SoCalBronco
05-23-2005, 02:11 AM
A new pickup game
Broncos hopeful Duke uses hands-on training as he tries to switch from basketball to tight end
By Lee Rasizer, Rocky Mountain News
May 23, 2005
Linus never puts down his blanket. Simon Cowell is rarely seen without his black T-shirt. And U2 guitarist The Edge might as well have a stocking cap affixed permanently to his head. They are trademarks.
And for about a month after working out for NFL teams before the April draft, Wesley Duke established his own: toting a football.
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Nearly everywhere Duke went, the pigskin was clasped between his biceps and chest or surrounded by his huge hands. He even showed up recently at his college's graduation ceremony sporting dress slacks, snazzy shirt - and that ever-present ball.
The sight became familiar to anyone who knew him.
But it also was strangely foreign.
It had been six years since Duke picked up a football, much less held it for an extended period. A high school tight end, he had turned away from the sport, choosing basketball and becoming a rebounding, shot-blocking and defensive force as a power forward for Mercer University in Macon, Ga.
That is, when he wasn't dealing with knee injuries.
Three times, Duke suffered tears of the left anterior cruciate ligament. And each time he seemingly came back stronger. The Atlanta Hawks physician who performed Duke's final surgery and stopped the vicious cycle of problems in 2001 did research and found only two other players at the college or NBA level who had returned after three ACL procedures. Neither Danny Manning nor Brent Price, both future pros, had three on the same leg as Duke did.
So as strange sights go, carrying a ball to bible study in March paled in comparison with watching Duke at a slam-dunk contest before this year's Final Four, where he showed off his incredible leaping ability.
On one attempt at the St. Louis event, he bit down on a pen, flew over the rim, landed, then signed the ball. On another, he removed his shirt to unveil his sculpted body, rattled the rim with another thunderous two-handed dunk, then raced to grab the pompoms from a cheerleader under the basket before beginning a spirited celebratory dance routine.
Terrell Owens, eat your heart out.
Or Shannon Sharpe, for that matter.
A week ago, Duke walked into the Denver Broncos passing camp for the first time as an undrafted free agent. He fiddled with his pads while his new teammates donned theirs as if it were second nature. And as this raw, 6-foot-5, 225-pound prospective tight end began his uphill climb to earn a roster spot in the pros, he reached into his locker for a jersey, finding a surprise.
He had been given No. 84.
No pressure there.
"I've got a lot to live up to," Duke said. "But I'm going to work as hard as I can to get it done."
A 'smaller' Ben Wallace
A strong work ethic right now is about all the Broncos can count on as it pertains to Duke's future, as they attempt to unearth the AFC West's next hoops-star-turned-legit-NFL-tight end after Tony Gonzalez and Antonio Gates. Effort was the very foundation of his game as a basketball player and earned him a reputation as "the Ben Wallace of the Atlantic Sun Conference, but on a smaller scale," according to Mercer coach Mark Slonaker.
Given Duke's layoff and the hurdles he faces, his willingness to put in a day's work was a subject the Broncos addressed extensively with the Mercer staff before deciding to offer him a three-year contract. Slonaker told them about Duke's improvement from a subpar shooter and dribbler to proficiency in both. Duke accomplished that feat by staying late and coming in early.
"In high school, I don't think he was class president but he was vice president or one of the top officers," Slonaker said. "He was a captain here, a leader in his fraternity. He's willing to put the time in."
Yet it was the Duke family's unwillingness to expose him to the brutality of college football that landed him on the hardwood full time in the first place.
He played tight end at Meadowcreek High School in Norcross, Ga., where his size was tough to defend.
"The cornerbacks and safeties were real small, so it made it real easy for me. All I had to do is cut in front of them and catch the ball," Duke said.
But he couldn't shake his toughest defender: cousin Rufus Mayes, an eight-year tackle for the Cincinnati Bengals.
Mayes told Duke's mother football was too brutal and her son instead should concentrate on academics and basketball, a sport that he apparently considered less taxing.
It wasn't until the end of Duke's sophomore year at Mercer that he considered returning to football.
"I realized I wasn't growing anymore," Duke said. "And I felt I could put on weight and get stronger to play football faster than I could gain inches to play basketball."
Duke had the height and strength to play basketball.
