Top Prospect

by Paul Volponi

  My voice was still echoing inside the stadium as the center snapped the ball. I took a quick two-step drop and spotted our slot receiver slanting across the middle. I planted my right foot into the ground. Then, my left arm, up around the ear hole of my helmet, whipped forward with the football. I could visualize a bull’s-eye on my receiver’s chest—and I fired the pass right on target.

  The cheers were almost deafening as our receiver streaked downfield for a forty-yard gain. They became the soundtrack to confidence building inside of me, beating back every last doubt.

  There were more than fifty plays on a five-inch-long wristband attached to my right forearm. Pisano would send in the call. Then I’d find its number on the band and give the play to our offense.

  I broke the huddle with a loud clap of my hands. Ten other guys on offense were moving in rhythm to me. I handed the ball off to our fullback, who gained a few yards. But I stayed extremely conscious of the position of my legs, waist, and shoulders. A couple of plays later, using that exact same form, I turned to hand the ball off again. Only, this time, I pulled the ball out from our fullback’s stomach. It was a perfect play-fake, and Raider defense took the bait, with the safety cheating up. Standing calmly in the pocket, I rifled the ball downfield. It spiraled through the air without wavering an inch. My receiver hauled it in and raced into the end zone.

  We took a 7-to-0 lead, but that was just the start.

  I stood on the sideline with my helmet off, gazing into the stands. I was trying not to smile too wide or too often, wanting people to believe this was nothing out of the ordinary for me. I was talking to all of my teammates, and they were all talking back.

  After that, I connected on my next nine passes. I was dropping balls into every open window, no matter how small. The Santa Fe D couldn’t do a thing to stop it.

  Just being out there gave me the most incredible feeling, the reason I started playing quarterback to begin with. The same feeling had hit me when I was a little kid, tossing the ball around with Dad and Carter. But now I was sharing it with an entire stadium full of fans. I wanted to keep that feeling forever. I wanted to ride it through four years of high school, and maybe win a state championship, before cruising into Gainesville to quarterback the Gators.

  We crushed Santa Fe, 37–6.

  I prayed Coach G. would catch the highlights on the local sports report and that ESPN would give me a shout-out. Now I had a win to back up all the hype. My teammates were looking at me like I was their leader. And I’d erased any last doubts about who should be the Bobcats’ quarterback.

  Chapter 15

  The next day, Saturday, I arrived at Carter and Alex’s dorm room before noon. I couldn’t get enough football. I put off any homework I had just to be there early and hang around. The Gators were opening their season against Appalachian State that night. It was supposed to be a real cupcake game, with Gainesville favored by nearly four touchdowns.

  Alex was finishing a set of five hundred sit-ups, twisting his midsection to touch his elbows to the opposite knee and letting out an umph with each one.

  Carter sat at his desk, going back and forth between his playbook and a chapter in some reading for a political science class. I settled on the floor with my back up against Carter’s bed, playing Angry Birds on my brother’s laptop.

  “This game’s addictive,” I said, using a slingshot to launch another bird at those stupid pigs.

  Alex popped up off the floor and asked me to mute the volume.

  “I’m going to grab some shut-eye,” Alex said, stretching out on the other bed in the room. “Team meal’s at three-thirty. Wake me up fifteen minutes before that.”

  Then he buried his face beneath a pillow. The game wasn’t the same without the sound. So I started searching around the room for something else to do.

  “Help me study,” Carter said in a quiet voice. “You can quiz me on my notes.”

  “I don’t know anything about political science,” I told him. “I’m not even old enough to vote.”

  “I was talking about my playbook,” Carter said.

  “Really? You told me that was super-secret stuff. For Gators’ eyes only,” I said.

  “You’re a season closer now. But hey, if you don’t want to help . . .”

  “No, I’ll do it,” I said, taking the notes from his hand.

  For nearly an hour, we went through all the play calls, audibles, and check-downs at the line of scrimmage. Carter had them pretty much memorized, but I helped him on a few. At the very end, I started calling out audibles for him like I was changing the play at the line myself.

