texas. Will Derting from Washington State is very good too, but I don't think he'll get enough hype from up there. The other guys I think that will merit some discussion are the Tennessee's Kevin Simon and Kevin Burnett, although they may cancel each other out the way Jonathan Vilma and DJ Williams did at Miami last year.
You guys in the media no nothing!!! You wanna sound smart, start talking about Leon Washington, the guy who is gonna win the Heisman and lead the Noles to the title.
KZ
Washington is a great all-around back. Although I think as talented as he is, so is Lorenzo Booker. So, Washington's gonna have to share the ball and I think that will keep his numbers down, especially compared to some other big-time RBs like KSU's Darren Sproles. As for FSU winning it all, you're not exactly picking a real sleeper here. As you mention, they have a stud RB (two in fact); an experienced QB who can make plays (Chris Rix), a game-breaking wideout (Cro Thorpe); a future top 10 pick in OT Alex Barron; a pair of fast, hard-hitting LBs (A.J. Nicholson and Ernie Sims) that probably will be as good as the Tennessee tandem and a guy who has NFL written all over him in Antonio Cromartie, a 6-3 DB with track speed. So, it wouldn't shock me if they won it all. But the ACC now is the toughest league in the country, although I think they can lose one game and still get to the title game -- especially if the loss is early.
How much no longer do you think I'm going to be stuck with Willingham as my coach because you know the administration isn't going to admit they made a huge, HUGE!! mistake in hiring him?
Casey Hawkins,
South Bend, Ind.
Casey,
Relax. I have good news. You won't be stuck with Coach Willingham much longer, provided of course, you become an Indiana Hoosier fan right now. Honestly, I think ND fans need to be a lot more patient. He raised expectations way higher because ND had such a great year in his first season there, and I think he'll have them in the top 10 by 2005 because they have a very good young QB (Brady Quinn), some really promising O-linemen (especially Ryan Harris) and some playmakers on defense (most notably rising soph Victor Abiamiri.) The trick will be coming up with a feature back. Funny thing is, I think if Reggie Bush had opted for ND over USC, the Irish would be a top 10 team this year. One thing I don't want to hear is about the academic standards being too tough. They are recruiting enough of the same kids to field a top 10 team. They just need the talent they sign to develop better.
Will this book of yours talk about the wild Jimmy Johnson days or just the last few years. Thanks.
Carl Johnson,
Opa-Locka
No Carl, thank you. Yes, there will be plenty of stuff from the Jimmy era. The book will go back even before Jimmy Johnson and before Schnellenberger, and actually is as much a college football book as it is a Miami book since it gives a landscape of the game and the things that have forced its evolution.
Don't you think it's time for Joe to retire? He's ruining the program!!!
Ray Hansen,
Chicago
No, I don't think it's time for me to say that. Actually, it's not up to me to say 'Joe, now go play like the rest of the folks at Del Boca Vista and play some shuffleboard.' It's his call. He built that program and gave a ton of money to that school. He has more power than any other coach in college sports and he's using it. And even if PSU has four more 5-6 type seasons, so what? Bob Stoops and Pete Carroll and Nick Saban have all shown that a proud program can be revived. The one thing I am sad to hear is whenever people talk about the three losing seasons out of the last four, they talk about that winning season like they won a title. That was a four-loss season, something which would've hardly had Nittany Lion fans beating their chests 10 years ago. But who knows maybe Austin Scott goes off this year and Joe ends up winning nine games and gets the last laugh.
Bruce Feldman is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine. His first book Cane Mutiny: How the Miami Hurricanes Overturned the Football Establishment comes out in the fall of 2004. He can be reached at bruce.feldman@espn3.com.
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