Wrestling with the Devil

by Lex Luger

  Was this really the best thing to do? I wondered. On the one hand, the experience in the CFL would probably prepare me well for the NFL. But maybe it would be better to finish out my college career first, if there was any chance of doing that. Before I made my final decision, I decided to make a phone call.

  I called the coach who had recruited me to Miami, telling him that I had received a contract offer from the Alouettes.

  “Could you find out if there is any chance I could come back and finish at Miami?” I asked him.

  “I’ll get back to you,” he said.

  I didn’t have to wait long for the answer—I was most definitely not welcome. I had slammed the door in Miami, and they had dead-bolted it for good measure. And to add insult to injury, he let me know that Coach Saban said I wasn’t ready for the pros. In his opinion, I didn’t have enough seasoning to even be considered.

  After talking with my family about the unexpected offer, I conferred with my “other” family. My job at the club was lucrative moneywise, but it wasn’t getting me closer to my dream of being a professional athlete.

  “Playing in the CFL seems like a good opportunity,” I said between bites of steak and eggs. “I know it’s not the NFL, but . . .”

  “Personally, I don’t enjoy the cold weather in Montreal,” my Mob friend said with a smile. “But, hey! If you want to play pro football, then go for it.”

  That’s all I needed to hear. His vote of confidence helped me make up my mind.

  Before we left the diner, he said, “And if it doesn’t work out, come back to Florida. There will always be a job for you here with us.”

  I appreciated all of their support and knew that I would miss our early-morning banter when I left for training camp in a couple of months.

  One night in March I was busy working the door at the club when suddenly I did a double take. “Peggy?” She and her best friend were standing in front of me. She had said she might be coming down to Florida for spring break, but it was still a surprise to see her.

  We hugged each other, but I could tell by the look on her friend’s face that she did not support any type of reunion between us. Thankfully, she went inside while Peggy stayed outside to talk for a few minutes. I was still on the clock, so I told Peggy to go ahead and enjoy herself. Throughout the night, she’d come out and spend some time with me before returning inside.

  Even though it was wonderful to see her again, I played it cool.

  For the rest of her stay in Florida, I spent as much time with Peggy as possible. Toward the end of the week, I remember talking about our relationship as we strolled hand in hand on the beach. We both realized that we were meant to be together. We decided to get married when Peggy finished school. Nothing could have made me happier.

  The contract was in the Alouettes’ hands, and it was time to start packing. But it wasn’t only my belongings I was thinking of. I had to pack on some serious muscle before I arrived at camp.

  My body weight had dropped twenty-five pounds since leaving Miami—I was now about 235. Even though I was heading to the gym daily, I didn’t have the luxury of continuous workouts combined with the nonstop feasting that I had enjoyed at the Miami athletes’ training table. And the hot weather made it even harder to keep weight on.

  I had always had a fast metabolism and was often kidded by family and friends about how much food I could put away. In my senior year of high school, my voracious appetite earned me the title of the class’s “biggest eater,” along with my female counterpart, a petite figure skater. We were featured together in a yearbook photograph that showed us lying in mounds of ice cream sandwiches and bags of potato chips. It was pretty common for me to swing by McDonald’s between lunch and dinner and grab a Big Mac, a Filet-O-Fish sandwich, a Quarter Pounder with cheese, a large order of French fries, an apple pie, and a milk shake for a “snack.” Whenever I went out for pizza with my friends, I would order my own large deep-dish pan pizza with all the toppings and a pitcher of Coca-Cola—just for me.

  Now, I had only a couple of months before I had to report to the Alouettes camp. I needed to gain weight in a hurry. At the time, most pro offensive linemen carried between 265 and 285 pounds, unlike today’s players, who are well over 300.

  For the first time in my life, I considered steroids. Everybody knew who to ask at the local gym. It wasn’t an easy decision, though. I had taken personal pride in the fact that I had never touched a steroid before and had managed to break records at Miami without them. But in this instance, with time so short, I thought I might need help. When he sold me the bottle of little blue pills called Dianabol, he assured me it would work.

