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From draft day to rookie camp, small-town player gets his chance

Discussion in 'AFC East Rivals' started by ATVZ400, May 12, 2008.

  1. ATVZ400

    ATVZ400 Senior Member

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    Mar 22, 2008
    parts unknown, NJ
    Xavier Omon, a sixth-round draftee out of Northwest Missouri State, has a sought-after combination of size, speed and sure hands.

    KANSAS CITY INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT: The rookie has two bags, an MP3 player and a ticket he's eyeballing like a straight-flush poker hand. He fetches a ride with his girlfriend, because his old green clunker died months ago. She tells him she loves him, and that she'll see him in three days.


    They know, as they say goodbye in a crowded hallway near the security gate, that his life is about to change.

    It's just the way Xavier Omon always wanted it. As a sophomore at Beatrice High School in southeastern Nebraska, he told a handful of people -- only the ones he trusted -- that someday he'd be an NFL running back. But life, for the first 23 years at least, has been far less hopeful. He was 8 when his brother was killed by a drunken driver; he was 14 when another brother committed suicide.

    Division I football snubbed him, recognition eluded him, but none of that matters now because Omon is holding a plane ticket to rookie camp. He's dressed in gray pants and an Ecko sweatshirt. He knows it's the fanciest outfit he'll need for his first week in the NFL.

    good read
    link to story
    http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=3387460
     

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