Here's a pretty interesting article from the Sporting News albeit it was from a week and a half ago. Suggs is just a wonderful athlete. Some may forget he rushed for +2000 yds & +20 tds as a senior in highschool.
Linky:
http://www.sportingnews.com/voices/dennis_dillon/
Terrell Suggs' relentless pursuit to be No. 1
March 19, 2003 Print it
More Suggs: Scouting report | SNR interview | Draft Diary
This is not part of the game plan. No, sir. Exactly where is this written into the script?
On this glorious spring morning in southern California -- a day on which you can practically feel the breeze wafting off the Pacific Ocean, two miles to the west, the football stadium at Santa Monica College is abuzz. Runners jog or sprint on the artificial track. At one end of the field, a co-ed softball game is being contested. At the other end, a solitary athlete stretches and fires up his muscles.
Thus begins another preparation day for Terrell Suggs, the Arizona State University defensive end whose name sits near the top of every NFL team's draft board. Suggs has been training in Los Angeles for more than two months -- he came out here December 28, the day after Arizona State's 34-27 loss to Kansas State in the Holiday Bowl -- through a program concocted by his agent, Gary Wichard.
Suggs has worked with a speed coach, an agility coach, a strength and conditioning coach and a nutritionist. He has changed his eating habits, going so far as to renounce his beloved No. 5 combo from Jack in the Box. He has added 12 pounds of muscle to his 6-33Ú8 frame and now weighs 262. It's all part of the grand plan to move Suggs to the No. 1 spot on those draft boards. Currently, The War Room rates him third, behind Southern California quarterback Carson Palmer and Michigan State wide receiver Charles Rogers.
But here comes a glitch. Charlie Wright, Santa Monica's athletic director, approaches Wichard and informs him that the activity in the stadium will be picking up. Several University of Hawaii players will be participating in a pro workout today, which means a bunch of NFL scouts soon will be wandering onto the premises.
An audible is called. Darren Willis, a personal trainer who has been working with Suggs on agility drills, suggests they move Suggs' workout down the street to John Adams Middle School. Suggs, Wichard and Willis make a hasty exit.
Wichard's goal is for Suggs to be at his zenith when Arizona State holds its pro workout day next Wednesday. The original date was April 4, but Wichard called George Wynn, ASU's director of football operations, and suggested the date be changed to March 26 to coincide with the end of the NFL owners meetings. Now, Suggs will have a captive audience that will include general managers and head coaches as well as scouts and position coaches.
"It's an opportunity to be seen by the decision makers," Wichard says of Suggs. Right now, however, Wichard doesn't want any prying eyes getting a sneak peek.
The grass at the middle school field is shorter than at the college, making for a quicker surface. Various implements are placed on the field: a 10-foot-long nylon ladder that lays flat on the ground, orange rubber cones and yellow plastic hurdles that look high enough to challenge only a rabbit. Let the drills begin.
First, Suggs runs through the ladder, taking quick, short steps as he puts both feet between each of the 12 "rungs." He runs forward, laterally and then moves down the line in a motion that makes him look like he's dancing a furiously fast hokey-pokey. All of this is for quickness and footwork.
Five orange cones are positioned about 5 yards apart in a staggered pattern. Suggs runs directly at the first cone, then moves laterally to each of the others. The purpose is to test his change of direction.
The miniature hurdles simulate dummies or fallen players on the field, what NFL scouts commonly refer to as "trash." Suggs moves sideways down the line, stepping over the hurdles. He finishes each drill with an explosive burst.
Finally, there is a drill Suggs can embrace. The five orange cones are placed in a semicircle, with the middle cone set back 7 yards -- the approximate dropback point for a quarterback. The idea is for Suggs to run around the first two cones on either side, as if he is beating an offensive tackle around the corner, and get to the middle cone as quickly as he can. Suggs lines up as if he is a right defensive end, gets down in a three-point stance and takes off. He arrives at the middle cone in 1.58 seconds. On his next try, he gets there in 1.49. That's hardly enough time enough for a quarterback to set up after a three-step drop. Suggs repeats the drill from the other side.