  “Take five pills a day for eight weeks. Eat all the food you can, especially protein, and it will help you put on a few pounds.”

  He was right. I put on about twenty pounds and arrived in Montreal weighing a respectable 255.

  Since I came to the team without anyone actually seeing me in person, I went through the standard evaluations that included everything from my bench-press strength to my speed. My forty-yard dash time, 4.6 seconds, got the same reaction as it had when I was in third grade. The coaches were looking at their stopwatches, and then looking at me. They called the head coach over and asked me to run it again. Still the same time. Everyone was shaking their heads. For most linemen at the time, running forty yards in under five seconds was unusual. The test results, coupled with my bodybuilder-type physique, caught their attention.

  That didn’t mean a spot on the team was mine. The CFL allowed only fifteen Americans per team—fewer spots than I had originally thought. Somehow they forgot to mention that little detail before I signed the contract. I was going to be competing against veteran US players who had either been on the team’s roster already or who were coming from the NFL to claim spots. Not only was I the only rookie player at my position in camp, I was a rookie with limited football experience—a total of five college games. It didn’t help that the other seven or eight offensive linemen I saw (all of whom were impressive) were also American. Vying for those two coveted spots was going to be a monumental task, especially with two incumbents in the running.

  One returning standout was four-time CFL all-star Dan Yochum. He and future Montreal all-star Doug Payton were both Americans. I started doing the math. The Alouettes would probably keep only two American offensive linemen. Most of the roster spots reserved for Americans were for the speedy skill positions. My back was to the wall. My NCAA eligibility had gone out the window the minute I signed the Alouettes’ contract and dropped it in the mail. If they cut me, I wasn’t sure what my next plan would be.

  Offensive line coach Jim Erkenbeck turned out to be perfect for me. With his distinctive gravelly voice, he was a retired Marine who had survived both the Korean War and cancer. Erkenbeck took an immediate liking to me. He wanted me—a long shot—to make the team.

  The Alouettes threw me into positions all over special teams—including kickoff coverage and punt coverage. Both units relied on speed and toughness; I wanted to make every play count.

  That was especially true in my last preseason game. My job was to be the wedge buster—decimating the three players running in tandem in front of the ball carrier—so my teammates could make the tackle. It’s not for the faint of heart; in a matter of seconds, you experience one of the most violent collisions in the game of football. I ran full throttle for thirty to forty yards downfield and hit one of the players in the wedge with such force that I pushed him backward five yards into the ball carrier and took them both down.

  Watching the film later with the whole team, the defensive coordinator replayed the clip of that play about five times, marveling each time. “I’ve never seen this before,” he said, laughing. “It’s not what we coached, but it was highly effective.”

  I was young and plenty raw on my football skills, but Coach Erkenbeck saw nothing but potential in me. Still, when I learned that I had made the team as a third offensive lineman, I was totally amazed
. All of twenty years old when I got the news, I think I was the youngest American ever to play for Montreal.

  Not only did the coach take me under his wing, but so did the Alouettes’ all-pro defensive end Junior Ah You. Since I had had such an abbreviated college career, pass blocking was relatively new to me. During practice Junior would tell me what I was doing right and what I was doing wrong, and he even worked with me after practice. It was a fast learning curve, but extremely valuable. Both men helped me tremendously.

  I played the first game of the regular season, and then was “hidden” on the injured reserve list. That strategy worked in Montreal’s and my favor when Dan Yochum was injured in the play-offs. I was activated to play in the CFL’s Super Bowl, the Grey Cup game. At left offensive tackle, I was facing the top defensive lineman in the entire CFL, Dave Fennell. A perennial all-everything for the Edmonton Eskimos, Fennell (nicknamed “Dr. Death”) looked incredible on film.

