Chapter 10

Ridge
Ridge had hired Doug Ericson to be his agent. His dad had done the research and determined that Doug was one of the best in the business. The man seemed to be constantly on his phone. Doug claimed it was so he could gauge teams’ interest and sell Ridge to them. Ridge had no doubt Doug was good, but the anticipation and anxiety over where he would end up in the draft were about to kill him.

Projections on the Internet were all over the board. There were mock drafts that had him as high as number one and going as late as the end of the first round. The difference in guaranteed money was significant.

He was brought out of his musings by David’s evil-pixie trainer, Cassidy.

“You’re up, Princess!” Cassidy barked.

David smirked at him. He’d warned Ridge that she would finally get him into shape. At the time, Ridge had dismissed the warning because he’d worked his butt off with the USC staff.

He’d been mistaken.

They’d been at it only a couple of days, and he’d considered bailing today because he ached everywhere. The only reason he’d kept at it was David. If she hadn’t killed his protege, then Ridge wasn’t about to admit that she might have gotten the best of him. It wasn’t in his nature to back down from a challenge.

What scared him a little was that Cassidy worked out with them. She might not lift as much weight, but she put him to shame when it came to cardio. She had them doing what David called ’sixty minutes of hell.’ If Ridge could lift his arms at the end of the day, he might have to kick his friend’s butt because David did the routine wearing a weighted vest. Ridge hadn’t quite gotten to that level of crazy yet.

“If I could make you some extra money, would you lighten up on me?” he asked Cassidy.

“What you don’t realize is that part of her payment is watching us suffer,” David shared.

“Shut it, Stupid Boy. Let him talk,” she said.

“A few other guys are preparing for the NFL draft like I am. I might have mentioned how you’re kicking my butt. They were wondering if you’d train them as well.” Ridge said.

“They would have to show up when we work out. I still have school and my rowing commitments,” Cassidy said to set expectations.

Ridge agreed with her thinking because being a full-time student with an athletic scholarship wasn’t easy. He was only taking one class this semester to free up his time to prepare for the draft.

He honestly didn’t know how David planned to do it when he added baseball into the mix. When Ridge had asked, David had laughed. He explained that he was used to working long hours from when he did his movies. Ridge suspected that David was more organized and focused than he ever was in his own freshman year.

Ridge was a little worried that David would have a reality check when the first round of midterms was given. Ridge remembered what had happened to him. School had taken a back burner to football and his social activities. When he’d all but flunked out, his parents came to his dorm and explained the facts of life to him. If he didn’t handle his schoolwork, he wouldn’t play ball.

“I’ll give them your number,” he promised Cassidy.

The dumbbell in Ridge’s left hand slipped out and almost hit him on the foot.

“What were you thinking?” she asked.

“Nothing.”

“It never ceases to amaze me how often men are being truthful when they answer ‘nothing’ to that question,” she quipped.

“You promised to go easy on me,” Ridge complained.

“Dude, she hasn’t been paid yet,” David teased.

“Bite me, Stupid Boy,” Ridge shot back, to Cassidy’s amusement.

’Let the pain begin,’ he thought.

Cassidy didn’t disappoint.

After their afternoon workout, David and Ridge went to the underground practice field in the John McKay Center. Ridge’s agent was bringing a scout from the Cleveland Browns in for an informal meet-and-greet.

David and Ridge were meeting a couple of receivers to help him work out. His agent had sprung the meeting on Ridge before he could reschedule his workout.

“I need to talk to my agent. Why don’t you warm them up for me and toss them some balls?” Ridge asked.

David nodded and went to help him out.

The Browns had the first draft pick in the upcoming draft. Personally, Ridge wasn’t too keen on them possibly picking him. He was keeping his fingers crossed that they would take the kid from Oklahoma. The Browns seemed to be near the top of each draft, and for good reason: they were a terrible franchise. Of course, to the public, Ridge said all the right things. Doug had warned him that even if he didn’t want to go to Cleveland, he didn’t want to look like a prima donna, either.

The talk with the Cleveland scout took longer than he’d thought it would. When he came back out, David had organized a seven-on-seven game. Somewhere, the guy had found eleven other ballplayers to join in their workout. When Doug and Ridge made it to the sidelines, Ridge held his agent back for a moment.

“You’ll want to watch this,” he said.

On the snap, David took a seven-step drop and pumped his arm to get the corner to break toward where he thought the ball was going. The receiver cut hard upfield. The pump fake had pulled the corner closer so that when the receiver cut upfield, the cornerback didn’t have as much time to react as he usually would. As soon as the receiver got his shoulders even with the cornerback, Ridge knew that David had him.

The safety had reacted when he saw his cornerback get fooled and was sprinting to disrupt the play. The cornerback had himself situated between the receiver and the quarterback as he tried to squeeze the receiver out of bounds. Ridge was impressed that the defensive players were doing everything they should.

Frequently, Ridge would have seen that and gone to his next read because it was the safe play. He smiled when David threw this high arcing pass. Both the corner and safety saw it coming. The cornerback timed his jump and reached for the ball. If it had been thrown normally, it would have been swatted away or intercepted. Instead, the corner didn’t have a chance of touching it as it dropped over the receiver’s shoulder, right into his hands.

The safety had held back to let his cornerback handle the play. When the receiver caught it, the corner had slowed down because he’d jumped. It was all the room the receiver needed to juke the safety and run free to the end zone. That was the type of throw that separated David from average quarterbacks.

“Matt’s looking good,” Doug said, referring to next year’s starter.

“That’s not Matt. That’s a freshman walk-on who they recruited to play defense.”

“Who is he?” Doug asked.