BEYOND
DJ READER
If I wasn’t playing ball, I’d be a teacher. Maybe a guidance counselor. It’s what I’ve always done, it’s what I’ve always seen.
My dad was a teacher and homeschooled me until the sixth grade. We didn’t live in the greatest neighborhood, but it wasn’t like it was the worst. We had a 900-square foot house, both of my parents were involved, and they had a great marriage.
To me, my dad was Superman. The best. Amazing. A true leader. There are really so many words to describe him, but he truly was the definition of what I think a man is supposed to be.
This Father’s Day weekend, I’ll go to the grave and give my dad a cold Mountain Dew. I’ll bring a copy of the Greensboro News and Record and read him some stories. My son, Rocky, will be with me and will probably be resting on my leg, just listening.
I don’t really think about this being the 10-year anniversary of his death too much. It used to be a day of grieving, but it’s more of a day of celebration now. He taught me to never forget about my community, to never forget about my mom, my family. To everything that’s helped me get to this point, I want to make sure I shine a light on that.
I don’t consider my story a tragedy. There are people who don’t have a father. I was blessed to have one for 19 years, an amazing one at that. I didn’t get cheated by God on a good dad, I got a great one.
When I was 4 years old, my dad was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis. He had just retired, and it got really bad by the time I was 6. Things were fine for the next 10 years or so, but there were times in my childhood where the arthritis was so bad that he’d be in a wheelchair.
Those were honestly some of my best memories with him.
I remember being in grocery stores, and my dad is obviously struggling, but he’s making it fun for me. Whether he’d be whispering in my ear to let me ride on the back of his wheelchair, he’d make everything into a game. ‘Hey, can you push me here?’ And my dad is not the smallest person, we’re both bigger guys, so it would be cool to be moving around and just messing with him. He made life fun, no matter what.
Not only was he my dad and my teacher, but he was also my coach. He was always separate in all of those roles though. I could easily tell when it was dad time, coach time and teacher time. But he did a great job of knowing when to blend those too, and I think they all have similar qualities. Those people are all making an impact on a young person’s life. Not all of my friends had a father figure in their life, so my dad became that father figure for a lot of them as well.
For places like where I’m from, kids need to find more people who look like them that are good, positive influences. That’s the only way they can go out and be positive influences on the rest of the world themselves.
To me, a true role model has integrity, and they have loyalty, and that can look a lot of different ways. You look for good people, and if you find enough people who have good qualities, you’re going to turn out better more times than not. I think that’s really it. They’re not just taking from the world, they’re giving something to the world. That’s exactly who my dad was.
A son never forgets what his father teaches him. And what he taught me is more clear than ever now.
Not only was he my dad and my teacher, but he was also my coach
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I think the defining moment of my life happened when I was 9 years old, the moment I wasn’t able to get on the baseball field because the coach didn’t think I was athletic enough. I was like, ‘Damn, out of nine people, you feel like I’m not athletic enough to ever get on the field?’
I still think about that all the time. I can tell you right now the coach who said it, I can tell you the baseball park I was at, what we were wearing, the orange GBC hat I had on, everything.
My dad was basically like, ‘Yo, do you want this?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, I really want to play.’ I’m just a kid, I don’t know what, ‘I’m not athletic enough to play on the field,’ even means.
So, from that moment on, my eyes were big as hell just following my dad. I had to be determined just like he was determined. I watched my dad go through multiple surgeries for his arthritis, but he’d still drive me to practice and coach me from his wheelchair. It mattered to him.
We were running laps pre-game, we had garbage bags on, we were just trying to do the right things. I’m playing every freaking sport, I don’t go home at night – I was just at the field. My dad’s got the keys to the gym, so now I’m a little gym-rat kid. Even for football, I’d always have to run extra laps just to make weight and he was always there to support me. It was a tough time as a little kid, running around all the time and doing laps just so I could play.
That type of fulfillment and joy that I got as a kid, that’s really what defined me as a person. My dad put a lot of work – a lot of work – into a chubby kid from Greensboro. He taught me the work ethic I’d need for the future. He always told me that hard work is going to beat talent in any field.
Those moments changed my life way before anything else.
That type of fulfillment and joy that I got as a kid, that’s really what defined me as a person.
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When I started my second year of college, my dad started dialysis treatment for kidney failure. I was very naïve to the situation. I’m just like every other male who’s 18 or 19 years old – I’m in my own world.
