Next Man Up
Chapter One
Unexpected Good-byes
January 3, 2005
FROM A DISTANCE, it looked like any other football Monday in Owings
Mills, Maryland. The coaches arrived early at the spectacular,
brandnew $32 million facility located at the optimistic address of 1
Winning Drive. They grabbed quick cups of coffee from the
first-floor cafeteria and headed up to their offices to begin their
day by preparing for their morning meeting. The players came later.
Like the coaches, they stopped in the cafeteria, but they sat at the
round tables in groups of three and four, eating lunch before
gathering in the posh auditorium that served as the meeting room
when the entire team was together.
But this was a Monday like no other in the nine-year history of the
Baltimore Ravens. There wasn't a soul in the organization who had
thought before the season began that this would be the day when
everyone said good-bye. In his first meeting with the entire team,
on the morning that the veterans' mandatory minicamp began in early
June, Coach Brian Billick had made his expectations clear: ... read full excerpt from: Next Man Up ebook
