What generally leads someone at a "non-football school" to stay for a fifth year because of football? Most people would respond with the "correct" response...something like "brotherhood" or "for the love of the game," but I have not lived my life according to any predetermined rulebook thus far, so why start now?
So why am I coming back? After back-to-back years of the same exact knee injury, why wouldn't I turn my back to the game which seems to keep pushing me away? In all honesty, it's because of what I know I can achieve in this game. Though I wouldn't call myself injury prone, I have found myself neck deep in a multitude of injuries which have forced me to miss time. Now that I think about it, I haven't actually played a full season in college thus far. Despite that, I have managed to achieve several accolades and even set myself up for a D3 All-American season - until that second knee injury which effectively cut out any postseason awards that I could have received. So I was forced to watch 2/3 of the season from the sidelines, knowing full well that our defense wouldn't have been in shambles had I been healthy. Call it cockiness, but I call it self-confidence...and the truth, but that's a different story altogether. So, again, why would I come back? I'm doing it because I want to show myself and everyone who has doubted me that I can be the most dominating player that anyone has ever seen. Regardless of the D3 tag, I have the tangibles, I have the intangibles, I have the work ethic, and, most importantly, I have the drive. I wasn't going to leave football on a sour note, watching from the sidelines. No, I need to take my career to its bitter end. I need to milk every last drop out of that Puget Sound Football udder. I'm a football player, no matter how frowned upon it may be at this "academic institution," and I am good at what I do. I will dominate from the first day of camp until the final whistle of the season, I will pursue football after the season, and I will prove hundreds, even thousands of people wrong along the way. I've been told since Junior High that I can't do certain things on the field, but I have always proven everyone wrong and done what they said was impossible.
From here on out, we leave the past in the past - I will discuss the present and the future instead of dwelling on the negatives of the past. So, if you're up for it, join me as I dive headfirst into my fifth year as a Logger football player.
