thedrifter
07-31-09, 08:21 AM
broncos
Schlueter's long road to NFL had slow start
Rookie center comes to Broncos from tiny town in Texas
By Jeff Legwold
The Denver Post
The Denver Post
Posted:07/30/2009 01:00:00 AM MDT
In each life a little what-if must fall.
Say Blake Schlueter just joined the Marines as his older brother did. Say he served two tours in Iraq, just like Colin Schlueter did, and moved on in his life, leaving football in the rearview mirror.
Say he simply went to junior college and "found a job to pay for it, to get my degree" and have a career.
Say a Texas Christian assistant coach — Eddie Williamson — wasn't prowling every corner and curved edge of Texas in search of players nine years ago and didn't think to ask on his way through a one-stoplight town, "Anybody got some Division I potential around here?"
"I don't know, hard to say," said Blake Schlueter, a Broncos rookie center. "But it's a long way from Ganado to here, I suppose."
Oh, about 1,055.78 miles on the map, maybe a little farther on the road to the NFL.
That's Ganado (pronounced Ga-nay-do), Texas, population 1,800 or so, just up the road from the Gulf of Mexico. Schlueter, who was the 10th and final draft pick by the Broncos in April, grew up in Ganado.
Grew up an undersized offensive and defensive lineman, tipping the scales at all of 215 pounds in his senior year, gripping the notion hard work could cure a lot of things. The strategy worked well enough that he was an all-Mountain West Conference player for TCU and now finds himself in an NFL training camp.
"Some people don't like the small-town life, but I'm glad it's been my life," Schlueter said. "Everybody always has a big smile on their face there. The school I went to, I was very fortunate to go to — very small, K through 12 in one building. From kindergarten to your senior year you went to the same school. Senior year you could go to the nurse or something like that and you would see kindergarten kids.
"That was cool, you knew them, they knew you. It's just real genuine, you knew what everybody was about, there wasn't a whole lot of sneaking around. I mean, if you got in trouble, your parents found out about it before you got home."
Schlueter credits Williamson for seeing what Broncos coach Josh McDaniels now calls a "really strong player, a great athlete at his position, who plays bigger than he is" long before maybe Schlueter himself did.
It was Williamson who, on his way through Ganado in what Schlueter said was his sophomore year, asked a local coach if there were any prospects around. Told there weren't that year but that there was a 10th-grader with potential, Williamson kept his eye on Schlueter.
Seven years later, Williamson has said Schlueter "epitomizes what you look for in an offensive lineman."
Schlueter went on to set weight-room records at TCU, and his coaches consistently told scouts his vision on the field — to see a defense's maneuvers and know how to adjust accordingly — was exceptional. But it took inventiveness to get there.
"I have a lot harder time putting on weight than some people do," Schlueter said. "At one point in my junior year at TCU — the summer before that year — I was even eating every two hours. I would do things like eat at 10 (p.m.), then make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and put it away, set my alarm for 3 or 4 in the morning, get up, eat the sandwich, go back to bed and then get up for breakfast a couple hours later.
"It worked, but I don't think people will be looking to do that too often."
So here he is at Dove Valley, the smallest of the 15 offensive linemen the Broncos will have in training camp, the only player in the position group listed at less than 280 pounds.
And while the Broncos were once the haven for smaller offensive linemen who moved well, McDaniels has made no secret of his desire to add some poundage across the front, offering that "bigger is better."
"But it's all about hard work," Schlueter said. "I feel honored they wanted to draft me and give me an opportunity. My part now is to work as hard as I possibly can and do what I can to make it. That's what you do. You never know how things can turn out."
Jeff Legwold: 303-954-2359 or jlegwold@denverpost.com
Blake Schlueter file
Position: Center
Height: 6-feet-2
Weight: 279 pounds
School: Texas Christian
Drafted: Seventh round, 2009
Awards: Selected to all-Mountain West Conference first team in 2008, second team in 2007
Best moment: "This past April I had my 23rd birthday, my son (Cole) was born and the Broncos drafted me all in a two-week span. That was pretty awesome."
The skinny: One of three full- time centers on the roster and one of two offensive linemen the Broncos drafted this year. Fourth-rounder Seth Olsen, a guard from Iowa, is the other.
