War Story Weds: Lone Star Law

02 Wednesday Jul 2014

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To illustrate our point about the importance of state registration for agents, I thought I’d make today’s WSW about a series of phone calls we got last spring.

We’re fortunate to work with plenty of new NFLPA contract advisors who reach out to us when they have questions. Around May or June of 2013, several panicked callers told us about registered letters they’d received from the office of the Secretary of State of Texas. Each recipient had (a) signed a player who finished his college football eligibility with a Texas school and (b) not registered as an athlete agent in Texas. They had been threatened with significant fines by the AG if they couldn’t prove registration, or if they couldn’t counter charges that they had signed a player from a Texas school.

In almost every case, it was a first- or second-year certified contract advisor who had had no intention of recruiting players from Texas schools. However, as happens every December/January, each had gotten inquiries from unsigned players who had sifted through the NFLPA’s published listing of certified agents and cold-called them. These callers, like so many would-be draft prospects hoping to earn the attention of NFL teams, saw signing with an agent as the best way to jump-start their pro football dreams. Rather than waiting to be courted by potential representatives, they were doing their own courting, and they wound up signed by agents trying to do them favors. These agents, who were acting altruistically, had no idea they were setting themselves up for a major fine.

Ultimately, probably a half-dozen agents called with similar stories. None had signed a draftee, and I think only one even signed a player who went to a rookie tryout camp (he ultimately signed briefly in Canada). Still, these agents were facing fines. What’s more, the way the statute is written, even if they had signed a player who had been out of college for several years, they were facing fines if it was the player’s first agent. In the eyes of the state, even if the young man had been out of college football for years, he was still an amateur until he signed an SRA (standard representation agreement).

So what’s the rest of the story? I referred all the agents who had called me to a sports attorney I know and he was able to smooth things out with the state.

There are two takeaways from this experience. One, understand that statutes are written most often by people who see athlete agents as threats, and don’t really understand the business. The people writing these laws don’t understand that the overwhelming majority of contract advisors get in the business to help young players, not to suck money out of them. Real enforcement of laws and investigation of the firms signing high-end players might make a difference in cleaning up the business, but ultimately, this doesn’t win anyone votes and may cost a state’s team its title hopes. So very little gets done.

Be that as it may, you have to make sure you know the laws in the states as you decide where to recruit. Especially in Texas. That’s the second takeaway. Fines are an added cost you don’t want to incur.

More on the costs of the business on Thursday.

The ABCs of being an NFL Agent (Pt. 2)

01 Tuesday Jul 2014

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On Tuesday, we dug in a bit on an overview of the job of NFL contract advisor. Today, we’ll talk a bit more about the finances of things, since they often come up when I talk to someone considering the business.

As we’ve already covered, your start-up costs, just for the purposes of registering with the NFLPA so you can take the exam, are about $5000, presuming you pass. Still, in a way, that’s just the start of expenses. Of course, there are a lot of variables that determine what your budget should be. The two biggest are recruiting and training.

Within recruiting, there are a couple of questions an agent has to ask himself. First, where will I recruit? If an agent seeks to recruit nationally — and I always encourage new contract advisors not to do this — he’s got lots of costs ahead. For example, to register in Texas, my home state, you’re looking at a $500 registration fee plus a $50,000 surety bond, which costs $1,000 and doesn’t translate to other states. More and more states are requiring such bonds on top of their registration fees. Texas is on the high end when it comes to costs, but still, there are plenty of states that have talented athletes (especially in the Southeast). If you want to do this legally and ethically, it will cost you. Let’s say you register in the 3-4 states closest to you. You’re probably looking at a couple thousand dollars, just to be safe.

Then there’s travel. If you participate in agent days at NCAA schools, you’ll spend a fair amount of time traveling to schools in the summer, and depending on where you live, each trip might represent a plane ride and a hotel stay (and maybe a rental car). As you move into the season, you may or may not have a lot of travel (depending on whether or not you want to attend games regularly), but as you move into November and December, you will most certainly be required to sit down at a kitchen table with parents and players to state your case. Depending on how many players you’re courting, that adds up, too. Let’s say you make it to the finals with five kids, and spend $500 per player, on average, on lodging and travel. That’s another $2500.

At this point, an agent is near spending $10,000, and he doesn’t even have a client on SRA yet. We’ll roll out the expenses of combine prep as we continue the discussion this week.

