My first practice of rookie camp was good. It’s a lot quicker than I’m used to, but it’s an adjustment — I’m learning and I’m excited.
From getting drafted last month to being at my first pro camp, it’s gone really fast. But in football, sometimes that’s how it goes.
The road I took to get here was definitely the road less taken. It was the harder road, but at the end of the day, I’m thankful for the opportunity and I’m just here to work hard every day.
To tell the truth, I did not expect this opportunity at all. I broke my leg in February of 2010 and I haven’t played much football at all in the past year. I got the boot off in November and I’ve just been training hard ever since.
Until I got drafted, I was thinking more about next year. I was going to take a year to train and maybe play a little local football and then try to come out to a pro camp next year. This situation — getting drafted by Calgary and coming to camp — is 20 times better than I could have imagined.
On draft day, I was sitting in my room watching the first two rounds of the draft on TV. I saw a few guys I know, so it was a little discouraging. Then I got a phone call and it was a Calgary area code, which gave me a little bit of a smile right away. When I picked up the phone, it was Coach Huff and he said, in these words, “Do you realize we just drafted you?” I repeated the words out loud so the people in the room with me could hear as well and as soon as I got off the phone, it was “Let the screaming begin!”
I’m getting a chance to play fullback here and it’s a really big adjustment after having been a tight end and receiver. I think the biggest adjustment is the mental aspect. My last year of football, I played junior and our playbook that year might have been a quarter of our training camp playbook here with the Stamps. So it’s a lot of studying and, as I found out first practice, things happen a lot faster out here.
I just want the coaches to see that I’m going to come out every day and compete and work hard and give it my all.
Jared Manchulenko, #43
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