  Out of nowhere, Carter grinned wide and said, “Breakdown on the O-line.” Then he pounced from his chair and tackled me to the floor. “Quarterback sack!”

  That’s when Alex jumped out of his bed, hollering, “What’s with you clowns? I asked for quiet, right? Can’t sleep for nothing around here!”

  He stormed into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind him.

  Carter’s Take

  PEDs—that was the only way I could explain what I’d witnessed. But there was no way I could tell that to Travis, who seemed completely shook.

  Four or five times over the last few weeks, Alex had blown up over nothing. But this was more intense than any of the others—an absolute explosion.

  “Think we should apologize for the noise?” Travis asked me.

  “No, it’s probably best to let it go for now. He’s always uptight before a game and cranky when he wakes up,” I answered, staring at the closed bathroom door. “Why don’t you go down to the complex for a while? Let me talk to Alex alone. You know, roommate stuff.”

  “All right. I’ll look for Harkey,” Travis said, moving toward the door to the hall. “He wanted to talk to me anyway, about starting on some kind of supplement.”

  “You know what?” I said, hooking him around the shoulder. “Harkey’s always real busy on game days. Let’s talk to him about supplements some other time, together. Why don’t you see if the equipment manager needs help setting out the helmets. And don’t spit inside mine.”

  “Hey, thanks for the idea, bro,” Travis said, regaining a smile.

  After Travis left, I stood right outside the bathroom. I was worried that Alex could be doping at that moment. Then I came to my senses. I realized that no matter what, the Alex I knew would never do anything like that with my brother hanging around. Unless those PEDs had totally changed his thinking.

  I couldn’t just stand there forever, hoping to figure it out.

  “You okay?” I asked, gently knocking at the door.

  “No sleep and no privacy, huh?” Alex replied.

  From inside, I heard the squeak of a faucet being turned and the shower starting to run.

  Alex could make his own decisions. His body. His choice. If he was hurting anyone, it was himself.

  But as I hit the hallway to go after Travis, the questions I’d been dodging began echoing in my mind louder than ever: Who’s supplying Alex, and how’s he paying for it?

  Chapter 16

  The Gators’ game against Appalachian State didn’t go as planned. The Mountaineers held a 10-to-9 lead at halftime. I’d stood on the sideline for a while behind Coach Goddard. He got angrier and angrier over every mistake his team made. And by the end of the first half, he was breathing fire.

  “You know why they call it an upset?” raged Coach G. in the locker room, with the whole team gathered around him. “Because some glue-factory nag named Upset beat Man o’ War, the greatest racehorse of all time. That’s what these guys are, compared to you—mules. They couldn’t get scholarships to a real football school. They didn’t have the talent. But they’re beating you. They want to steal your dreams of a national title. You’re supposed to be the thoroughbreds here. Perform like it!”

  He slammed a marker against a dry-erase board and walked off. The assistant coaches for defense, special teams, and receivers pulled their players together in small groups to start making a
djustments. Alex had caught five first-half passes. He’d been the whole offense and the main reason the Gators were trailing by a single point, not more.

  Right before the Gators left the locker room, Alex spoke to the team.

  “Hear me, my brothers. This game of football’s my life. It’s where I’m going. It’s who I am. I know for lots of you it’s the same,” Alex said, holding his helmet in one hand and his mouthpiece in the other. “There’s no second-best in me. The true talent’s on our sideline, not theirs. I’m going to push twice as hard to get this done. Not for tonight, but for this entire season. I’ll prove that to you all, every practice, every game. All I want to know is, who’s with me?”

  Carter was the first one to shout, “Gators!”

  Then a hundred other voices, including mine, shouted it too.

  I was ready to put my head down and run through a brick wall after hearing Alex’s speech. And I didn’t even have a helmet.

  * * *

  Appalachian State didn’t disappear in the second half. They kept fighting hard and making plays. But the Gators’ size and strength started to wear the Mountaineers down in the fourth quarter.