The ABCs of being an NFL agent

30 Monday Jun 2014

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In less than a month, about 250 men and women will arrive at the Four Seasons in Washington, D.C., to take the 2014 NFLPA agent exam. Since the business of being an agent seems to carry so much intrigue, I thought I’d shed a little light on the business this week. Let’s start with the registration process.

As of today, there are 814 registered NFLPA contract advisors. Step one for all of them was registering in January before taking the test the following July. Upon registration, your first fee ($2,500) is due. To register, you must have at least a postgraduate degree or seven years of experience negotiating contracts. Once the NFLPA approves your application, confirming that you have an advanced degree and that you don’t have any arrests, bankruptcies or other blips that might preclude registration, officials send a copy of the Collective Bargaining Agreement as well as other study materials.

Sometimes, it takes a while to get those source materials, especially if there’s anything that holds up the review process. If you’ve ever had any legal or financial trouble, the process could drag. I’ve heard of people not getting the go-ahead to take the exam until literally a week before the test is administered at the end of July. It can be very frustrating, especially if you aren’t an attorney or if you struggle with tests. Of course, that just adds to your costs, as buying flights just days before your departure can add hundreds of dollars to the cost.

Speaking of money, if you’re a person who’s really low on funds, consider waiting before you dive into the representation world. By the time you get the results of your exam, you will already be down $2,500, and no matter the results of your exam, it’s a good news/bad news proposition. If you didn’t pass, sorry! The NFLPA keeps your money and gives you another shot to take it next summer at no extra cost (besides the trip back to D.C. in July).

Then again, if you pass, congratulations! Now the NFLPA needs a $1,200 annual dues fee plus liability insurance of about $1,400, and even if you’re an attorney with your own liability insurance, you still need to buy this. Bottom line: to get fully certified and ready to roll as a contract advisor, you’re in about $5K (plus the cost of travel/hotel/food for the exam) before you fire your first shot, figuratively.

More bad news: you are forbidden from any form of recruiting until you pass the exam, and you won’t know your results until at least October. This means all other agents have attended agent days; gathered contact information; built relationships with prospects and their parents; and whittled down their recruiting lists for 3-4 months before you’re allowed to make your first call.

That’s enough to chew on for one day. We’ll be back with more Tuesday.

More on the roots of NFL scouts

27 Friday Jun 2014

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Today we thought we’d wrap up the week with a few more notes on NFL scouts, and where they come from.

  • One of my AFL friends, Scott Bailey with the Los Angeles Kiss, let me know that Colts GM Ryan Grigson was Director of Player Personnel for the AFL’s Buffalo Destroyers just 15 years ago (1999). So, that’s one more recent connection between arena football and high-level people in the game.
  • Though the UFL never turned out to be the pipeline to the pros its founders hoped it would be, the league did help a few budding personnel types hone their skills. Though the Redskins’ Bret Munsey is the only NFL scout who was also a scout for the UFL, Eagles area scout Trey Brown (UCLA) played in the UFL, while Jets scout Rick Courtright coached in the UFL and Rams scout Brian Shields was a personnel intern in the league.
  • One might expect that people in the scouting world got their jobs by playing or coaching at powerhouse college programs that send players to the NFL by the bucketful. Not true. For example, as of last fall, there were three NFL area scouts from Florida State, but also three from Heidelberg and North Carolina A&T; four from DePauw, UMass and Richmond; and even five from that powerhouse of powerhouses, Princeton!
  • If Miami (Ohio) is the ‘cradle of coaches,’ the University of Tennessee is the Cradle of Scouts. As of last fall, there were eight former Vols at the area or regional scout level in the NFL, including Jeremy Breit (Giants), Reggie Cobb (49ers), C.J. Leak (Bills), Mickey Marvin (Raiders), Raleigh McKenzie (Raiders), Kevin Simon (Cowboys), Jon Salge (Titans) and Mike Yowarsky (Titans). That doesn’t even count Raiders GM Reggie McKenzie or Raiders Director of Player Personnel Joey Clinkscales, also UT grads.
  • Being an area scout — the person who goes on the road 11 months out of the year and often lives out of hotels while driving thousands of miles annually — is, no surprise, a young man’s game. Out of 286 scouts from the Director of College Scouting level down to area scout, we found only one (Oakland’s Mickey Marvin) who’s been on the road, in his current position, since 1977. The only other man with similar tenure was former Vikings Director of College Scouting Scott Studwell, who retired this year.
  • Expanding on that, there are six road scouts who started in the 80s; 29 who’ve been on the road since the 90s; 151 who started between 2000-2009; and 98 who got their start in 2010 or later.
  • Youth served again: 198 of the 286 have been on the job for 10 years or less, indicating that (a) there’s a high burnout factor and (b) area scouts are often seen as disposable, especially when a team is looking to tighten its belt.

