Rudy (20 page)

Of course, in my opinion, the greatest motivator Parseghian gave to any of us to show up to practice and work hard was his promise, at any number of practices, that as long as we kept showing up to practice, he would let all of the graduating seniors—even the walk-ons—dress for the final home game of the season. The fact that he would give all of his players, all the way down to the bottom rung of the ladder, that dignity to fulfill their dreams of running out of that tunnel onto the field was about the most impressive thing I'd ever heard.

I was a junior. I'd have a whole year to wait for my shot. But the thought that I might actually get to dress for a game—that my wild, unrealistic, over-the-top, impossible-to-reach dream was now on its way to becoming true—felt awesome!

I remember telling my parents and my brothers and sisters all about it. What a thrill it would be for my younger siblings to see me wearing that uniform. To see their oldest brother get out there and play for Notre Dame? It felt big. It felt like the sort of thing that would change their whole worldview, you know? I loved that feeling.

For some reason, as December rolled around that excited feeling was replaced by something bittersweet. Maybe it's because the season was almost over. The thought of not playing got me down. Football was the reason I got up in the morning. For many reasons, I didn't want to see 1974 come to an end, even as I dreamed of what the following year would bring. But it couldn't have been more than a week or two into that month when I picked up a copy of
The Observer
and just about fell over, completely sucker-punched by the top story: Coach Ara Parseghian was retiring.

I thought about what it meant for the team. I thought about what it meant for morale. I thought about what it meant for the legacy of Notre Dame football. In his decade in South Bend, which would become known as “the Era of Ara,” he amassed ninety-five wins, only seventeen losses, and four ties. That's an .836 average! Unheard of in the modern era! He was kind. He was fair. He was tough. He was everything a coach should be.

I was devastated.

And I couldn't help but think about the one thing that suddenly felt selfish to worry over:
What would this mean for my chances of actually dressing for a game? Would a new coach think of that? What if a new coach didn't like me? I' d have to prove myself all over again to whoever took over next year
.

To say I had a little frustration built up as that football season came to a close would be quite the understatement. Lucky for me, I'd have a place to throw all of that energy: January meant the start of training season for the Bengal Bouts.

Six weeks of training; three days of fights. The Bengal Bouts are like an entire football or baseball or basketball season compressed into a single weekend. The energy on campus is intense. To be one of those fighters and to have a shot at the top, you have to be 100 percent in the game, in the zone, fixated on the task in front of you, which amounts to pummeling the other guy with as many hits as possible to score points, move ahead, and make it to the championship.

I didn't care about
winning
the Bengal Bouts. I just wanted to make it to the final round so I could get one of those championship jackets. I'd only have to survive through three rounds of fights. I was stronger than ever. Still scrappy as ever. That goal seemed entirely attainable to me.

Pulling those gloves on, stepping out into the roar of that capacity crowd in the basketball arena, climbing into the ring under those lights, hearing my name announced over the loudspeaker—“And in this corner . . . Rudyyyyy Rueeetigger!”—it was all a bit surreal. The funny thing about working hard toward any goal, preparing for weeks on end, focusing so intently on something, is that once you're in the actual game, there's almost no room for thought anymore. It all comes down to instinct. It all comes down to preparation. I found the sound of the crowd disappearing as I focused on my opponent. It was just a wash of noise in the background. I didn't think about my hands or my stance or protecting my face or protecting my body. I just did it. “Ding!” I stepped into the center of that ring and just went for it.
Boom! Boom!
Took a couple of hits, then
Wham!
I knocked him hard, following up with a
right, right, right, left!
I just kept going, thinking about that jacket, thinking about making it through, not falling behind.
Keep punching, Rudy! Don't let him in!

The first fight flew by. The bell rang and I couldn't believe it was over. I closed my eyes, just praying I'd done enough. Judge's decision: “Ruuudyyy Rueeetigger!”

All right. All right
.
Phew!
I caught my breath. I went back to the locker room and wound myself down.
Two more to go. Two more to go
. It's all I thought about.

The next round, I was up against a well-known opponent in the same weight class who was a varsity football player—a halfback. I thought his fame as a Fighting Irish star would put the crowd firmly in his corner. But as we came face-to-face to touch gloves in the ring, something happened in that arena. In the greatest tradition of Notre Dame sports, the students immediately picked me as the underdog . . . and started rooting for me. Loudly.

After taking a few hits in the opening moment, I came back strong and started landing body blows just like I wanted. Suddenly I felt the crowd behind me. It felt like a surge. Like I was carrying their energy. It was all a rush of noise in the background as I focused on that opponent, anticipating his every move from the look in his eyes and counter-striking on pure gut reaction. When the bell rang, I finally heard what that crowd had been chanting: “Ru-dy! Ru-dy! Ru-dy!” They were chanting my name! And they didn't stop. They kept chanting until the judge's decision came in: “Ruuudyyy Rueeeettiger!”

The place went wild. It was awesome. As if the whole student body suddenly knew my name.
Me!
The fact that I defeated a football player was huge.

Stepping into the ring for the championship fight is nothing but a blur to me now. I know I was up against a bigger opponent again, a varsity football player named Mike McGuire, and after what I'd done in the last fight, the crowd was looking for an epic battle. I know the crowd started chanting my name. I also know I didn't give it my all. I lost focus. I had already won! I wanted to make the championship round so I could earn that jacket—and I did. So I let my guard down. I fought, but not to win. And guess what happens when you don't fight to win? You don't win. No surprise there. I lost in a split decision. It didn't matter to me. Walking out of that arena, hearing hundreds of students and coaches and professors say, “Great fight, Rudy!” “Way to go, man!” All those hands patting me on the back of that Bengal Bouts jacket was the greatest win I could have imagined at that point.