  Late in the game, Carter leaped up, trying to snag a pass for a big first down and keep a drive alive. I never saw him get up so high, not even off a diving board in the Alachua Community Pool. At the height of his leap, a defender hit him in the thigh, sending Carter into a mid-air backflip. He crashed to the ground, clamping his fingers around the ball a split-second before it touched the turf.

  I clapped so hard for Carter that my palms stung.

  On the next play from scrimmage, Alex caught a short pass and made a Mountaineer miss a tackle. He burst into the open, dodging defenders like a deer cutting in and out of trees. That long gain by Alex set up the game-winning field goal. The Gators survived, 22–20. In the locker room, Coach G. gave Alex the game ball.

  “Remember what I pledged,” Alex told the team, taking the ball from Goddard’s hands. “All out. Twice as hard, every day. I won’t let you down. Just be sure that none of you let yourselves down.”

  * * *

  That night and most of the next day, Alex’s speech was on my mind. I wanted to be that kind of leader and work as hard as he did. Then, on Sunday night, with a couple of unfinished homework assignments spread out across my bed, I got down on the floor for a set of five hundred sit-ups.

  I could hear Alex’s speech ringing in my ears—football’s my life . . . no second-best in me . . . it’s who I am. The echo of his voice pushed me past the pain. It helped me outlast the tightening knots in my stomach muscles, all the way to five hundred.

  Those final ten sit-ups felt amazing. Despite the strain, knowing I was going to make it brought me nothing but joy.

  “Four ninety-seven. Four ninety-eight. Four ninety-nine. Five hundred.”

  I was sweating so much, I needed to change my shirt and towel off or I’d drip sweat all over my assignments. The endorphins pumping through my body had me feeling too good for homework. Instead, I phoned Damon, just to talk about football for a few minutes.

  “You played great on Friday. I know. I watched almost every down from our bench,” said Damon, who only got into the game on a few plays. “But there’s a question I’ve wanted to ask for a while.”

  “Go ahead,” I said.

  “Is football still fun for you? I mean the way it used to be, like when we were kids playing in the park?”

  It took me a couple of seconds to get my mind in gear before I could answer his question.

  “Yeah, I’m having fun. Who wouldn’t? Why would you even ask me something like that?”

  “Ever since they gave you the scholarship,” Damon said, “it looks more like work. Like football’s your job now.”

  I didn’t know what to say, but the buzz from those endorphins began to wear off.

  “Well, it’s not exactly easy. I’ve got something to live up to on every snap, every game. But it’s nothing I didn’t ask for. That’s the challenge of being quarterback. It’s all in my hands,” I said, and then changed the subject to how Damon was dealing with his role on the Bobcats.

  I could barely listen to him, though, filling up my end with an “I hear you” every now and then. Damon’s question wouldn’t leave me alone. When the conversation was over, I felt a little numb. The sensation started in the tips of my fingers, working its way down my arms to my core. But I convinced myself it was all because of the sit-ups.

  * * *

  Monday morning at school, my name seemed to have replaced the regular hallway chatter. I couldn’t turn my head around without hearing praise about the game I’d played Friday night.

  My haters, however many of them were left, kept their mouths shut.

  Walking between classes was like stepping through some incredible dream, until a guy on the Bobcats came up from behind me with his iPhone out.

  “Travis, you hear the news yet?” he asked.

  “No, what news?”

  “One of the Gators died at football practice this morning,” he said, showing me the Sentinel website.

  “What? How?” I asked, with my blood turning cold. The image of Carter’s face filled my mind. “Who? Who was it?”

  As I searched the text beneath the headline for a name, my teammate said, “Their receiver, the guy from Santa Fe High. Alex Moore.”

  My insides started shaking and wouldn’t stop. I couldn’t tell if I was about to puke or cry.