After two more exercises, one in which he drops into coverage and changes directions and another in which he sprints straight down the field and does a pair of 360s, turning first to one side, then to the other, to test his hip movement, Suggs finishes by running 110 yards six times. But the day is not done. After lunch, he will go to Gold's Gym in Venice to lift weights.
"When can I make up yesterday?" asks Suggs, referring to a workout he missed the day before. He was in Arizona over the weekend to visit his family and to be honored at halftime of Arizona State's basketball game. His return flight to L.A. was late. "I've got to keep going. I always feel like someone is breathing down my neck."
As a junior in 2002, Suggs was a pass-rushing wolf who huffed and puffed and blew down opposing quarterbacks. He broke the NCAA Division I record for sacks in a season with 22, then added two in the bowl game. He collected three major college prizes: the Lombardi Trophy (best lineman or linebacker), the Bronko Nagurski Award (best defensive player) and the Ted Hendricks Award (best defensive end). But all that hardware won't mean diddly come March 26. What NFL scouts will want to see is how high Suggs can jump, how quickly can he move laterally and, most important, how fast can he run the 40.
"His workout can really elevate him up to the top of the board," says Vinny Cerrato, the Redskins' director of player personnel. "If he runs in the 4.5s, people will be talking about him being at one or two. If he has just a decent workout, he probably goes from four to seven, right in there."
Suggs' workout numbers will strongly influence where he is drafted in the first round. But any GM, coach or scout who has watched Suggs on tape knows he is a rare breed at one of the most important positions in today's NFL. Trent Baalke, the Redskins' western college scout, told Cerrato that Suggs is the best pass rusher he has graded in his six years in the NFL.
Suggs isn't just an edge rusher who tries to beat his opponent with pure speed. He'll come directly at him and knock him off balance with a variety of moves. He rarely loses sight of the quarterback, even while he is trying to get off blocks. And his relentless hustle allows him to make plays from the backside and all the way across the field.
What's most impressive about Suggs is his anticipation and instincts off the snap. "It's unbelievable," says Mike Ackerley, the Titans' director of college scouting. "As soon as that ball moves, he's beaten everybody but the center off the ball. And his upfield burst is probably as good as anybody's. I would compare him to the guy we've got, the 'Freak' (Jevon Kearse)."
Next to quarterbacks, pass rushers are the most coveted commodity in the NFL. Ten years ago, Suggs would have been too light to be a full-time defensive end. But the position has evolved, and coaches now are emphasizing speed on the outside. Faster, smaller players who can turn the corner are in. Bigger, slower linemen . . . well, they're likely to be moved to tackle.
Teams that play a 3-4 defense, such as the Texans, who have the third pick in the draft, visualize Suggs as an outside linebacker. Because of the preponderance of three- and four-receiver offensive sets, defenses go to their nickel and dime schemes more now, so chances are Suggs will be on the field often no matter where he plays. Although Suggs will have to improve against the run, he's not a one-dimensional player.
"It's not like he's just out there beating people around the corner and sacking the quarterback," says Rams defensive line coach Bill Kollar. "The guy plays with some toughness. He's pretty stout against the run and lays a pretty good load when he ends up tackling."
Then, there is this testimonial from Stanford's Kwame Harris, who is rated as one of the best offensive tackles in the draft and went head to head with Suggs last season: "His first step off the ball is incredible, and he has the strength to go along with it. You wouldn't guess just by his size that he would be as powerful a human being as he is."
The seed for Wichard's workout program was planted during his own football career. A Little All-American quarterback at C.W. Post College in 1971 -- he was a 16th-round draft pick of the Baltimore Colts in '72 but suffered a broken collarbone and a separated shoulder and retired -- Wichard was invited to play in the Senior Bowl. He says he "stunk it up because I wasn't prepared."
So over the years, he designed a program for his clients that focuses on weight training, conditioning, speed and nutrition. A regular crew of specialists -- including Danny Everett, a member of the United States' gold medal 4x400 relay team at the 1988 Seoul Olympics -- works with the players in each of those areas. Sometimes, Wichard brings in a football coach to work with a player on his specific position skills.
Among the current NFL players who have trained with Wichard's experts are Dolphins defensive end Jason Taylor; Rams safety Adam Archuleta, who was the first defensive back drafted in 2001 even though he was making a transition from college linebacker, and Colts defensive end Dwight Freeney, who was judged to be undersized by some scouts but wound up with 13 sacks as a rookie last year despite not starting until the ninth game of the season.
