SNELLVILLE -- Falcons placekicker Jason Elam pointed to the spot at midfield about 20 yards away from where he was standing on Friday at Brookwood Community Stadium and thought back in time 23 years.
His high school coach at Brookwood, Dave Hunter, had told him to go and sit down. Elam thought he was in trouble and went over to the bench as instructed. That spring of 1986 Elam had been practicing as a split end.
“Son, you’re going to have your education paid for,” Elam recalled Hunter telling him. “I don’t want you to do nothing else but kick.”
And that was the beginning of what has been a 17-year NFL career in which Elam ranks fifth in league history in both field goals made and points and which Elam said has exceeded his dreams. Perhaps it was appropriate, then, that the Falcons dubbed Friday’s scrimmage “Friday Night Lights.”
Friday was the fourth incarnation of the event, which began as part of a weekend afternoon football festival at Piedmont Park and at Grady High School in Atlanta, the brainchild of Owner and CEO Arthur Blank.
Last year the scrimmage took place at Gwinnett County’s Mill Creek High. Falcons director of event marketing Roddy White said the team has three criteria for where it holds the event each year: the location must be in proximity to the team’s practice facility in Flowery Branch to allow a morning practice, it must be able to accommodate the large crowds and it has to have a grass field – a prerequisite of Head Coach Mike Smith’s.
The event is part of a two-day Allstate All-Access Weekend. The offense won this year's scrimmage, 37-34 with Jerious Norwood, Thomas Brown and Michael Jenkins scoring touchdowns.
“It’s a great occasion,” said Allstate Southeast Region Field Vice President Cliff Butler. “We love the partnership.”
On Friday an overflow crowd of 12,316 came out to Brookwood. Among them were Elam’s wife and children and his mother, Evelyn. Elam’s brother Mark was supposed to attend but could not find a parking spot. So his mother suggested he drive to her house about a mile away and walk.
Asked if she thought Jason would ever achieve what he has in football, Evelyn Elam responded, “Oh, heavens no.”
“He was always good in sports,” she said. “He didn’t go out for football until high school. He played soccer and swam and ran track. He went to a football game and he came home and said, ‘I think I’ll play football.’ I said, ‘You don’t know a thing about football.’ He said, ‘I think I can kick.’ So it started from there.”
Evelyn Elam said she told her son never to get a big head because he could “pull a muscle and it’s all over.”
Hunter recalled that Elam could bench press 310 pounds and could run the 40 in 4.6 seconds. Elam’s senior year was Hunter’s first at Brookwood. It wasn’t until the ensuing years that the program began to compete for state championships, grew in popularity to the point where the 10,000-seat stadium was erected and the program began to serve as a model for its neighbors to emulate, turning Gwinnett County football into the envy of the rest of the state.
Hunter remembers a 52-yard field goal that Elam made against Johnson High of Gainesville and a 63-yarder that he missed against Newton County, but not because it wasn’t strong enough. Hunter said Elam is someone who is “always cognitive of his roots.”
The two have stayed in touch over the years and have a running debate about something that happened at a practice during Elam’s senior year.
As Elam lined up for a long field goal, Hunter threw down a $100 bill. Elam made the attempt, but Hunter snapped up the bill before the kicker could get to it. Hunter said he challenged Elam to go double or nothing and won the money back.
Elam doesn’t remember it that way. He said Hunter still owes him.
As the offense and defense scrimmaged, Elam stood on the sideline, laughing and reminiscing, saying that he had probably kicked thousands of balls on the field. Elam said his only coach in high school was Clay Cox, who kicked for Brookwood before Elam did. Cox is now a representative to the Georgia General Assembly from Augusta and remains one of Elam’s closest friends.
“To this day, he’s still been my best coach,” Elam said. “I still call him up and talk to him about technique and stuff.”
For someone who has made Pro Bowls and has won Super Bowls, Elam still got a kick out of coming home.
“It was a dream to be able to do something like this,” he said. “I’m not trying to be cheesy or anything like this, I’m fulfilling a dream here. It’s pretty special. To be able to come back, I never dreamed that this would be able to happen.”
Day Seven -- Friday, Aug. 7, 2009
10:15 a.m. Practice/Friday Night Lights
@FalconsJMoore "Words of the Day"
- VIDEO: Head Coach Mike Smith | Ferguson
- FEATURE: Memories stir for Elam at Friday Night Lights
- BLOGS: J. Michael Moore's blog posts from Aug. 7, 2009
- LIVE BLOG: Live notes from Friday Night Lights
- PHOTOS: Photos from Friday Night Lights (Flickr)
Email
Facebook
Twitter