  Playing in the Grey Cup in my rookie season? The whole scenario was surreal. On game day, I was fired up, but I was also just hoping to survive. I had a major case of the butterflies. I wasn’t sure how I would match up against a player called Dr. Death. I would soon find out if all that extra practice with Junior had paid off.

  Early in the game on a running play, I drove Fennell downfield and pancaked him into the turf. From that point on, I more than held my own against Dr. Death. I heard that he had been playing with a bad ankle or knee, but I was still excited that I had been able to contain him the entire game. Unfortunately, the Eskimos, led by future NFL Hall of Famer Warren Moon at quarterback, won 17–9. (I would learn later that Coach Saban had seen the televised game at a sports banquet. For me, it was sweet vengeance to prove him wrong about my readiness to play pro football.)

  It was great to end the season on such an exhilarating note, especially leading into a much-anticipated event—my wedding.

  The setting couldn’t have been more perfect when Peggy and I were married on December 15, 1979, at the Penn State University Eisenhower Chapel. Even the weather cooperated, with sunny skies and moderate temperatures. The chapel is intimate and beautiful, ideal for the fifty to seventy-five family members and friends who celebrated with us. Because it happened to be during semester exams, very few of my college friends were able to attend, but they all sent their best wishes.

  Peggy and I honeymooned in Hawaii for five weeks, staying in a gorgeous town house along the North Shore of Oahu, with a scenic ocean view. Junior Ah You helped me find an incredible deal since he and his family lived in Hawaii and were involved in the tourism industry.

  We swam, played a little tennis, spent time at the Polynesian Cultural Center, and took in as much of the natural beauty of the island as possible. Junior’s family made us feel welcome, and we’d often get together for pig roasts and barbecues. There was one unfortunate incident: one day as I charged into the ocean, doing my best Tarzan impersonation, my wedding ring flew off into the water. I grabbed snorkeling gear and hunted for two hours but never found it.

  As tempting as it was to stay longer in paradise, we did have to get back Stateside to prepare for my second season with the Alouettes. I consulted with athletes and other people who were knowledgeable about using steroids. Again, I didn’t take the decision lightly. I was concerned about possible long-term side effects. After a lot of discussion, I began an eight-week cycle of both Dianabol and Deca Durabolin (Deca), an injectable steroid, because I was told the two worked well together. Peggy wasn’t keen on me taking steroids. I assured her that I was taking them for only eight weeks for off-season strength and size gain.

  At training camp in May, I immediately noticed someone was missing.

  “Where’s Dan?”

  Dan Yochum was holding out while he negotiated new contract terms. When he and the team couldn’t reach an agreement before the final roster, he was gone.

  Our team had another good season and I played well, but we lost in the conference finals.

  Peggy wanted to work before we had kids and utilize her degree in speech-language pathology and audiology. She found a position at an elementary school in Syracuse, New York, for the winter of 1980–81, filling in for a woman on maternity leave.

  When Peggy was at school, I’d head off to the gym for two to three hours. My job was to eat and train, then eat and train some more. I approached both very seriously. I was a ravenous carnivore, wolfing down all kinds of protein—hamburgers, steak, fish, and chicken—usually with a big baked potato and salad on the side.

  Once again, I turned to my reliables—Dianabol and Deca—for my off-season training, this time for a twelve-week cycle. It was all part of my relentless quest to become bigger, stronger, and faster.

  The winter flew by, and I reported to training camp in early May 1981 for my third season in Montreal while Peggy finished out the school year. Peggy had enjoyed the experience, but she wanted to explore other career possibilities during the next off-season.

  I was the starting left tackle for the Alouettes, and after a few games I began to be bothered by a “stinger,” a nagging neck injury. I sat out for a couple of plays here and there, but I didn’t think it was anything serious.

  The team’s doctors and trainers had a different opinion. They wanted to give me a game or two off so my neck would heal. Coach Erkenbeck called me into his office and explained what was going to happen.

  “We love having you, Lar,” he said. “We just want you to rest your injury for a week or two. So we’re going to release you on waivers so we can fill a roster spot. It’s just the way we do things sometimes. Then we’ll re-sign you, and you’ll be back in action.”