The first time I came home and saw what was going on – that look on his face, how he was drained – I think that part killed me. I’ve never seen him have that look on his face where you can tell he’s down and out. I’ve never seen him have a tough day to where he couldn’t muster up the courage to be strong in front of me. I’m just sitting there watching my Superman become lifeless.
That was when the pain settled in for me.
Another time I came home, and he was like, ‘Yo, if this does that…,’ and I’m young, I don’t want to hear that shit. Immediately, when you start having that conversation – it’s like those movies. It’s audible, but you’re not processing it. It’s like that person saying, ‘Wah, wa, wah, wa.’ Like you know what was said, but you can’t process it in your mind until you have time to really sit down. And that was it for me, I had to sit down and process it. And then everything just came to me really, really fast.
He just told me, ‘You obviously don’t know it all, but I’ve given you tools to go out and be a man, identify what a man is, to be there for your mom, to be supportive. You have the tools to move forward as a person.’ I think that conversation stuck with me through life way more than any other conversation that he and I ever had.
My dad was 19 when his father passed. I was 19 when my dad died.
Anger can be incredible fuel, but when it is your sole source of fuel for an extended period of time, it will wear you down.
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I had to step away from the football team at Clemson after I failed a drug test. I was spiraling. In the year that followed my dad’s death, everything was a whirlwind for me.
I wasn’t just surviving, I was mourning through survival. I was numb to a lot of feelings. I didn’t really have sympathy or empathy for people with any type of loss. It was hard to. I just couldn’t find it in myself.
This was before the days of mental health – and even counseling for players is a relatively new thing. But for me, even trusting another grown person wasn’t something I had to do up until that point of my life. I had my parents for everything, for any kind of question that I had. That was an adjustment.
I used to call my dad for any random thing, but now who do I have those talks with? I have a question here, I have a question there, but now what do I do? Now I have to find damn near another male role model, someone I respect enough to even ask certain questions. It’s not like, ‘Oh, I’ve got to find a mentor,’ I’ve got to find somebody who hopefully has my best interests. I’ve never had to do that once in my life. I’m new to all of this, I’m just 19. I’m a freaking kid.
The time away from football was hell because three times a week, I had to drive an hour away, go to an outpatient rehab for three hours, and drive the hour back. Like, I’m spending time with real-life drug addicts. I’m about to get kicked out of school, and I’m focusing on that because I really just want to graduate. They’re not letting me work out at the football facility, so I’ve got to come up with my own workouts in the rec center. Thankfully I got some help from Rendrick Taylor, who now works for Colorado’s strength staff, but I had to live like that for six weeks.
The structure of college and football actually saved me in a lot of ways because it gave me a focus. And I think you learn a lot about yourself when you’re in those deep waters. I think that’s when – especially for me – I think that’s when the basics of what your parents taught you kick in. Three weeks into my rehab and counseling, I changed my perspective. My dad built this beautiful, amazing family and did all of these things for me, made all these sacrifices, and really showed me what a man was.
I’d be weak and cowardly if I didn’t keep going, if not only for anything but his legacy.
It took me two years to first visit the gravesite after his funeral. I got drafted by the Texans on a Saturday, so the next day, we went to church and then to Texas Roadhouse to celebrate. I left to go to the grave by myself for a while and my mom met me over there a little bit later. I just talked to him about, man, all that work we put in. All of it. Everything we’ve ever done paid off, and I wish he was here to see it. I had that conversation of, ‘I really, truly wish you were here to experience an ounce of it.’
I didn’t know what to expect, but you get there, and you go right back to being that 9-year-old kid and just talking to him like he’s your dad. That’s really what ends up happening. You revert back to being a child and remembering those young moments.
You think about those times – man, our favorite thing to do together was going to the bowling alley on Sundays. I vividly remember the times he’d come home from tutoring kids, and we’d stay up super late to watch wrestling together. I always thought those were the best times.
I felt like that was really what happened when I first went to visit him. I think it helped re-center me. I don’t care what people say, man – there’s just something about that spirit. It was good. I was just sitting out there, talking to my dad, and just kicking the shit.
It’s kind of crazy because I’m not the type of person who really believes in instant love. All the movies would portray it to be kind of different. I never thought you could look at something and instantly fall in love, but Nov. 9, 2019 was the first time it ever happened. Rocky was born, and the first time I looked at him, I was instantly willing to die for that person.
