And there were no girls around. That was probably the most important part. The other undrafted guys and I didn’t talk much while we ate - it was weird sitting at a table full of guys you were competing with for such a small set of roster spots.
Professional football teams come in to training camp with about a hundred guys on the team. By the time the 4 preseason games were over, a little under four weeks from now, that number would decrease to around 60. In the couple days before the season began, the team would have to cut even more people, down to the maximum of 53.
And there were plenty of people on the team who had guaranteed roster spots - the veterans who formed the backbone of the team. There was room of course for someone to come in and blow the doors off the team and steal a roster spot, but that didn’t happen often.
The Patriots had 35 roster spots pretty much spoken for, leaving 18 spots to divide among about 60 guys, all of whom needed this in order to make their dreams of a professional football life come true.
That kind of scarcity was really good at creating competition, and in this situation, competition didn’t really breed friendships. Especially between people who did the same thing.
I was a wide receiver - my job was to catch the ball when the quarterback threw it to me, no matter what, and then head as close to the end zone as possible. Sometimes, in crunch situations, instead of the end zone I was supposed to get out of bounds to stop the clock.
It sounded pretty easy, but it wasn’t, because while I was trying to catch the ball and make a play, the other team’s defenders were hell-bent on taking me down and stopping me in my tracks.
Luckily for me, and now for the Patriots, I was damn good at what I do. Best receiver in all of college football by a country mile. No one else could get out of a cornerback’s range faster than me, and safeties would chase ghosts before they could even find me on the field.
So that was a leg up on the competition, but it was no guarantee. If I didn’t perform on the practice field and in the preseason games, I’d be out on the street again.
After lunch we had another meeting, then we were off to the practice field. Practice was brutal, but it felt great to be out on the field again after months without.
Not too much happened that first day - some speeches by the coaches, some pep talks about big expectations for the season, a lot of administrative stuff. The coaches made it clear - we were expected to know the playbook inside and out in the next couple days so they could start installing and running through the more complicated parts of the offense.
Ugh, more studying. I thumbed through the iPad, looking at the playbook, and starting to memorize it, but man, there was a lot here. In college things were way easier. A big part of our playbook was “throw the ball to Drake,” and it had served us pretty well.
After practice, we had another meal and we were done for the day. Lily and I met for the first of our interviews - it was nothing exciting, just her asking questions about me on camera. No time for me to flirt with her at all, she was all business.
But damn, did she look fine. I had so much trouble concentrating on the questions she was asking me - all I could do was imagine her in a tight body-hugging dress, the faint outline of lace underneath, and imagine undressing her slowly.
OK, not too slowly - if I ever got my hands on that girl, I doubt I would be able to go slow at all. I would need to bend her over and stuff my cock into her as fast as possible.
The second day passed by just as quickly, and all of a sudden it was night time. I was tired as fuck from the morning session in the weight room and the afternoon practice on the field, but even though I wanted nothing more than to collapse into bed, I couldn’t wait for my dinner with Lily.
The best part of my day until the evening? When Lily had texted me and asked me when and where we should meet. Smart girl. I knew Lily and I couldn’t really walk around the facility dressed up like we were going out, not on a ‘school night,’ as it were, and I had a curfew too, so we had to get this show on the road. I had replied with a location and time, and I spent the rest of the afternoon looking up at every available clock I passed by.
It reminded me of school, but back in school I had always looked at the clocks because I was bored, and in a hurry to get to the practice field or the game.
Now I was eager to get away from football just so I could spend time with a girl?! And a girl who didn’t even like me very much? What was happening to me?
Was I…maturing? Nah, that couldn’t be it. Getting mature was overrated in my book - why do it when I could keep being a big kid like I always had? Seemed to work so far, why mess with a good thing?