thedrifter
01-23-06, 01:27 PM
January 22, 2006
Broncos' Anderson Has Been Banging the Drum Loudly
By JOHN BRANCH
DENVER, Jan. 21 - Sometimes, all it takes is a steady beat to take Mike Anderson back. A marching band may take the field before the game or at halftime. Music fills the air. And Anderson's belly fills with the boom-boom-boom of the drum section, and his heart with the rat-a-tat-tat.
"I'm planning on getting a drum set," Anderson, a Broncos running back, said somewhat wistfully. "It's a lot of noise, a lot of ruckus. I don't think my family will put up with that. But the place we're moving to, I'm going to have my own set and get back to playing."
There are other reminders, too, of the life he used to lead, the part without football and fame but still filled with adrenaline and satisfaction.
On the shelf of his locker is a black trucker-style cap with a mesh back and a patch on the front. A glance takes him back to boot camp, to Camp Pendleton, to nighttime patrols in Somalia. "Once a Marine, always a Marine," the patch reads.
Once a reluctant football player, now the unlikeliest of stars, Anderson has further reminders everywhere. The lockers near his once belonged to other running backs who have come and gone. He outlasted them all. Now the lockers belong to those who hoped to take his job.
Not yet. Anderson was late getting here. He is in no hurry to leave.
"I'm dreaming," Anderson said. "Don't wake me up yet."
His story is out of the ordinary in several ways, but in no way more than this: He never envisioned a football career. He never imagined a place as impossible as here.
Football dreamers do not play drums in the high school marching band. They do not join the Marines. They do not play organized football in Pop Warner, then give the game up until they are 21. They do not go from flag football on a military base to rookie of the year in the N.F.L. They do not gain 1,487 yards as rookie running backs, then 1,321 over the next three seasons, then sit out a year with an injury and emerge, at 32, with the expectations of carrying a team to a championship.
No, Anderson is not a football dreamer. He is a humble and grounded man, and his imagination is not that vivid.
"I try not to get too high, I try not to get too low, but at the same time, I understand the path it took to get to the league and to still be in the league," Anderson said. "And to have the success I had the first year, and then have that gap, and have success again this year, it's kind of unbelievable."
As a boy, his primary diversion was music. He played in the high school marching band in Fairfield, S.C. No one knew that the teenager banging away on the drum strapped over his shoulders at halftime would become an N.F.L. star.
"I loved it," said Anderson, his deep whisper of a voice growing more animated. "Now, when we come out there and they have a drum section playing, I still get hyped off that - to see those guys playing, out there jamming and having fun, in rhythm with each other, bonding off one another. If you've never played, you can't understand it. But it's a great feeling."
Anderson and his family could not afford college. So he joined the Marines, signed up for four years. At worst, he would earn money for college. At best, he would forge a military career.
He played some flag football. Friends saw the way he ran and said he should join them on one of the full-contact teams at Camp Pendleton, near San Diego.
"I told my buddies, yeah, I'm coming," Anderson said. "But I never showed up. It took a coach, higher ranked than me. He came to me in the mess hall one day and just told me I was coming out to practice. And I said, 'Well, O.K.' "
Two years later, Anderson had a ticket to a college education. He was at Mount San Jacinto Community College in California, a junior-college powerhouse, on his way to becoming a two-time all-American. He was signed by Utah and became a two-time all-conference player.
The Broncos, in 2000, drafted him in the sixth round. He had been out of high school for eight years. Coaches loved his maturity and his discipline, and Anderson made the final roster. When running backs Terrell Davis and Olandis Gary went down with injuries, the Broncos handed Anderson the ball.
At 27, older than 29 of his teammates, he was the N.F.L.'s offensive rookie of the year in 2000. The Pro Football Hall of Fame took his jersey for safekeeping after he ran for a rookie-record 251 yards against the Saints in New Orleans.
"I was thinking, 'Wow, I made it - and not just made it, I'm playing.' " Anderson said of his rookie season, his tone still tinged with disbelief. "I was learning on the go, I was learning from one week to the next. But the team had so much confidence and faith in me that they kept putting me out there. They kept letting me play."
Not for long. It would take five years before the Broncos viewed him again as their best alternative at halfback.
First, Davis tried one more time to come back from injury. Then Clinton Portis was drafted, and Anderson was shifted to fullback. He moved back two years later, but the Broncos drafted Tatum Bell in the second round.
In between, in 2003, Anderson tested positive for marijuana and was suspended for four games for violating the league's substance-abuse policy.
"It was a low point, probably the lowest point of my career," he said. "I just feel like, it did happen, it was a dumb mistake, dumb on my part just being involved around that and in that. But it was something to learn from."
This, remarkably, is how he views every decision and everything that has happened to him - without regret. He would not give up the drums for football. He would not give up the Marines to start an N.F.L. career four years earlier. He would not even change 2004, when a preseason groin injury wiped out his season.
"I was able to think and collect my thoughts and look back and reflect," Anderson said, who is married with three children. "I was like, 'Man, I want to get back out there. I'm not ready to go yet.' "
He finally won the starting job this season. When he gained 1,014 yards, he became the first N.F.L. player to have four years between 1,000-yard seasons for the same team.
"This weekend is the biggest game of my career," he said. "It's so gratifying to be a part of all this."
As he has done since childhood, he will march down the field in fits and starts, this time wearing a helmet instead of a funny fuzzy hat, carrying a football instead of a drum.
But Anderson will be reminded of where he has been. If there is no real marching band, his fellow running backs will do as they usually do to help Anderson relax: They will walk around before the game pretending to play the drums.
That kind of reminder will have to do for now, at least until Anderson can buy that drum set he has always wanted.