Ellie
Schlueter's long road to NFL had slow start
Rookie center comes to Broncos from tiny town in Texas
By Jeff Legwold
The Denver Post
The Denver Post
Posted:07/30/2009 01:00:00 AM MDT
In each life a little what-if must fall.
Say Blake Schlueter just joined the Marines as his older brother did. Say he served two tours in Iraq, just like Colin Schlueter did, and moved on in his life, leaving football in the rearview mirror.
Say he simply went to junior college and "found a job to pay for it, to get my degree" and have a career.
Say a Texas Christian assistant coach — Eddie Williamson — wasn't prowling every corner and curved edge of Texas in search of players nine years ago and didn't think to ask on his way through a one-stoplight town, "Anybody got some Division I potential around here?"
"I don't know, hard to say," said Blake Schlueter, a Broncos rookie center. "But it's a long way from Ganado to here, I suppose."
Oh, about 1,055.78 miles on the map, maybe a little farther on the road to the NFL.
That's Ganado (pronounced Ga-nay-do), Texas, population 1,800 or so, just up the road from the Gulf of Mexico. Schlueter, who was the 10th and final draft pick by the Broncos in April, grew up in Ganado.
Grew up an undersized offensive and defensive lineman, tipping the scales at all of 215 pounds in his senior year, gripping the notion hard work could cure a lot of things. The strategy worked well enough that he was an all-Mountain West Conference player for TCU and now finds himself in an NFL training camp.
"Some people don't like the small-town life, but I'm glad it's been my life," Schlueter said. "Everybody always has a big smile on their face there. The school I went to, I was very fortunate to go to — very small, K through 12 in one building. From kindergarten to your senior year you went to the same school. Senior year you could go to the nurse or something like that and you would see kindergarten kids.
"That was cool, you knew them, they knew you. It's just real genuine, you knew what everybody was about, there wasn't a whole lot of sneaking around. I mean, if you got in trouble, your parents found out about it before you got home."
Schlueter credits Williamson for seeing what Broncos coach Josh McDaniels now calls a "really strong player, a great athlete at his position, who plays bigger than he is" long before maybe Schlueter himself did.
It was Williamson who, on his way through Ganado in what Schlueter said was his sophomore year, asked a local coach if there were any prospects around. Told there weren't that year but that there was a 10th-grader with potential, Williamson kept his eye on Schlueter.
Seven years later, Williamson has said Schlueter "epitomizes what you look for in an offensive lineman."
Schlueter went on to set weight-room records at TCU, and his coaches consistently told scouts his vision on the field — to see a defense's maneuvers and know how to adjust accordingly — was exceptional. But it took inventiveness to get there.
"I have a lot harder time putting on weight than some people do," Schlueter said. "At one point in my junior year at TCU — the summer before that year — I was even eating every two hours. I would do things like eat at 10 (p.m.), then make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and put it away, set my alarm for 3 or 4 in the morning, get up, eat the sandwich, go back to bed and then get up for breakfast a couple hours later.
"It worked, but I don't think people will be looking to do that too often."
So here he is at Dove Valley, the smallest of the 15 offensive linemen the Broncos will have in training camp, the only player in the position group listed at less than 280 pounds.
And while the Broncos were once the haven for smaller offensive linemen who moved well, McDaniels has made no secret of his desire to add some poundage across the front, offering that "bigger is better."
"But it's all about hard work," Schlueter said. "I feel honored they wanted to draft me and give me an opportunity. My part now is to work as hard as I possibly can and do what I can to make it. That's what you do. You never know how things can turn out."
Jeff Legwold: 303-954-2359 or jlegwold@denverpost.com
Blake Schlueter file
Position: Center
Height: 6-feet-2
Weight: 279 pounds
School: Texas Christian
Drafted: Seventh round, 2009
Awards: Selected to all-Mountain West Conference first team in 2008, second team in 2007
Best moment: "This past April I had my 23rd birthday, my son (Cole) was born and the Broncos drafted me all in a two-week span. That was pretty awesome."
The skinny: One of three full- time centers on the roster and one of two offensive linemen the Broncos drafted this year. Fourth-rounder Seth Olsen, a guard from Iowa, is the other.
Ellie