Coming Back Stronger

by Drew Brees

  San Diego had the first pick in the second round. Little did I know they had actually tried to trade up to get me late in the first round, but no one would trade with them. They were sure that I wouldn’t be available to them in the second round. But there I was, still watching, still waiting.

  Finally the phone rang. It was John Butler, general manager for the Chargers. I was going to San Diego! They chose me with the first pick of the second round, the thirty-second pick overall. Of course I would have liked to have been drafted higher, but I was happy about going to San Diego. I loved John and the coaching staff he had put together. His résumé spoke for itself. He had been with the Buffalo Bills for many years, including four consecutive trips to the Super Bowl in the early nineties. He had also brought in Doug Flutie a few weeks earlier as the starting quarterback. In my mind—and a lot of people would agree with me—Doug Flutie was a legend. I was five years old when he threw that legendary Hail Mary for Boston College to beat Miami in 1984. There was so much I could learn from this guy, and with no pressure to immediately come in as the starter, I could relax and get indoctrinated gradually. Plus, I would have the opportunity to play with some of the greatest to ever play the game—LaDainian Tomlinson, Junior Seau, and Rodney Harrison.

  I hopped on a plane to San Diego to meet with head coach Mike Riley and answer questions from the media. As I tried to wrap my brain around my new reality, I realized something: I could get stuck in disappointment because I hadn’t gone in the first round like I’d envisioned, or I could be thankful I’d landed in the right place. Sometimes it’s not how you get to your destination that’s most important. The key is ending up in the right place—on the right team, in the right situation, with the right opportunity. I felt that God had put me in San Diego for a reason. A new adventure was about to begin.

  Second-String

  As soon as training camp was underway, one thing was clear: I was the backup. In fact, I was competing for a spot on the team, as far as I was concerned. Dave Dickenson was making a run for the backup quarterback role, and I had my work cut out for me. Doug Flutie, the former Heisman Trophy winner and free agent who had been acquired by the Chargers, would be the starting quarterback. I played in only one game all year—when Flutie got a concussion—and even then, it was only for about half of the game. But I was watching Doug and taking notes.

  Doug Flutie was a mentor to me; he did so much for my career and my development as a young player. I loved the way he played the game—with a fire and passion to win like I’d never seen before. I’m sure that’s why he played professional football for so long—over twenty years in three different leagues. We were friends then, and we are to this day. He really cared about me as a person and as a player—I don’t think he saw me as a threat. When I became a Charger, I wanted to help Doug and the rest of the team. My goal was to work my tail off and play as well as I could, and if I was good enough to play, great. If I wasn’t good enough, then I wouldn’t play. I just wanted to play my best, and I think Doug respected that.

  Flutie was tough. He’s a small guy—only five-nine. He’ll tell you he’s five-ten, but don’t believe him. He’s five-nine and 180 pounds. But what he lacks in height, he makes up for in heart, athletic ability, and a supercompetitive nature. Mentally he’s as tough as they come, and physically he can’t be kept down. You can knock him around all you want, but he’s going to get back up and fight. A great example of this came during the 2002 training camp. In a freak accident during practice, someone ran into Doug on the sideline and separated his shoulder. He jumped up, brushed himself off, and didn’t tell anyone about the injury until two weeks later. Meanwhile, he kept slinging the ball around as if nothing had happened. That was Doug.

  Early in that season Doug revealed something interesting to me that must have come from his experience in Buffalo. He said, “I’ve learned to never take myself out of a game and to never let someone else take you out of a game. Do whatever you can to prevent injury, but if you do get hurt, fight through whatever you can. Never give your backup the opportunity to see the field because you might not get back out there again.”

  In Buffalo, Doug had experienced a divided locker room, where half the players wanted Rob Johnson as quarterback and the other half wanted Doug. There were stories of heated rivalries within the team, and when Doug came to San Diego, he wanted to be as far away from that as possible. I had heard about that situation secondhand, and although Doug and I would compete fiercely for the starting job the next year, we could not have been better friends during our four years together.

  In the 2000 season, the year before I arrived, San Diego had a 1–15 record—about as bad as you can get. The year I joined the team, Flutie led the team to a 5–2 start before losing the last nine games of the season. It was disappointing to all of us, but it was still an improvement. The next year Mike Riley was let go as head coach, and Marty Schottenheimer was hired. My world was about to change.

  Valentine’s Day Amour

  The past several years had been a whirlwind for Brittany and me. Between finishing school, getting drafted, and playing my first season in the NFL, it seemed like we’d barely had time to catch our breath, let alone spend much quality time together. We decided to take our first big trip as a couple, and we settled on Europe: London, Italy, Normandy, and Paris. We started making the plans together, but what Brittany didn’t know was that I was also making plans to propose.

  I made sure we were in Paris on Valentine’s Day. I’d practiced my proposal speech over and over—I knew exactly what I was going to say. And I was going to say it in French. I wish I could tell you what I said because I am quite proud of my memorization, but it was for her ears only. Although Brittany had taken six years of French classes in high school and college, I wasn’t sure she’d be able to understand my pronunciation. But I figured once I got down on one knee, she’d catch on pretty quickly.

