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Competition awakens the animal from its sleep. Jesus rose from the dead; he refused to accept defeat. I grew up on the sandlots and playgrounds. We moved with the seasons. No matter the numbers, we could split ourselves into teams and play football, basketball and baseball.

Basketball was the easiest. Some of the greatest confrontations were one-on-one showdowns. It soon got around whether or not you could play ball. One-on-one was difficult in football and baseball, but two-against-two sufficed.

In football we created narrow but long fields that demanded all of one's running, passing and tackling abilities.

In baseball we had a variety of two-against-two games that included fast pitch against a wall, but our favorite required the batter to hit the ball out of the infield on a fly for a single. The teammates pitched to each other. On the opposing team one player played a deep short while the other played left field.

All fouls and balls hit to the right side of second base were outs. Each team had six outs per inning. A ball that rolled to the fence was a double, off the fence a triple and over the fence a homer. It was nothing but hitting and fielding. We played this game for hours.

There were dozens of kids milling around school yards and play grounds waiting for someone to organize games. These were neighborhood gatherings and there was a understanding that a sufficient number of participants would arrive by a certain time.

After school, on weekends and during vacations dads would be returning home from work and honk to their boys locked in their life-and-death struggles that were highlighted by harsh words and blows. One thinks of the many great athletes who as poor and working-class kids learned their craft without organized instruction.

There was Little League, but my father didn't allow me to join until I was eleven. According to him, Little League had never produced one major league player. He had his beliefs. This was in the late fifties and early sixties. I don't know if there was any truth to his assertion, but he relented. To his credit, his belief proved true in my case.

One made his mark in high school sports. There was no specialization. You played the big three. None of my friends picked up a golf club or a tennis racket. Peer pressure was too strong. Golf and tennis weren't masculine sports. Dad was 6'2'' but barely 150 pounds. He played the big three and carried a knee injury for the rest of his life from football.

I was 5'4" and weighed 105 pounds when I entered Modesto High as a freshman. By Texas standards, Modesto High was a 6A school. It was also the school that 90% of the city's blacks attended. By the time I finished high school, I measured 5'10'' and weighed 175 pounds. I had earned a fair athletic reputation for myself. I started at wide receiver and strong safety, could pop twenty-foot jumpers as the number two guard and covered third and batted second.

I blossomed my senior year. The Panthers went 5-5, but I had an outstanding season: I caught 12 touchdown passes and ran back a kickoff and a punt for scores. I was the only athlete in the district selected first team on both the offensive and defensive sides of the ball.

Several of my friends received full-rides to Pac Eight schools, but the USCs and UCLAs overlooked me. They didn't feel I had the size to compete at their level even though my 40-times were as fast as anyone. I notched a 4.46 at a recruitment camp. After my performance in agility drills, the Sacramento State Hornets offered me a partial scholarship. I was content with the deal. I had family in Sacramento and Modesto was 75 miles away.

I started at corner my first two seasons and I returned a punt for a TD my sophomore year, but I felt the coaches weren't realizing my full potential. Though some of the receivers were taller than me, I was faster and had better hands than any of them. I wanted to score touchdowns and that wasn't going to happen as a defensive and special teams player.

At the end of my sophomore season the wide-receiver corps was depleted by graduations. I went to Head Coach Ray Clemons and pleaded my case. He had been the Hornets head coach for more than a decade and he spoke the final word. He was a gruff individual who never showed much emotion even when we scored, but he treated everyone the same and based his decisions on our performances. He never showed any favoritism.

He agreed to give me an opportunity. By the end of the spring practice drills, I had established myself as the prime receiver. I didn't grow in height, but I added 15 pounds as I hit the weights every day. I didn't lose any speed either.

In 1972 we opened the season against Pacific. I caught two TD passes and returned the season-opening kickoff for a touchdown. I had convinced Coach Clemons that I didn't want to go both ways and he agreed. I wanted to be in peak form whenever the offense took the field. 

After so-so games against Nevada and Cal Poly at Pomona, I exploded against a weak St. Mary's eleven. I snagged three TD passes and took another kickoff back for the distance. On the last TD catch I sprained my ankle. Coach Clemons kept me out of the Cal State Fullerton game. He wanted me fresh for the Far Western Conference opener against Humboldt State. 

In our next three league contests against Humboldt State, UC Davis and San Francisco State, I went on a spree and chalked up six more touchdown catches as well as returning a punt for six. In the fourth quarter of the SF State game, I pulled a hamstring and didn't suit up for our final two games against Cal State Hayward and Chico State.

My last year Sacramento recruited Babe Boxer from a hick town in Idaho. He was a freshman sensation and he would have been a NFL quarterback, but he committed suicide his senior year after he was accused of raping a co-ed. Regardless of his weaknesses, he could throw a football. He had pinpoint accuracy, he fired a bullet and he could loft a ball 60 yards. And I was on the receiving end of his brilliance.

It was reflected in my stats that benefitted from an injury free season. I caught 18 touchdowns. I returned two punts and one kickoff for touchdowns. Babe was the hand and I was the glove as we gained fame in the press as one of the top passing-and-receiving combinations in the state. As for my old high school buddies, most of them spent their college careers sitting on the bench.

I loved football and I wasn't ready to stop playing. Nothing gave me greater pleasure and I was a gym rat who could out-work anyone and welcomed every second of pain as I pushed myself to my physical limits. I was still 5'10", but I now displayed 200 pounds of solid muscle and I ran a 4.4. If the NFL had implemented slot receivers into their offenses like Julian Edelman and Wes Welker in modern times, I might have lined-up at the highest levels, but there wasn't an opportunity for this type of player during that era. Quarterbacks wanted to throw 40-yard passes to fast, tall ends.

I wasn't about to surrender. I investigated the Canadian Football League. I contacted the league headquarters in Toronto and received a call the next day from the Saskatchewan Roughriders. The management gave me an address in Regina, Saskatchewan. "I hear you're headed to Vagina, Canada," potato-couch pals would ride me, but I went. 

Those were two of the most fulfilling years of my life. The people were wonderful and it's a wilder style of football that requires more passing since there are only three downs. I started, led the league in receiving yards my second year, but I suffered both ACL and MCL tears on a simple cut during spring drills my third season. Unlike today with all the medical advances, a player can recover, but a double tear in those days was the death knell.

I had reached a fork in the road. I finished my degree majors in English and Spanish literature. Fate deposited me in Brownsville. My two oldest boys were basketball players, but Mick has followed in the old man's footsteps. He bleeds football. He has a Marine mentality. He loves the feeling of getting smacked after he has snagged a pass between two defenders. He shone as a receiver last year as a freshman at Veterans Memorial and he is a projected starter as a sophomore on the varsity team. When I watch him on the sward giving a 100%, I'm filled with the same ecstasy that took me to a transcendent place.