"I've seen so many alley-oops where he's dunked on balls where the pass was (seemingly) too high and he's just jumping over people," said Justin Howard, a teammate for four of Duke's six years at Mercer. "Not only does he leap over you, but he's also stronger than you, so he's going to push you out of the way and dunk on you. And I've seen him dunk on 7-footers in the (Atlantic Coast Conference) and the Pac-10, so it's not like he's doing it on small guys. He doesn't back down."
A hit on video
Duke adopted the same mind-set after deciding to give football a try. While the idea was floating in his mind for several years, it became a firm goal after watching Gates star for the Chargers. "It made me say, 'OK, this is really possible.' "
He hired an agent this spring, and after the slam-dunk competition, several NFL teams - Tampa Bay, Jacksonville, Green Bay, Carolina and the New York Giants - worked him out. The video of that on-campus session was included along with the Final Four slam-dunk tape. It then reached Tim Brewster, who developed Gates and now serves as the Broncos tight ends coach.
Brewster and the Broncos dispatched area scout Dale Strahm to conduct a personal workout.
The team officially was intrigued.
Around that time Virgil Adams, Duke's hired representative, told him it was time to get serious about the sport.
"He was playing basketball every day, and I said, 'Basketball's a nice sport, but now you're a football player and you have to put the roundball down and pick up this oblong piece of leather because that's the one you're going to be catching from now on,' " Adams said. "It has to feel second nature to take hold of it. So you sleep with it. You wake up, you've got your football. You leave, you take the football with you. When he'd come by the office, he'd walk in the door and the football was in his hand."
In fact, the only time Adams remembered his client without the ball was when Duke and his girlfriend came over for dinner one night.
The football was in Duke's truck, however.
But even all that time spent trying to get used to holding the ball can't erase six seasons away from the football field.
Forget the terminology of the offense or reading defenses. Running crisp routes and catching are initial challenges for Duke.
"I told everybody honestly I wouldn't say he has great hands, but he has good hands," said Slonaker, who spent six years at the University of Georgia as an assistant basketball coach. "There are times he took his eyes off or didn't always catch clean."
Preparing for a challenge
Nonetheless, because of Brewster's history with Gates, a Pro Bowl player in 2004, Denver is hoping lightning will strike twice.
Brewster and the other Broncos assistant coaches currently are precluded from talking to the media. But some of Duke's new teammates envision a long road ahead for him.
"He's a good-looking athlete, but he's very far behind, unfortunately," Broncos tight end Jeb Putzier said. "He's got a good head on his shoulders and you can already tell he's going to work hard. But . . . he's got a ways to go to understand a lot real quick."
Even so, with Duke's leaping ability that sometimes had opposing coaches oohing and ahhing after monstrous dunks, Denver might be wise to simply mention a "fade" now and let it go at that.
Except there's one problem. "He might think that's a type of haircut," Putzier joked.
The fade was one of Sharpe's preferred 'dos in his illustrious career.
But forget looking like Sharpe in any sense right now. Duke already has gotten grief for being the first Denver player to inherit the number since Sharpe's retirement a year ago. His only other resemblance to Sharpe is his Georgia upbringing.
Duke just wants to be open-minded, work hard and take everything "one day at a time."
Duke's agent, Adams, although admitting he's probably "the Lone Ranger" on the subject, already is predicting a contribution this season from Duke, then future stardom.
The Broncos are more muted in their praise. Coach Mike Shanahan last week called the player's size, speed and athleticism "very apparent" but in the same breath mentioned Duke's "outside chance" to help the team.
Slonaker told scouts Duke will pass the eye test in terms of physique, though his lower body might need bulking up to handle blocking chores. It's up to the Broncos coaches to school his former player in the fundamentals. And if Denver is willing to spend a year with him and be patient, he thinks Duke has a chance.
"I think the kid can make it," Slonaker said. "He's just a gem of a human being, and anytime you're a coach of the Denver Broncos or the Mercer Bears, no matter what level you're on, you want guys that you know you can go to battle with. Wes is one of those kids you can always count on. And once they train him and, if he gets up to par where he can run routes, read things, all the things that are required of a tight end in the NFL, they'll want to go to war with him because they'll know they can count on that kid."
Duke's personal workout for the Broncos in March ended with him running a post route, with arenafootball2 quarterback Lionel Hayes throwing the ball. Duke dropped the pass. Instead of calling it a day, he came back to the line of scrimmage, intent on finishing on a high note.
He joins the Broncos with similar thoughts of working through the mistakes and eventually showing he can not only make a good catch, but become one himself.
"I'm going to make this happen," Duke said. "Deep down, I just know. I'm going to keep working and doing what I have to do inside and out to make this happen."