Ellie
Broncos' Anderson Has Been Banging the Drum Loudly
By JOHN BRANCH
DENVER, Jan. 21 - Sometimes, all it takes is a steady beat to take Mike Anderson back. A marching band may take the field before the game or at halftime. Music fills the air. And Anderson's belly fills with the boom-boom-boom of the drum section, and his heart with the rat-a-tat-tat.
"I'm planning on getting a drum set," Anderson, a Broncos running back, said somewhat wistfully. "It's a lot of noise, a lot of ruckus. I don't think my family will put up with that. But the place we're moving to, I'm going to have my own set and get back to playing."
There are other reminders, too, of the life he used to lead, the part without football and fame but still filled with adrenaline and satisfaction.
On the shelf of his locker is a black trucker-style cap with a mesh back and a patch on the front. A glance takes him back to boot camp, to Camp Pendleton, to nighttime patrols in Somalia. "Once a Marine, always a Marine," the patch reads.
Once a reluctant football player, now the unlikeliest of stars, Anderson has further reminders everywhere. The lockers near his once belonged to other running backs who have come and gone. He outlasted them all. Now the lockers belong to those who hoped to take his job.
Not yet. Anderson was late getting here. He is in no hurry to leave.
"I'm dreaming," Anderson said. "Don't wake me up yet."
His story is out of the ordinary in several ways, but in no way more than this: He never envisioned a football career. He never imagined a place as impossible as here.
Football dreamers do not play drums in the high school marching band. They do not join the Marines. They do not play organized football in Pop Warner, then give the game up until they are 21. They do not go from flag football on a military base to rookie of the year in the N.F.L. They do not gain 1,487 yards as rookie running backs, then 1,321 over the next three seasons, then sit out a year with an injury and emerge, at 32, with the expectations of carrying a team to a championship.
No, Anderson is not a football dreamer. He is a humble and grounded man, and his imagination is not that vivid.
"I try not to get too high, I try not to get too low, but at the same time, I understand the path it took to get to the league and to still be in the league," Anderson said. "And to have the success I had the first year, and then have that gap, and have success again this year, it's kind of unbelievable."
As a boy, his primary diversion was music. He played in the high school marching band in Fairfield, S.C. No one knew that the teenager banging away on the drum strapped over his shoulders at halftime would become an N.F.L. star.
"I loved it," said Anderson, his deep whisper of a voice growing more animated. "Now, when we come out there and they have a drum section playing, I still get hyped off that - to see those guys playing, out there jamming and having fun, in rhythm with each other, bonding off one another. If you've never played, you can't understand it. But it's a great feeling."
Anderson and his family could not afford college. So he joined the Marines, signed up for four years. At worst, he would earn money for college. At best, he would forge a military career.
He played some flag football. Friends saw the way he ran and said he should join them on one of the full-contact teams at Camp Pendleton, near San Diego.
"I told my buddies, yeah, I'm coming," Anderson said. "But I never showed up. It took a coach, higher ranked than me. He came to me in the mess hall one day and just told me I was coming out to practice. And I said, 'Well, O.K.' "
Two years later, Anderson had a ticket to a college education. He was at Mount San Jacinto Community College in California, a junior-college powerhouse, on his way to becoming a two-time all-American. He was signed by Utah and became a two-time all-conference player.
The Broncos, in 2000, drafted him in the sixth round. He had been out of high school for eight years. Coaches loved his maturity and his discipline, and Anderson made the final roster. When running backs Terrell Davis and Olandis Gary went down with injuries, the Broncos handed Anderson the ball.
At 27, older than 29 of his teammates, he was the N.F.L.'s offensive rookie of the year in 2000. The Pro Football Hall of Fame took his jersey for safekeeping after he ran for a rookie-record 251 yards against the Saints in New Orleans.
"I was thinking, 'Wow, I made it - and not just made it, I'm playing.' " Anderson said of his rookie season, his tone still tinged with disbelief. "I was learning on the go, I was learning from one week to the next. But the team had so much confidence and faith in me that they kept putting me out there. They kept letting me play."
Not for long. It would take five years before the Broncos viewed him again as their best alternative at halfback.
First, Davis tried one more time to come back from injury. Then Clinton Portis was drafted, and Anderson was shifted to fullback. He moved back two years later, but the Broncos drafted Tatum Bell in the second round.
In between, in 2003, Anderson tested positive for marijuana and was suspended for four games for violating the league's substance-abuse policy.
"It was a low point, probably the lowest point of my career," he said. "I just feel like, it did happen, it was a dumb mistake, dumb on my part just being involved around that and in that. But it was something to learn from."
This, remarkably, is how he views every decision and everything that has happened to him - without regret. He would not give up the drums for football. He would not give up the Marines to start an N.F.L. career four years earlier. He would not even change 2004, when a preseason groin injury wiped out his season.
"I was able to think and collect my thoughts and look back and reflect," Anderson said, who is married with three children. "I was like, 'Man, I want to get back out there. I'm not ready to go yet.' "
He finally won the starting job this season. When he gained 1,014 yards, he became the first N.F.L. player to have four years between 1,000-yard seasons for the same team.
"This weekend is the biggest game of my career," he said. "It's so gratifying to be a part of all this."
As he has done since childhood, he will march down the field in fits and starts, this time wearing a helmet instead of a funny fuzzy hat, carrying a football instead of a drum.
But Anderson will be reminded of where he has been. If there is no real marching band, his fellow running backs will do as they usually do to help Anderson relax: They will walk around before the game pretending to play the drums.
That kind of reminder will have to do for now, at least until Anderson can buy that drum set he has always wanted.
Ellie