 

Volunteers

26 Thursday Jun 2014

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I wanted to take a minute today to talk about how important it is to volunteer in your quest for a career in football.

If you live in an NFL city, and you want to work in pro football, find a way to volunteer with your local team. If you have an FBS (or FCS, or good D2 or even D3) team in your city or town, go volunteer. Granted, volunteering for NFL teams may be a little harder, but usually if you poke around on a team’s website long enough you’ll find someone that will take you. As for colleges, summer camps have become a really big revenue stream for most coaching staffs, and if you’re willing to work for no pay, they can usually find something for you to do.

I’m always struck by how many people in awesome football jobs started off as volunteers, hung around, paid attention, showed their intelligence, and got hired. Dru Grigson started off as a volunteer scout with the Eagles in 2005, and 10 years later, he’s the Director of College Scouting for the Cardinals. Tom Ciskowski volunteered as a defensive coach with Butch Davis at Miami (Fla.) in 1985; in 2008, he was named Director of College and Pro Scouting for the Cowboys. Steven Price volunteered with the Panthers at the age of 16 and now he’s a scout with the Vikings.

Granted, some of them had an angle and had some assurances that if they put in work they’d get the first opening, but not all of them; Price started interning with the Panthers because his mother was a secretary there.

Can’t get an NFL team to even let you work for free? Have you tried the AFL route? Two Titans scouts, Jon Salge (Nashville Kats) and Brandon Taylor (Columbus Destroyers), were with AFL teams before landing a job in Tennessee. Bears scout Zach Truty was Director of Player Personnel with the Arizona Rattlers before coming to Chicago. Eagles scout Bret Munsey was Director of Player Personnel for the Orlando Predators before he latched on in Philly. Steelers area scout Mark Gorscak was the GM of Pittsburgh’s arena team in 1987 before moving over to the city’s NFL team.

I don’t know how many of these people got AFL positions by emailing resumes, knocking on doors or waiting in the parking lot to assail a top team executive. What’s more, there are lots of indoor teams of dubious nature that are not AFL teams, per se; they’re just teams trying to copy their model. Sometimes, these teams can be a little shaky and offer limited ability to provide reliable contacts.

Still, there are many routes into the game. We’ll discuss this at greater length tomorrow.

 

 

War Story Wednesday: NFL scouts edition

25 Wednesday Jun 2014

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Since it’s WSW, we thought we’d pass along a few stories about NFL scouts that we thought illustrated the inexact nature of the business.

I think there’s a perception that the evaluation process is very scientific, dry and unerring. Nothing could be further from the truth. No matter how many scouts a team has on staff, and no matter how long they’ve been evaluating personnel, there’s a human element to it, and people make mistakes. They always will.

One example of this is the Bears, who in 1991 drafted running back Darren Lewis out of Texas A&M in the sixth round (161 overall), though they didn’t mean to. In ’91, the combine was still in its early stages, but the league did perform drug tests on those they invited. Lewis failed his drug test, causing many teams to remove him from their boards. That includes the Bears. So how did they wind up drafting him? It turns out there were two running backs named Lewis in the 1991 NFL draft: Greg Lewis out of Washington in addition to the Aggies’ Lewis. According to reports, the Bears took the wrong Lewis off their board, then accidentally took the rusher struggling with off-field issues. Perhaps not surprisingly, the he lasted less than three seasons, getting cut by the Bears in 1993. As of last year, he was in jail after a series of petty crimes.

There are also a series of disagreements between scouts on teams that lead to players falling through the cracks. Longtime NFL scout Bill Groman illustrated this by telling this story at our first-ever seminar for parents of draft-eligible players in 2010.

“Dominic Rhodes was at Midwestern State, I think was the name of the school. . . Back then I was a national cross-check scout (for the Falcons), and I was in the Dallas area, up in that area, covering another school, and I thought I’d run into the school. Another guy had gone and seen him and given him a free agent grade. He was about 5-foot-8 and a half, 5-9, a short guy, and about 205 pounds, but I saw him run real fast, and I like speed, you know, and athletic ability, and I saw he had some stats, and he could really (play).