  I immediately sensed an unexpected opportunity. As I calmly nodded at everything Coach Erkenbeck was saying, my mind was racing at warp speed. If temporarily I’m not under contract, then technically I would be a free agent until I re-sign.

  When I left the coach’s office, I immediately called an attorney back in Buffalo to clarify what my options were. It was just as I thought: I was under no obligation to re-sign with the Alouettes if I decided not to. It was the chance I had dreamed of—to play in the NFL.

  I didn’t attend the Alouettes’ practice the next day. When someone asked Coach Erkenbeck where I was, he summed it up well: “Larry took the money and ran.”

  Peg and I moved to Buffalo so I could prepare for my move to the NFL. I began working out with Don Reinhoudt, a world champion powerlifter and the 1979 winner of the World’s Strongest Man competition. We had met when I was in high school, and I considered him a mentor. I enjoyed pumping iron with him in his garage as I waited for the calls from the pros.

  The Green Bay Packers were the first team to fly me in for a workout in late January 1982. I didn’t know what to expect. I was weighed, measured, and tested on various skills such as vertical jump, standing broad jump, shuttle run, and the forty-yard dash. I got the “Are you kidding me?” look from the coaches when I finished. In nearly everything, I tested off the charts.

  The Packers immediately called me the next morning and offered me a free-agent contract, a two-year deal that paid me roughly $55,000 the first year and $65,000 the second, with an additional $10,000 signing bonus. “If you do well in camp,” they said, “you have a good chance of being our starting left guard.” I was thrilled.

  Everything was falling into place. Peggy was very supportive of my decision to join the team.

  I was back in Green Bay for my first NFL minicamp in May and quickly created quite a buzz. I had met head coach Bart Starr in January, but on a day-to-day basis I was working with two position coaches—Ernie McMillan and assistant offensive line coach Bill Meyers, an ex-Marine. Everyone was high on me.

  Unfortunately, in the first few days of training camp in July, I injured my left hip flexor and groin muscle, which sidelined me for most of the preseason. Every time I felt ready and tried to play, I would reinjure myself. I had gone from a feeling of elation to one of discouragement. With my performance suff
ering, I could tell the coaching staff was disappointed. The team eventually placed me on the injured reserve list during the 1982 season.

  I put my time on injured reserve to good use, spending hours lifting weights for my upper body while my injuries healed. When Coach Meyers would see me in the weight room, he’d make a sarcastic comment, such as, “Well, I sure wish you played football as seriously as you work out.” His intuition was right, of course—I did enjoy working out more than practicing football—but I wasn’t going to tell him. Still, I saw the handwriting on the wall: I felt that as long as he was my position coach, I was probably not going to play very much at Green Bay.

  In 1983 the upstart United States Football League (USFL) arrived on the sports scene, about to begin training camps. The Tampa Bay Bandits, who owned my USFL rights based on where I played collegiate ball, came knocking at my door. Once again, the timing seemed serendipitous. Tampa was a whole lot warmer than Green Bay (which was too cold even for a Buffalo guy like me), and I would avoid the possibility of being benched for most of the season. Before the final cuts at the Packers’ training camp, I decided to ask Bart Starr for my release.

  I told Coach Starr that I appreciated the opportunity the Packers had given me, but I didn’t think things were working out the way everyone planned. He thought about it, talked to his coaches, and granted my request. I was grateful. Within hours, the Buffalo Bills called, wanting to pick me up. It would have been fun to play for the team I had grown up watching, but I was already heading to Tampa with my CFL films.

  Once the staff went over the films, they signed me on the spot. I took a little pay cut, but that didn’t matter because I was back in Florida and playing Bandit Ball for head coach Steve Spurrier. It was time to finally settle down. Peggy and I bought our first house, one complete with three bedrooms, two and a half baths, a beautiful stone fireplace, and a screened-in backyard swimming pool.