The next day, life was different. Notre Dame knew my name. Complete strangers said, “Hey, man! . . . Hi, Rudy! . . . Nice fights, man!” as I walked through the quad. I'd never felt that kind of recognition before. I'd never felt that sort of admiration. What was really strange about it was I didn't feel like I had worked all that hard to get it. It came easier than I would have thought. Just like the academics. I was tapping into something. I was starting to understand something here and there, in little glimpses: focusing on an achievable, accomplishable goal can turn a far-fetched fantasy into an attainable dream. A dream that can become real with a little hard work and perseverance.

There was something more to it than that, as well. I started to realize that accomplishing that goal, achieving that one dream, made a whole bunch of other dreams come true too. I had seen it in my quest to get into Notre Dame and in my quest to land a spot on the football team. When spring football practice came around, I would see it on the team.

Not long after those fights were over, I wore that Bengal Bouts jacket into the locker room on my way to suit up for our very first football practice under new head coach Dan Devine. Devine was a great coach who had been considered by Notre Dame way back in 1964, when Parseghian was first hired. He had spent the previous couple of years with the NFL coaching the Green Bay Packers. Not exactly chump change! I was excited to get to work for the man, even though the depression over Parseghian's departure seemed to permeate the entire football program.

On that very first day of practice, I noticed a whole bunch of my teammates looked at me a little differently. A couple of the first-team players made a point to say, “Nice fights, Rudy.” These were guys who had never spoken to me before. My performance in the Bengal Bouts helped change the attitude I faced on the football team. It didn't change everyone's attitude, of course. There are some people who are never willing to let go of that us-versus-them mentality as they cling to their elite status. But it made a difference. It made a difference in the way I felt in that locker room. And the more comfortable I felt, the more included I felt, the harder I wanted to work to become the best football player I could be.

Oddly enough, just as I had predicted in my mind when I heard that Coach Parseghian was leaving, Coach Devine had a very different attitude about team camaraderie. He actually separated the teams, divided the teams, never brought us together at the end of the week for any kind of common exercises, let alone some fun skits. In fact, it was his official policy that the prep teams weren't even allowed to sit and eat with the regular players! That made a lot of us upset, and in fact, there were many times when I flat-out ignored the order. I was friendly with some of those guys, and there was no way I was gonna sit like an outsider and not eat with them. No one could really blame Devine. He came from the NFL. It was a different mentality, and there was definitely a method to his madness. The fact that the prep team was off by itself meant we bonded in our own way, on a smaller scale, like never before. Even so, as the year progressed, Coach Devine would see the differences in the Notre Dame traditions and start to embrace them.

Spring practices were divided up into two shifts so the team members would have plenty of time to study for their final exams. That apparently bugged Devine, but he would learn to deal with it. Academics never took a backseat to football at Notre Dame, yet I understood where Coach was coming from. I was glad I had time to study, but if I could have been out there on the football field both shifts I would have been. I had begun to make a name for myself on that team. I had established a reputation for never giving up, never backing down, always playing my hardest. There were certain players who didn't appreciate that. They thought it made them look bad. I didn't understand how it was my fault if they wanted to rest on their talents and not strive for the best every practice, but that's how they treated it. Even so, there were other players, the guys I became friendly with, who would knock me on the helmet or say, “Great practice, man,” as we walked off the field. “Man, you come out here and work your tail off! I appreciate that!” Players like Gerry DiNardo, Willie Fry Jr., Ross Browner, Luther Bradley, and Ken MacAfee lived up to the Notre Dame name in every way. There were times when I'd invite some of those guys to ride back to Joliet with me to have dinner with my family. My mom loved it. Now that a few of her flock had flown the coop, she was thrilled to have a big, full table with lots of big eaters. And those guys liked nothing more than a good home-cooked meal.

D-Bob and I designed custom Notre Dame jackets for those players, with their names on 'em. It turned into a lucrative little side business for the both of us, and the players appreciated having unique keepsakes, so it was a win-win. The camaraderie of all of it grew stronger every week.

As the days grew warmer, the idea of making a name for myself on that team became more and more important to me. I'm not sure why. I guess we all want recognition for the hard work we do in life. But at some point, I also realized that my dream of dressing for a game, of allowing my friends and family to see me play, had a whole other level of depth behind it that I wasn't aware of in the beginning: unless I dressed, and unless I stepped foot on that field during a game, my name wouldn't appear in the history books. My name wouldn't appear alongside the rest of the Notre Dame players in the yearbook. My name wouldn't appear on the bronze plaques filled with player names that lined the walls in the ACC. As far as history was concerned, it would look as if I had never been a part of that team at all. That didn't sit well with me. I don't care who you are or how gracious you are, that's a hard thing to take. Sure, I would know in my heart that I was a part of that team, an important part of that team, forever. That's important. But if a tree falls in the forest and no one's there to hear it . . . I dunno. It just bothered me that no one would know.

During the spring season, Coach Devine never, ever mentioned the notion that seniors would get to dress for a home game. That worried me. I also became aware of a whole new set of NCAA rules that were put into effect that year, rules dictating that no team would be allowed to dress more than sixty players for any single home game. Coach Parseghian had the option to suit up 110 players if he wanted. The NCAA cut it by almost half! At a place as flush with great players as Notre Dame, where there were nearly one hundred scholarship players on the team, that meant there weren't nearly enough dress slots for even the scholarship players to suit up.
How would I ever have a shot now?