  I had done research and talked to the concierge to find the perfect restaurant. It made me nervous having never been there before. I’m a visual person, and I like to see all the factors so I can anticipate what’s going to happen. I tried to imagine the restaurant’s layout and the setting for the proposal, but there were still some unknowns.

  When we arrived at Le Petit Bofinger, we were seated at a table for two. I had the ring in my coat pocket. I took off my coat and placed it on the back of the bench where she was sitting. We relived the highlights from the day—our tour of Notre Dame Cathedral and some of our favorite painters and sculptors from the stroll through the Louvre. I was waiting for the right time. Finally I said, “Hey, babe, reach into my coat pocket and grab the map. Let’s figure out where we’re going tomorrow.”

  She reached in and suddenly pulled her hand back out as if she’d found something crawling in there. “The map’s not in there,” she said.

  “Are you sure? Check one more time.” I knew full well the ring box was waiting for her in that pocket. Again she insisted the map was not in that pocket and began to check the other pockets in my coat.

  “Check that pocket again, sweetie.”

  “It’s not there.” She shoved the coat my way for me to find the map.

  “Baby, just pull out what’s in there.”

  She was kind of flustered at that point, but she reached in and pulled out the box. While she was concentrating on that, I slipped onto one knee next to her. I took out the ring and put it on her finger, proposing in my best Texas French. She was wiping away the tears. I was crying too. It was a good thing I’d practiced so much—somehow the words came out perfectly.

  What we didn’t know at the time was that a couple from Canada was sitting behind us to our right. Brittany and I were so oblivious, we had no idea there was a single other person in the restaurant. The husband saw me go down on my knee, and he must have been a Boy Scout—always prepared—because he pulled out his camera and took a picture.

  Six months later I got the picture in the mail. There would be many more good sna
pshots to come.

  A New Coach, a New Season

  When I got back from the trip, I was introduced to our new coach, Marty Schottenheimer. I loved the guy from the start. I’d still run through a wall for him. But when I started out, I was a young quarterback who needed to learn, grow, mature, and develop. He was a hard-nosed football coach who knew only one way. He helped toughen me up mentally and emotionally. He talked about the great quarterbacks he had coached in the past—guys like Bernie Kosar, Joe Montana, and Rich Gannon. I just hoped he would be talking about me like that someday.

  Marty was passionate about coaching. He always wore his emotions on his sleeve. If he was talking about somebody he cared about, he’d get choked up. He’d cry at half the team meetings too—that was just his personality. And if you were sitting in the front row, your chances of catching some of his saliva on your forehead from the speech he was giving were pretty good. Behind that passion was always a very articulate and specific message. Marty was a great communicator and motivator, and he had an old-school mentality of taking pride in being tough. That was one of the things we loved about him. “We’re gonna pound the ball! We’re gonna play great defense! And we’re gonna hit ’em in the mouth.” That was saying it nicely.

  At training camp in the summer of 2002, Marty introduced a new set of coaches: Cam Cameron, Brian Schottenheimer, and Pete Carmichael. Marty sized up the quarterback situation and said, “Competition’s open, Drew and Doug. And whoever wins this job will have earned it—I can promise you that.”

  Doug and I battled it out that preseason. Doug was a fierce competitor, and his desire to keep the job made me better. Competition seems to bring out the best in everyone. By the time regular season began, I was named starting quarterback. To be perfectly honest, I think it was dead even between me and Doug. But the fact was, he was forty years old and I was twenty-three. Marty seemed to like the upside of the young buck, although he could certainly appreciate the fight the old dog still had in him. I started every game that year.

  Then came a pivotal moment in a matchup against Buffalo, the fourteenth game of the season. We had gotten off to a blistering start that year, winning six of our first seven games, but now we were stalled. After a tough few weeks, we had an 8–5 record and still had a good shot at making the playoffs. We were losing to the Bills at Orchard Park, New York. Nobody on our team was playing well. I know I wasn’t. In the fourth quarter Marty came up to me on the sideline and said, “I’m going to pull you, and I’m going to put Flutie in.”

  I knew Doug had some loaded history with the Bills after his time playing there. He was pretty pumped up for the game, and I could understand that. But I couldn’t believe that Marty would take me out. So I voiced my displeasure.

  “We just need a spark right now,” Marty said. “I think Doug can do that for us.”

  I could understand it from a coaching perspective, but I also remembered what Doug had told me about not letting your backup see the field. This was the first time anybody had pulled me out of a game like that. Coaches had taken me out because we were up by four touchdowns, more of a “Hey, great job—you’re done for the day” kind of thing. But this wasn’t a reward; this was pulling me for somebody else. And I wasn’t about to let that happen.

  “No, I’m not coming out,” I said.

  Marty recognized the fire in me and said, “You’re still the starter. It’s just for this game.”

  I was angry and hurt, and I kept pushing. “No, you can’t do this. This is my team. I’m not coming out.”

  He said, “Oh yes, you are. Doug is in.”

  I fought Marty really hard, but there’s a point when you finally have to relent to the head coach. There was nothing I could say or do to change his mind. I realized I had to accept his decision and support the team.