“I went and looked at film and tape on him, and then I stayed over on Saturday and went to the game. Shoot, the game I was at, I think he was at 200-some yards rushing, and did all kinds of stuff, so I wrote him up to be like a third- or fourth-round pick and make somebody’s team. The other (scout), I know what he was looking at was the fact that this was a Division II school, he doesn’t play against the great big guys, but I think offensive linemen, defensive linemen, from those schools, yeah, they aren’t playing against the big guys, but when you’re a skilled athlete, a receiver, a defensive back, a running back, I don’t care who you’re playing with. If you can do it, you can do it. He just stood out so much, and what ended up happening was, I was at Atlanta at the time and Dan Reeves was our coach, and so what happened is, I wrote him up good, and this other guy had just given him a free-agent grade, and for some reason or other, our Director of Player Personnel at the time put him as a free agent, and we didn’t talk about them, so we didn’t talk about him in our meetings, so Dan didn’t know anything about him.

“Well, he gets drafted late by the Indianapolis Colts (Rhodes was actually signed as an undrafted free agent after the ’01 draft), and doesn’t play, like, the first 5-6 games, and then they come and play at Atlanta, and the starting running back (Edgerrin James) gets hurt. Dominic starts the game and gets like 170-some yards rushing (Rhodes ran for 177 yards on 29 carries with two TDs in a 41-27 Colts win), and I get a telephone call Monday from Dan, and he said something about, well, this guy runs so well, and you know, I said just go look at my grade, which he did.”

For more stories from Bill, check out our video archive at Inside the League.

For another story discussing how players fall through the cracks, check out this interview I did with former Cowboys scout Jim Hess. In this YouTube clip (the interview starts at :34), Jim discusses how he, along with then-Cowboys quarterbacks coach Sean Payton, came to like an Eastern Illinois passer named Tony Romo. From obscurity, Hess and Payton came to champion Romo, so much so that he turned down a more lucrative UFA offer from Denver to sign with the Cowboys after the ’03 draft.

 

Thoughts from a rare rookie year

24 Tuesday Jun 2014

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John Thornton got certified last fall, and by any measure, it’s been a great rookie season. In his first season, he negotiated a big veteran free agent deal (new Bucs DE Michael Johnson got $43.5 million over five years) and had a player drafted (the Seahawks took Marshall OT Garrett Scott at 6/199) despite being independent. Though he credits Chicago-based Rick Smith of Priority Sports as being a huge help and a big influence, he has no specific affiliation with Priority or any other firm.

Also making him unique: he’s one of only a handful of contract advisors who also played in the league; he was a 10-year veteran with the Titans and Bengals after being drafted by Tennessee in the second round in 1999. As such he’s got some unique takes on the football business after his first year certified by the NFLPA. In fact, he had too many thoughts to fit into Monday’s newsletter, so we thought we’d pass along some of what we couldn’t use in today’s post.

On the draft, and the expectations of draft prospects: “I think the rookie side of the business has gone out of whack on how they train and agents are told where (players are) going to go. I would say that’s the craziest part of this thing. You almost don’t want to deal with a rookie, and if you have a first-rounder you spend a lot to get them and to train them. It’s almost better to find a guy that you know is a good football player and have a great relationship with. Who cares if you have a first rounder if you overspent on him? I’d rather have a fourth- or fifth-rounder that you didn’t spend as much on but have a great relationship on. On the rookie side, so much is done for egos. Being (an ex-player, you know) it doesn’t matter where you’re training at and (you know) a guy can train at school, like Garrett did, and had better numbers than probably 95 percent of the guys at the combine. You got to send them here and there, and that’s part of the game. You know a lot of that is BS, but everybody’s doing it.”

On protecting a client while also managing expectations: “You gotta really keep your circle tight on who you do business with. Most people say they can do things and they can’t, and they’re usually marketing people or financial people. One thing that (Arizona State Director of Athletics and former NFL Executive V.P. of Football Operations) Ray Anderson told me is to stick to your principles in this business, and if I don’t know someone, I don’t do business with them. Everybody’s not in this business for the same thing. If you’re going to do business with someone, make sure they’re the same as you, business-wise. If you don’t do business with people you trust, nine times out of 10 they’re going to try to stab you in the back. Everybody says they have a deal for you, but they don’t always have it on paper. All they really want to do is to have a player’s name so they can go shop it around. Good players get great deals, but if you’re not a good player, you won’t get a good deal on or off the field. Nobody’s giving a bad player anything. There’s no marketing deal and no second contract to talk about. Football is football, and (Broncos QB) Peyton Manning is getting deals off the field because he’s a great player. That’s the thing I learned.”