  The Gainesville Sentinel

  Section D/Sports – Columnists

  Fightin’ Gator Alex Moore Dies of Heart Failure

  Karen Wolfendale

  Alex Moore, a junior wide receiver for the Gainesville University football program, collapsed due to an apparent heart failure during drills at practice yesterday morning. Emergency medical technicians rushed Moore to North Florida Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead on arrival at 9:32 EST.

  Team doctors gave Moore a clean bill of health at the start of the season, following surgery to repair a torn ACL in his left knee earlier this year. This past Saturday, the receiver recorded eleven receptions and was instrumental in a hard-fought Gator victory, finishing the game without any apparent health issues.

  “It’s a stunning blow for our program and the university,” said Head Coach Elvis Goddard. “Alex Moore was an inspiration to everyone on this team. He was totally committed to fight back from his injury and to play to the very best of his God-given abilities. The only solace we have is that Alex spent his last minutes on this earth surrounded by his teammates—his football family, preparing for the game he loved. I’m sure that his spirit and memory will remain a vital part of this team.”

  ESPN football analysts had projected Moore as a late first-round or early second-round pick in next year’s NFL draft. Moore had no history of heart disease. He is survived by his mother, Dorothy Moore, of Alachua.

  According to published studies, approximately one out of every 200,000 athletes dies due to unexpected cardiac arrest each year. The event is usually precipitated by physical activity.

  “Alex was the hardest worker I ever knew,” said Carter Gardner, who was Moore’s roommate and the first to reach him on the practice field after he collapsed. “Alex was holding on with everything he had. I could see it in his eyes. He fought until his heart stopped beating. After the EMTs put Alex in the ambulance, we all held hands in a circle and got down on one knee to pray.”

  Funeral services for Alex Moore are scheduled for Friday at 10:00 a.m. at Calvary Baptist Church in Alachua.

  The Gators play their next game the following night at home against Furman University.

  Chapter 17

  The only funerals I’d been to before were for old people, like my two grandpas. But they’d both been sick for a long time first. This was different. Alex was an athlete. He was young and strong. Even though he wasn’t part of my real family, his death hit me ten times as hard.

  Alex’s wake was held on Thursday
afternoon and through the evening. Mom made me go to school on Thursday, because I was already going to miss classes Friday for the funeral. I went to Thursday practice too, preparing for our game the next night. I raced back home to take a five-minute shower. Then I wolfed down some leftover ravioli before jumping into the car with Mom. She got lost on the drive over to the funeral home. Part of me hoped we’d never get there. But eventually we did.

  “Hold still,” Mom said, retying my tie for the second time, after we finally found a parking space. “Walter Henry’s knots always look perfect. Maybe you could ask him to show you how he does it.”

  “Remember when I could wear those clip-on ties?”

  “Those were the easy days. You’re too grown-up for those now,” she said, getting out of the car and smoothing out her skirt.

  My legs shook as we walked through the front door of the funeral home. The place was packed with people. And in every direction I looked, somebody was crying.

  Coach G. and Harkey were standing outside the viewing room, having what looked like a private conversation in the corner. So I didn’t try to get their attention as Mom walked me past. Once we got inside, I saw Carter. He’d been there all day with his teammates, and his eyes were completely red.

  “I’m glad you’re here, Trav,” he said, putting an arm around my shoulder and pulling me in close. “I’ve been thinking about you a lot today.”

  “About me?” I asked. “Why?”

  “Because you’re a great brother,” he answered, squeezing me a little harder.

  I couldn’t remember the last time Carter said something like that.

  “I just can’t believe I’ll never see Alex flying down a football field again,” I said. “I’ll never forget that day he beat Galaxy in a race.”

  Carter nodded his head and started to choke up. That’s when he turned me loose, and walked off to be alone.

  Walter Henry had come to the wake too, sitting alone at the back of the room. He didn’t look anything like himself. His swagger was nonexistent. He wore dark glasses and was using a handkerchief to smother the tears running down his cheeks. I don’t think he even noticed me that night. I knew Walter and Alex were close. I had figured Walter would become Alex’s agent when he made it to the NFL. And now he looked completely broken up.