Many agents set up their players for special training in preparation for the NFL Scouting Combine and the draft. NFL personnel men view the value of such programs as debatable.
"I don't think it's going to hurt a player, but I'm not sure how much it's going to help him, other than making him familiar with the drills he's going to run at the Combine and on pro days," says Colts director of football operations Dom Anile, who, coincidentally, coached Wichard at C.W. Post. "I think the kids who stay in school and work with their college trainers, who are just as competent as some of these personal trainers, are going to fare just as well.
"We loved Dwight Freeney before he went out there (to Wichard's program). All you had to do was watch him on tape sacking Michael Vick four times to see that Freeney was good."
The silver 2003 Escalade SUV pulls into a parking lot in downtown Santa Monica. Terrell Suggs exits the vehicle, walks down an alley and around the corner to the Firehouse Restaurant and Bar. He is accompanied by Rico Suggs, his cousin and best friend, who recently moved to L.A. from Arizona and is sharing an apartment with Terrell.
Fast food used to be a dietary staple for Suggs. Now he eats chicken, pasta, string beans and salad. But no egg whites. Wichard convinced Suggs to try egg whites once, and it almost turned ugly. "I tried putting everything on them -- strawberry preserves, salt and pepper -- but it just wasn't working," Suggs says. "I almost threw up right on the table."
Tonight, Suggs veers off course slightly. He orders hot wings, a small mushroom pizza and pink lemonade.
Although he is standing on the threshold of a man's world, he won't turn 21 until October 11. He's still a kid at heart who enjoys PlayStation 2 basketball, burning CDs and collecting action figures. He loves history; he recalls going to Washington, D.C., as a high school junior as "one of the best trips I've ever been on." He hasn't started his professional football career, but he already is thinking about what he'll do when it ends.
"After football, that's when my life is going to really take off," he says. "I'm going to act in some movies. I'm going to coach high school football and teach history. My biggest thing is I'm trying to do is get my voice on a Disney movie. I really want to do that."
The most influential people in Suggs' life have been his father, Donald, and his mother, LaVerne, with whom he has a special bond. They share the same birthday.
LaVerne told Terrell he was chosen by God to help his family. On his left biceps, Suggs has a tattoo with a big "S" and the words "The Chosen One." One of the pearls of wisdom LaVerne imparted to Terrell was never be afraid to dream. "She told me to aim for the moon," he says, "because if you miss, you'll at least be among the stars."
John Wrenn, the football coach at Hamilton High School in the Phoenix suburb of Chandler, also is responsible for shaping Suggs. Before his senior year, Suggs transferred to Hamilton and rushed for 2,274 yards and 26 touchdowns.
Wrenn was both coach and mentor to Suggs. He was the driving force behind Terrell's academic turnaround. As a senior, Suggs needed a mix of A's and B's in his core classes to be eligible for college. That required taking a Saturday morning English class from 8 a.m. to noon. So on the mornings after football games, Wrenn made the 30-minute drive from his house to pick up Terrell, arriving at 6:30 a.m. Sometimes, he'd have to knock on Terrell's bedroom window to wake him up. Of course, on the way to school they had to make a stop at a Jack in the Box.
Suggs persevered and ended up with a 3.5 GPA as a senior. He also credits Wrenn with changing his work ethic and arrogant attitude as an athlete during his year at Hamilton. "I was a knucklehead when I showed up, and I left as a young man," Suggs says.
He now is on the verge of becoming a rich young man. Recently, Suggs stood in the board room at Wichard's headquarters in Pacific Palisades, Calif., and was measured for the suit he will wear on April 26, the first day of the draft. A cut-up tape of all 44 of Suggs' career sacks plays on a big-screen television as Suggs looks through pictures of the clothier's clients. "I want that one in platinum," he says, selecting a $1,395 ensemble.
When commissioner Paul Tagliabue announces his selection, Suggs will cut as striking a figure on stage as he does on a football field. Later that night, Suggs and Wichard will sit down to a celebratory dinner. Egg whites will not be served.
E-mail senior writer Dennis Dillon at
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