On transitioning from player to agent: “When I played, I was always the type of player that coaches would say, ‘do what he does, follow him,’ and I became a big brother to guys like Robaire Smith and Albert Haynesworth at Tennessee. I was (head coach) Marvin Lewis’ first free agent at Cincinnati, and I tried to help change the perception of the team. Rather than being a dominant player, I did the right thing to prolong my career, and in doing that I became a big brother to players. I also had four agents (during my career), and I was always changing. There was Ray Anderson, Ralph Cindrich, Harold Lewis and David Dunn, and I learned a lot from them in what they do best and what they don’t do so well. Then, I helped Frostee Rucker during his pre-draft process, and while I was helping him, the Lions wanted me to come play because (then-head coach) Jim Schwartz had been my defensive coordinator at Tennessee, so I agreed to it, but two days later, I backed out, and I just said, I have something I want to do. I had made enough money to not have to struggle, and I had this itch to be a manger and be a professional and help guys off the field. I told the agents I would handle my side if you handle your side, and I wasn’t a runner. I was really helping the players through the agent process, and then I was coming out of my pocket as well, so that’s why I was given the opportunity to be a player with really good agents. As far as wanting to be an agent, that was the next step for me as player, mentor, manager, and then being an agent.”

Obstacles

23 Monday Jun 2014

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Lots of people dream of being a sports agent. I get to work with the ones who actually go through with the necessary steps to make that dream a reality, and it’s very rewarding when it works out. But sometimes it doesn’t, and there are some very good reasons for that. Here are two.

1. In the interests of full disclosure, Rand Getlin of Yahoo! Sports is a good friend, and even spoke at our last symposium at the 2014 NFL combine. He occasionally cites me on his Twitter feed or posts stuff that I have on ITL. On Friday, he commented on the University of Texas’ cancellation of its agent day, and what followed was this interplay with one of his followers. Now, I understand that Twitter is where snark reigns, and I know that in today’s post-modern society, everyone’s opinion is to be given equal weight, no matter how without merit. Still, Stosberg’s retort really makes me angry because he clearly has no understanding of the agent process and sees only one side of the argument. Which is really convenient.

Yes, I understand that agents make easy scapegoats.

Yes, I understand that the common perception is that all sports agents are sleeping on piles of money, washing their hair with money, drying themselves off with money after working out, etc., but the vast majority of contract advisors are taking great financial risks on long shot players with no prospect of recovering these fees.

Yes, I recognize that sports masses only know of agents what they see in TV or read online. I realize that there’s even a fair amount of jealousy on the part of some sports fans who wish they had the opportunity to play in the NFL.

Still, isn’t it worth considering that these players have a right to make informed decisions about the people in whose hands they’ll be putting their NFL dreams? Is that unfair? Which leads me to my second item.

2. Check out this story that was in the Texas Tribune (and NYT online) on Sunday, and not just because I’m quoted in it. I think the ‘wow’ moment comes when Drew Pittman, a long-established agent with Domann & Pittman (and yes, Drew and I are also good friends) talks about the money he’s spent with the state just staying certified. Even at that, if he wants to stay in good graces, he’ll stay in his lane and not complain when the University of Texas bars him from speaking to any of its players until the entire regular season has been completed. And he shouldn’t expect the state to go out and bring down the few dirty guys out there. He just needs to stay in his corner, and keep his mouth shut until at least the end of November, with no other contact, and hope he can get lucky based on one quick meeting.

Is that how most multi-million dollar business deals are consummated?

Is that how any multi-million dollar business deals are consummated?

The narrative says that your run-of-the-mill agent is so corrupt that you can’t take any chances. You just have to bar them completely from even speaking to players to preserve these players’ pristine, blameless, innocent amateur status. That’s sad. Still, is it so absurd to suggest that if you’re in the education business, and you care about your players (even after they leave college), you might be interested in educating them? Maybe it is absurd, because most schools hold to this kind of policy. There are very few schools with progressive policies that give players the tools to know what to look for and what to stay away from. That’s a real shame.

These are two examples of what NFL agents have to deal with. The issues look simple, but they’re not. If you’re seeking to work with NFL hopefuls one day, keep this in mind.

Dollars and cents

20 Friday Jun 2014

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If you’ve been reading us for our first week-plus in existence, you know we’re here to help people fight their way into the football business and climb the ladder against all odds. We’ve focused mainly on three areas: NFL scouts, NFL agents and high school football coaches, especially in Texas. Though all three have had popular modern movies made about them (Draft Day, Jerry Maguire and Friday Night Lights), some are a little more glorious than others.

