finale

“By far the most challenging thing I’ve ever done,” Reitz says.
Other college basketball players had landed successfully in the NFL without college football, including San Diego Pro Bowl tight end
Antonio Gates, who played basketball at Kent State, another MAC school. Yet as much as Reitz fought it, doubt would creep in at
times. There were sleepless nights, the seeming absurdity of it all crashing against him in ways a 300-pound defender never could.
“Sometimes in the middle of the grind,” Reitz says, “you don’t always see the light at the end of the tunnel.”
Jill, back in Kalamazoo finishing her senior year, offered long-distance support. They talked on the phone every night, often praying
together for most of the call.
“It was really rough,” she remembers. “It was his first taste of the NFL and he’d never been through anything like that before.
Sometimes, all I could do was listen.”
The long road home
Dreams of becoming the next Gates vanished quickly. Baltimore’s coaches were blunt: If Reitz had a future in the NFL, it was on the
offensive line.
"About a week in, they told me to start eating, to start working on my blocking," Reitz recalls.
Gaining weight was never a problem. In college, he'd run three miles a day in the summers to keep his weight down for basketball.
"So putting weight on for me wasn't as hard as some people might have figured," he says.
But progress was slow. He spent two years on the Ravens’ practice squad, adding 70 pounds to his frame, living in the film room,
heeding advice from veterans.
Reitz spent a third training camp with the team, in 2010, before being cut. Miami claimed him, then cut him three days later to make
room for a kick-return specialist.
With his NFL dreams hanging by a thread, Reitz planned to return to Baltimore, where he’d battle for a spot on the practice squad. But
there was no guarantee how long that would last.
Sitting in the Miami airport, he texted Hawkins.
“Coach,” he wrote, “I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
But before he boarded his flight, his phone buzzed. The Colts wanted him at practice the next day.
Reitz called his dad. “You’re never going to believe this ...” he began.
Said Dave Reitz, “By the end of our conversation, I had tears in my eyes. To get a chance to play, and play for your hometown team ...
it was just the neatest two-minute phone call ever.”
Reitz spent 2010 on the Colts’ practice squad before earning a starting spot at tackle for last season’s opener. He remained with the
starting unit for nine games before injuries hampered the rest of his rookie year.
Healthy and revived for a new season, he figures to play an important role as a young offense meshes with its rookie quarterback. He's
currently listed as a back-up at left guard to Jeff Linkenbach but has spent most of this week practicing with the first unit at training
camp in Anderson.
He’s a full-time football player now, content even if his journey ends tomorrow.
“I guess in a way I’ve been able to live out both my dreams,” Reitz said. “I got to play basketball for four years. Now I get to play
football for a living.”
Said Jill: “I always believed something better would come along. I just never thought it would be this.”