Broncos hopeful Duke uses hands-on training as he tries to switch from basketball to tight end
By Lee Rasizer, Rocky Mountain News
May 23, 2005
Linus never puts down his blanket. Simon Cowell is rarely seen without his black T-shirt. And U2 guitarist The Edge might as well have a stocking cap affixed permanently to his head. They are trademarks.
And for about a month after working out for NFL teams before the April draft, Wesley Duke established his own: toting a football.
Advertisement
Nearly everywhere Duke went, the pigskin was clasped between his biceps and chest or surrounded by his huge hands. He even showed up recently at his college's graduation ceremony sporting dress slacks, snazzy shirt - and that ever-present ball.
The sight became familiar to anyone who knew him.
But it also was strangely foreign.
It had been six years since Duke picked up a football, much less held it for an extended period. A high school tight end, he had turned away from the sport, choosing basketball and becoming a rebounding, shot-blocking and defensive force as a power forward for Mercer University in Macon, Ga.
That is, when he wasn't dealing with knee injuries.
Three times, Duke suffered tears of the left anterior cruciate ligament. And each time he seemingly came back stronger. The Atlanta Hawks physician who performed Duke's final surgery and stopped the vicious cycle of problems in 2001 did research and found only two other players at the college or NBA level who had returned after three ACL procedures. Neither Danny Manning nor Brent Price, both future pros, had three on the same leg as Duke did.
So as strange sights go, carrying a ball to bible study in March paled in comparison with watching Duke at a slam-dunk contest before this year's Final Four, where he showed off his incredible leaping ability.
On one attempt at the St. Louis event, he bit down on a pen, flew over the rim, landed, then signed the ball. On another, he removed his shirt to unveil his sculpted body, rattled the rim with another thunderous two-handed dunk, then raced to grab the pompoms from a cheerleader under the basket before beginning a spirited celebratory dance routine.
Terrell Owens, eat your heart out.
Or Shannon Sharpe, for that matter.
A week ago, Duke walked into the Denver Broncos passing camp for the first time as an undrafted free agent. He fiddled with his pads while his new teammates donned theirs as if it were second nature. And as this raw, 6-foot-5, 225-pound prospective tight end began his uphill climb to earn a roster spot in the pros, he reached into his locker for a jersey, finding a surprise.
He had been given No. 84.
No pressure there.
"I've got a lot to live up to," Duke said. "But I'm going to work as hard as I can to get it done."
A 'smaller' Ben Wallace
A strong work ethic right now is about all the Broncos can count on as it pertains to Duke's future, as they attempt to unearth the AFC West's next hoops-star-turned-legit-NFL-tight end after Tony Gonzalez and Antonio Gates. Effort was the very foundation of his game as a basketball player and earned him a reputation as "the Ben Wallace of the Atlantic Sun Conference, but on a smaller scale," according to Mercer coach Mark Slonaker.
Given Duke's layoff and the hurdles he faces, his willingness to put in a day's work was a subject the Broncos addressed extensively with the Mercer staff before deciding to offer him a three-year contract. Slonaker told them about Duke's improvement from a subpar shooter and dribbler to proficiency in both. Duke accomplished that feat by staying late and coming in early.
"In high school, I don't think he was class president but he was vice president or one of the top officers," Slonaker said. "He was a captain here, a leader in his fraternity. He's willing to put the time in."
Yet it was the Duke family's unwillingness to expose him to the brutality of college football that landed him on the hardwood full time in the first place.
He played tight end at Meadowcreek High School in Norcross, Ga., where his size was tough to defend.
"The cornerbacks and safeties were real small, so it made it real easy for me. All I had to do is cut in front of them and catch the ball," Duke said.
But he couldn't shake his toughest defender: cousin Rufus Mayes, an eight-year tackle for the Cincinnati Bengals.
Mayes told Duke's mother football was too brutal and her son instead should concentrate on academics and basketball, a sport that he apparently considered less taxing.
It wasn't until the end of Duke's sophomore year at Mercer that he considered returning to football.
"I realized I wasn't growing anymore," Duke said. "And I felt I could put on weight and get stronger to play football faster than I could gain inches to play basketball."
Duke had the height and strength to play basketball.
"I've seen so many alley-oops where he's dunked on balls where the pass was (seemingly) too high and he's just jumping over people," said Justin Howard, a teammate for four of Duke's six years at Mercer. "Not only does he leap over you, but he's also stronger than you, so he's going to push you out of the way and dunk on you. And I've seen him dunk on 7-footers in the (Atlantic Coast Conference) and the Pac-10, so it's not like he's doing it on small guys. He doesn't back down."
