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November 15, 2018

In My Words | Drew Wolitarsky

There’s a moment in most everyone’s football career when they have to make a choice: Do I keep going at this or do I quit and try something else?

The funny thing is, if you take too much time to contemplate the choice in front of you, it can quickly be all over and pass you by before you know it.

I think about that often because here I am today, I’m 23, it’s already my second year in the CFL and we’re just a couple of weeks from the end of the season. That’s why I’m so glad I made the decision to keep playing last year when I had that choice.

My road here to Winnipeg wasn’t conventional. Think about it – I was born in Santa Clarita, California, went to school at the University of Minnesota, and now I’m a national playing for the Blue Bombers.

All that is surreal to me, man. It’s really surreal.

So here’s my moment, that time when I had to make a choice…

It came last spring after I had been at the Minnesota Vikings rookie camp. They said they weren’t really interested and I was super bummed out about it. That’s when I texted my family to thank them for their support and then said I was going to keep my ears open for the next opportunity.

But my older brother Austin said, ‘Dude, I just don’t think you’re ready to hang up the cleats. I think you should go play somewhere. What about Canada?’

I didn’t really know anything about the CFL. I probably had watched one game in my life and didn’t even know about the different rules. I looked into it and thought it looked pretty fun.

My dad then said, “Yeah, and we have the ability to get your Canadian citizenship.’ I really didn’t know how important that was at the time, but I thought it would at least make it easier to be up here. The story of how I came to have Canadian connections has been told before, but I’ll mention it again here for context:

My mom was born in Montreal, she’s a true Quebecois. My dad is American, but moved to Montreal when he was three. My mom and dad went to the same school and my dad was actually best friends with my mom’s brother. They were just a couple of meatheads who loved to lift. My dad ended up coming back to the U.S. when he was older and my mom agreed to come with him, providing they got married. That’s how our family started in California.

It was after I began to explore playing in Canada that I came to understand how important those Canadian ties would be for me.

Believe it or not, the guy I was living with while I was at Minnesota, Sam Richter, was neighbours growing up with Marc Trestman. They lived in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. So I gave Trestman a call – I had called him before about the NFL – and said, ‘Hey, I’m thinking about playing in the CFL. What do I need to do to achieve that?’

He told me it was a little late because the season had started and that I’d have to go to a camp and then… that’s when I interrupted and said. ‘Oh, by the way, I can be Canadian.’ He was like, ‘Ooooooh…. In that case, definitely get that citizenship because you could be drafted in a supplemental draft and maybe even play this year as a national player.’ He explained how vital it was to have nationals in the league.

So I went with the flow, got the citizenship papers while I was working at a French restaurant in Minneapolis named Bellecour. I can remember serving dinner to Chad Greenway, who had just retired from the Vikings. He’s seated at the chef’s table with all these nice dishes, and all I could think was ‘Man, all I want is the opportunity to at least get a shot at playing somewhere like Chad did for his long career.’

That was a humbling moment. That’s why every day I get the opportunity to play, even if I’m tired or beat up, I’m grateful. Just to be able to get out here and have that camaraderie with teammates and earn their trust, it was something I had missed when I wasn’t playing and it’s hard to find in everyday life. I’m truly happy I’m here now in Winnipeg.

But how I got here, that’s still strange to me with how it all went down…

After I had filled out all my paperwork to be Canadian, I started getting calls from teams saying things like, ‘Hey, we just heard about you and don’t have much film because we didn’t know you were in this draft class.’ I think teams were just scrambling.

Ironically, the only team that did not call me was Winnipeg… which seems really weird now. I can remember being at my buddy Sam’s house on the day of the supplemental draft and knew it started at 1. At about 1:15-1:30, I get a call from Manitoba. I’m like, ‘What? Who’s this?’

It went like this: ‘Hey Drew, this is Mike O’Shea and we want to welcome you to the Bombers. We just drafted you and are looking forward to having you….’

A week later I’m in Winnipeg. It all happened so fast. I remember coming up here and getting thrown into a hotel. I was making peanut butter and jellies every day and eating mangos from Superstore and just trying to learn fast.

I’d be in Starbucks and it would just be study, study, study so that I could get on the field as fast as I could. It was a lot of special teams last year because I hadn’t really been in camp to gain trust and prove that I knew what I was doing.

That’s why this year has been incredible. Everything has worked out beautifully. I love the staff here. Guys on the team who have been other places say, ‘Dude, this is the best coaching staff in the league and this is as good as it gets.’

I look at me being here today with the Bombers as just a testament to following the signs. It’s my brother texting me and saying, ‘You should do this man.’ I could have easily said, ‘Nah dude, not the CFL. I don’t want to do it.’ Look at what I would have missed out on.

It’s just about going where life is trying to take you. It’s following that unknown path sometimes, even if you are a little nervous or a little scared. It’s worked out for me and it’s continued to work out for me on a lot of things in my life.

I’m a curious man. My mind’s always going. I don’t feel a rush to make money or have a solid 9-to-5. I’m a bit of a free-spirited guy. I really like doing what I do.

It’s not always about the money for me. I do things because I like to do them. I like to play music. I like to write. I like to read. Those things aren’t necessarily leading me to a richer pocket, but I just feel better doing them. I feel my life is better when I do them.

To me, a good life is when I feel proud of what I’m doing and when I feel I’m overcoming obstacles and pushing myself all the time. I find great happiness in those moments, even if they’re not easy. That’s what helps give my life that richness or fulfillment that I need or yearn for.

I have an example of that: there was a moment this year when we were in Montreal. My dad sent me a note before the game saying when he was 13 years old, he remembers going to Alouettes games and thinking, ‘These guys are like gods. They’re so big, so fast.’ And then 30 years later he’s in Montreal again watching his own son playing the Alouettes and how it was a surreal cycle of life.

Last week, our coach printed off all these pictures from the whole year, from Game 1 all the way up to Game 18 leading into last week’s West Semi-Final in Sask.

It was just so funny to see all these things we were doing with our teammates… Weston Dressler and Darvin Adams, Jermarcus Hardrick holding up Dressler on his shoulder. It was all just so awesome. We started talking about it and it was like, ‘Man, think about all the time we’ve put into this, all the sacrifices we’ve made and all the fun we’re having. It can’t end here. This team is too good.’

That’s just a small reminder of how lucky we are to be out here having all this fun. There are so many people who watch our games and dream of having that feeling of getting in the end zone and celebrating with your teammates.

It’s a gift to be able to do that and live that. No matter how hard the work is, it’s all been so worth it.

 

– Drew Wolitarsky