Today I wanted to take a quick look at two career paths, scouts and prep coaches, at least in Texas.

Used to, entry-level scouts were called ’20-20 guys.’ That’s because they were hired in their early 20s and were making around $20,000-$25,000, at least in their first year or so. Based on texts from a handful of scouts this morning, new scouts are making in the $40,000-$50,000 range now. That’s about double the old days. The downside is that it’s a very volatile business, and changes at the GM level, and sometimes at the head coach spot, can mean you’re out and on the street. What’s more, it’s not always easy to find another job.

High school football coaches, at least in the Lone Star State, are probably starting off in the $50,000 range, too. That’s because entry-level teachers make around $40,000 in better school districts, and by the time you factor in the stipends involved with coaching a couple sports (football isn’t the only sport for most coaches), you’re in that $50K range. The big difference is that if your head coach gets reassigned, you’ve still got a job. The other big plus is that you’re not on the road 11 months out of the year, as a scout is. Of course, if you’re young and single, maybe that’s not such a big deal, but if you’re more focused on starting a family, coaching is pretty attractive.

We’ll continue to discuss various football careers next week. Happy weekend.

Dedication

19 Thursday Jun 2014

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On Tuesday, as I’ve mentioned in this space previously, I spoke at a football clinic in West Texas (San Angelo, to be exact). The clinic, which brings in hundreds of high school coaches from across the state of Texas and much farther away, is an annual fixture on the calendar for prep coaches in the Lone Star State. While there, I was struck by a couple things there that really espouse the focus, dedication and single-minded effort that you see in people who are trying to accomplish a goal, in this case, climbing the high school football mountain.

The first example involves me. I was scheduled to speak twice about resumes and interviews, once on Tuesday and once on Wednesday, 90 minutes each. As it happened, I was slated to speak in a small room well off the main floor from 5-6:30 p.m. Also speaking at 5 p.m. was former NFL head coach Wade Phillips (one of the clinic’s co-owners), who was scheduled to discuss the finer points of defensive line play. His talks are always one of the high points of the clinic, and it showed, as he was given a two-hour time block.

Then, at 5:15 p.m., perhaps the most talked-about man in Texas football today, new Texas head coach Charlie Strong, was taking the dais for 20 minutes. So if you were a wide-eyed coach looking to learn as much as you could sometime in the late afternoon around 5 p.m. on Tuesday, your choices were a former NFL coach with three of the state’s teams (Texans, Cowboys and Oilers), the new head coach at the state’s biggest and most storied football school, and . . . me.

I should mention that you also had the option of hearing me speak — on the same topic — on Wednesday at noon.

Given all these circumstances, I was pleasantly surprised that we had 11 attendees. At least one is a current head coach in South Texas. Another, Deer Park assistant coach Nolan Patterson, is a longtime friend and a hot name in coaching circles who’s made it to the finals for several coaching jobs so far but not quite gotten his first top post. There were several more, and I hope they all get to the summit. They certainly are willing to pay a price for the chance to improve themselves.

The second example involves a coach named Paul Banks. I was fortunate enough to be invited to a dinner Tuesday night that was a sort of reunion for former Oilers players, coaches and training staff. Oilers greats Dan Pastorini and Carl Mauck were there along with several coaches. Paul was also there as a guest. At one point, John Paul Young, whom I’ve mentioned previously in this space, asked him to stand up and raise his hand. Paul’s a coach in Memphis, Tenn., and on his finger was a state championship ring for a title his team won last year. Here’s the story of Paul and his devotion to Angelo Clinic.

Now, Paul didn’t win a state championship because he’s been coming to Angelo Clinic for almost 20 years, and he didn’t win it because he used to take a Greyhound bus to the clinic, by himself, every year. It’s also not because he chose to honeymoon in San Angelo when his wedding day conflicted with the clinic schedule. But it didn’t hurt. And here’s my point. You’re going to have to take some chances on the road to success, especially in football. It might be missing the opportunity to hear two coaching titans speak on the off chance you’ll hear something that will help you get a job. It might be riding long hours across the country, knowing you could learn some coaching tips you can apply to your own team. There will be no guarantees.

I know I’m not passing along any secrets here, but I’ve always found it helpful to see the kinds of sacrifices others make, especially when, in Paul’s case, they pay off.

I encourage you to keep believing, keep working, keep taking risks and keep doing what it takes to make your dream come true.