A hit on video
Duke adopted the same mind-set after deciding to give football a try. While the idea was floating in his mind for several years, it became a firm goal after watching Gates star for the Chargers. "It made me say, 'OK, this is really possible.' "
He hired an agent this spring, and after the slam-dunk competition, several NFL teams - Tampa Bay, Jacksonville, Green Bay, Carolina and the New York Giants - worked him out. The video of that on-campus session was included along with the Final Four slam-dunk tape. It then reached Tim Brewster, who developed Gates and now serves as the Broncos tight ends coach.
Brewster and the Broncos dispatched area scout Dale Strahm to conduct a personal workout.
The team officially was intrigued.
Around that time Virgil Adams, Duke's hired representative, told him it was time to get serious about the sport.
"He was playing basketball every day, and I said, 'Basketball's a nice sport, but now you're a football player and you have to put the roundball down and pick up this oblong piece of leather because that's the one you're going to be catching from now on,' " Adams said. "It has to feel second nature to take hold of it. So you sleep with it. You wake up, you've got your football. You leave, you take the football with you. When he'd come by the office, he'd walk in the door and the football was in his hand."
In fact, the only time Adams remembered his client without the ball was when Duke and his girlfriend came over for dinner one night.
The football was in Duke's truck, however.
But even all that time spent trying to get used to holding the ball can't erase six seasons away from the football field.
Forget the terminology of the offense or reading defenses. Running crisp routes and catching are initial challenges for Duke.
"I told everybody honestly I wouldn't say he has great hands, but he has good hands," said Slonaker, who spent six years at the University of Georgia as an assistant basketball coach. "There are times he took his eyes off or didn't always catch clean."
Preparing for a challenge
Nonetheless, because of Brewster's history with Gates, a Pro Bowl player in 2004, Denver is hoping lightning will strike twice.
Brewster and the other Broncos assistant coaches currently are precluded from talking to the media. But some of Duke's new teammates envision a long road ahead for him.
"He's a good-looking athlete, but he's very far behind, unfortunately," Broncos tight end Jeb Putzier said. "He's got a good head on his shoulders and you can already tell he's going to work hard. But . . . he's got a ways to go to understand a lot real quick."
Even so, with Duke's leaping ability that sometimes had opposing coaches oohing and ahhing after monstrous dunks, Denver might be wise to simply mention a "fade" now and let it go at that.
Except there's one problem. "He might think that's a type of haircut," Putzier joked.
The fade was one of Sharpe's preferred 'dos in his illustrious career.
But forget looking like Sharpe in any sense right now. Duke already has gotten grief for being the first Denver player to inherit the number since Sharpe's retirement a year ago. His only other resemblance to Sharpe is his Georgia upbringing.
Duke just wants to be open-minded, work hard and take everything "one day at a time."
Duke's agent, Adams, although admitting he's probably "the Lone Ranger" on the subject, already is predicting a contribution this season from Duke, then future stardom.
The Broncos are more muted in their praise. Coach Mike Shanahan last week called the player's size, speed and athleticism "very apparent" but in the same breath mentioned Duke's "outside chance" to help the team.
Slonaker told scouts Duke will pass the eye test in terms of physique, though his lower body might need bulking up to handle blocking chores. It's up to the Broncos coaches to school his former player in the fundamentals. And if Denver is willing to spend a year with him and be patient, he thinks Duke has a chance.
"I think the kid can make it," Slonaker said. "He's just a gem of a human being, and anytime you're a coach of the Denver Broncos or the Mercer Bears, no matter what level you're on, you want guys that you know you can go to battle with. Wes is one of those kids you can always count on. And once they train him and, if he gets up to par where he can run routes, read things, all the things that are required of a tight end in the NFL, they'll want to go to war with him because they'll know they can count on that kid."
Duke's personal workout for the Broncos in March ended with him running a post route, with arenafootball2 quarterback Lionel Hayes throwing the ball. Duke dropped the pass. Instead of calling it a day, he came back to the line of scrimmage, intent on finishing on a high note.
He joins the Broncos with similar thoughts of working through the mistakes and eventually showing he can not only make a good catch, but become one himself.
"I'm going to make this happen," Duke said. "Deep down, I just know. I'm going to keep working and doing what I have to do inside and out to make this happen."