My son is funny, man. He’s a lot like I was as a kid. He’s free, he has a big imagination, he’s really rough. Rocky’s a true outdoors kid, a ‘boy’s boy,’ into bugs, lizards, insects, all that stuff. He loves being in the pool. He reminds me a lot of myself, and I get to see him live a lot more freely than I did as a kid. Things aren’t tight for him, he doesn’t have a certain money struggle, he’s not growing up in the same environment that I grew up in. He gets to see the world in a different lens than I got to at that age.
He loves working out with me. And whenever I get him in his car seat, he talks. All. The. Time. Nonstop. The back-and-forth banter that we have, it was just like how me and my dad were.
I just want to teach him how to be a man and how to be able to stand for something. Not to be a follower, to always be a leader, to hold his head high in whatever he does. Work hard, be a provider, be consistent every day. Those are things that qualify, to me, being a man.
I never thought you could look at something and instantly fall in love, but Nov. 9, 2019 was the first time it ever happened.
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I think that a father being in a child’s life is super important. I think our world, in general, misses that on a lot of fronts. I think we see the downfall of fathers not taking responsibility.
I want to give Rocky the best life ever. I feel like I was able to get that father-son relationship back – in another way – by having him. Being his father means the world to me.
Even through God taking my dad away, he gave me my own boy. Rocky is the flesh of my flesh and the blood of my blood, someone that I can love to death.
I got a beautiful thing out of my struggle. An amazing thing out of it – a full-circle moment. But it took time to get there. Just look at music. Some of the most beautiful songs come from heartbreak and pain. I think some of the best stories are created out of terrible situations. I’m a big proponent of that, and I think there’s always beauty in the struggle. That’s the only way you get to a final product worth something.
I just want people to know that this could be anybody’s story. There’s nothing special about me that separates me from everybody else. To anybody experiencing loss, it’s going to suck – it’s never going to be easy. No one can tell you the right way to deal with it.
Just know that there are a lot of people out there in this world that are just like you, and a lot of stories that are going to be just like yours. Try to make yourself end up on the positive end of those stories rather than falling to the negative end.
If you’ve got to look at my story as motivation, then do that. I look at my dad’s story as motivation. I mean him losing his dad at 19, it changed his whole life around, and my father was amazing to me. You just need to find that spark that keeps you going in a positive manner. People have done it before you and unfortunately, people will do it after you. You can do it.
FULL CIRCLE
BEYOND
My dad’s legacy is embedded in me. I’ve always played for that jersey on the front, but I’ve wanted to change the legacy of that name on the back because that’s forever. I feel like it’s still important to keep living that dream out that he and I had together when I was a kid and just living it to the fullest.
I talk to him every Sunday. When you see me on a knee pregame, I’m usually talking to him. All of my prayers have been said at that point, and I always just tell him, ‘You have the best seat in the house, and I hope you enjoy the show.’ I’m excited to go out and play because after that, I feel fearless. The gut feeling I have knowing he’s looking down on me happy, it’s priceless.
Rocky asks about my dad sometimes, but he still doesn’t know what’s going on – he’s too young. In years to come, he’ll understand a little bit more. But I tell him stories all the time. He’s not big on listening to long stories right now, but I still tell them.
He’s actually a lot like my dad. Rocky’s very headstrong, very determined and doesn’t mind being the lone wolf. I really have so many questions about fatherhood I wish I could ask my dad. I’d love to know his thought process on a lot of things. Those are some moments you miss him the most.
The interesting part is you realize that your dad – and your mom – they’ve prepared you to be the exact man that you are. Life’s going to beat Rocky up at some point. It is. And I’m going to cry the day it does. I’m going to be weak. I know it’s going to happen, and I’d rather set him up with tools, like, ‘OK, I’ve been through this. I’m confident, my dad taught me.’
That’s what my dad did in our 19 years together. That’s what his dad did in their 19 years together.
I had a sense Detroit wanted me back, I wanted to be back
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The day before Father’s Day, I’ll host my annual, free youth football camp. We’ll have a cookout at my mom’s house – and yes, the first thing I did when I got that second contract was move her out of that 900-square foot house.
Rocky and I will pick up that cold Mountain Dew and a fresh copy of the Greensboro News and Record and head to the grave.
On Father’s Day, we’ll go back to my mom’s house to have brunch with all the men in my life.
And when I see my uncles, they’ll say what they always tell me – ‘Shit, you made it way further than what he was thinking.’
I know he’d be proud of me. A son never forgets.