  We wound up losing our last four games and went 8–8 that year. Once again we missed the playoffs. But as we assessed the past few seasons, we could see a gradual improvement in the team. We had gone from winning one game to five games to eight games. That progression gave us hope for the next year. Our talent level was off the charts, and so were our expectations.

  A Low Point in My Career

  But in 2003, things didn’t work out as planned. Looking back, I can see how the adversity of that season helped prepare me for better things down the road, but it was excruciating at the time. I was still a young player, with much to learn about playing in the big leagues. Going into that season, we were as talented a team as I’d ever known, and the expectation was playoffs or bust. Unfortunately, it ended up being a huge bust. Injuries plagued us all season long, but the real problem was our youth, inexperience, and lack of leadership. When things started going downhill early in the season with a 0–5 start, the finger-pointing began.

  No one wanted to admit they were at fault, so instead, players went around blaming everyone else. Cliques began forming on the team, and people would either bash the coaches or talk about the other guys behind their backs. The negativity became like a disease that spread throughout our team and infected us all to the point that we were completely dysfunctional. There was so much distrust in each other and in the system that the young guys didn’t know who to follow.

  The fact is, we were all to blame. Especially me, because it’s my job as a quarterback to squash that kind of stuff the minute it rears its ugly head. But I was young and probably not equipped to handle it at the time. Still, you live and learn. Sometimes you have to go through some deep valleys in order to climb the next mountain.

  The lowest point of that season came in the eighth game of the year. We were 1–6 and playing at Chicago. The minute I got into the game, I began putting intense pressure on myself. I desperately wanted things to turn around with this game. I knew I needed to relax and just play, but I couldn’t loosen up. This led to forced throws, and I played terribly for the first three quarters.

  Near the end of the third quarter, we were down 13–0. Chicago had just kicked a field goal, putting us behind by two scores. If we were going to win, I knew we needed a big momentum shift. And it was up to me to create it.

  After playing poorly the whole game, I saw this as my opportunity to come in and fix things, just like I’d done in college many times before. Cam Cameron, our offensive coordinator, called the play—a pass to wide receiver Tim Dwight—and I hesitated. I was lacking a bit of confidence, so I didn’t turn the ball loose and fire it in there like I should have. The throw was late, and the ball got knocked down. Incomplete.

  On second down, another pass play was called, so I went through my read and threw it out in the flat. LaDainian Tomlinson got pushed out-of-bounds almost immediately for a short three-yard gain. So now we were third and seven, in Chicago territory. We called a pass play, and I felt confident we would get the first down. Tim Dwight ran the route again, and like most routes in an NFL offense, it required trust and timing for it to work—neither of which I had at that moment. Tim ran a nine-yard stop route, a pass I normally could complete in my sleep. He was open, and I threw it, but again my lack of confidence caused me to airmail the ball high and behind him. I was so afraid of making a mistake or making a bad throw that ironically, that’s what inevitably happened. When you think negative thoughts, negative things usually happen. On the flip side, when you think positively and visualize success, that’s usually what you get. It’s amazing how that works. Tim tried to recover to make the catch, but the ball slipped through his fingers. Incomplete again. Fourth down.

  As I jogged off the field, reality set in. That was my opportunity to save my job, and I blew it. I realized I was about to get benched.

  I got to the sideline, and sure enough Marty Schottenheimer came up to me. “I’m pulling you. Doug’s in.” I could see in Marty’s eyes that he was ready for a fight. He was remembering that game in Buffalo and the fire I’d shown him. He was expecting me to get in his face and refuse to come out of the game.

  But by that point I was defeated mentally and emoti
onally. In my entire professional career, I’d never been this low. So instead of fighting with him, I just took off my helmet. “I understand.”

  As I headed to the bench, I thought about my quarterbacks coach from Purdue, Greg Olson, who was now the quarterbacks coach for the Bears. He was a mentor to me, not only in my growth as a quarterback, but also in my maturity as a person. He’d been key in helping me approach the game professionally and develop a strong work ethic. We’d spent countless hours at Purdue studying film, with Coach Olson guiding me through each play, each mistake, so I could learn from it.

  Knowing my former coach was across the field had been added incentive for me to play well that game. I wanted to impress him and show him that all his hard work was for a purpose. And now, instead of excelling, I’d just been benched.

  We ended up losing to Chicago 20–7. Doug Flutie finished out the game at quarterback and led us on a scoring drive capped off by a LaDainian Tomlinson touchdown, but it was too little, too late. It was a devastating loss, bringing our record to 1–7. After the game, I was more disheartened than I’d ever been. The little confidence I’d had left seemed to have dried up. I walked across the field and found Greg. I saw the hurt in his eyes. He’s hurting for me.

  “Hey, things are going to be okay,” Greg said, putting his arm around me. He continued to try to console me as I nodded to acknowledge his efforts.

  I was fighting back tears. I felt lost. Suddenly something came over me—sort of a courageous feeling. I stepped back and looked him dead in the eyes. With my chin still quivering a bit, I choked out, “I’m going to be a great player in this league someday.”