How Cam Ward built his unshakable confidence: ‘He has a boulder on his shoulder’

In 2020, on his first day at the University of the Encarnada Word, Cam Ward entered the Office of the Football Chief Eric Morris and told him that he was going to be his senior seafood. It is not possible; That Year, despite the fact that the cardinals returned to a first-year All-American pin that took school to a conference championship the previous season.

A recruit of zero stars leaving high school, Ward got up and left after delivering the message, closing the being.

“I didn’t say a word … That was the whole conversation right there,” said Morris, now the chief coach of northern Texas, to Fox Sports. “This child never had shotgun tasks when he told me that.”

But he had time. Ward joined UIW-The only program of division I to offer a scholarship in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic, which postponed the cardinal season. They obtained more than four months of practice without the preparation of the game. He became comfortable in the offensive, so much that when UIW scheduled the state of Arkansas by the end of November of that year, Morris declared an open competition in the Quarterback between Ward and the headline for his scrimmage before the game.

Ward worked to play “Lights out”, according to Morris.

“Obviously, it was a difficult conversation for me to have our first-year-old student who was going to start that game,” he said. “But our whole team was [for Ward]. The most obvious thing was that Cam was the best player of this football team.

“Unfortunately, we were about to climb a plane for that game and our entire line D was the tracked contact for a positive covid test and we did it,” he continued. “But that was the first time for us as a coaching staff to say:” Hey, this child is different when he enters the fashion of his game. ”

The NFL will soon learn for itself.

The unjustured. 1 General Selection, Ward brings its unwavering confidence to professional ranks as a hopeful field of hopeful franchise. He arrived with him from Little West Columbia, Texas, and through his long-term word, Via-Via FCS Encarnada, Washington State and Miami. It is obvious in his viral interactions with the friend and training partner Shedeur Sanders, a senior seafaring partner in this year’s draft. He was very clear on the professional day of Miami in March, when he completed a pass and immediately looked at the Brass of Tennessee Titans, he says he was “solidifying” his condition of no. 1 General Selection.

Trust is shaped by his trip, and a mentality that will not let him rest.

“I’m not worried about any attention center,” Ward said at the NFL Combine in February. “There was once in my life where I was in the center of attention. It’s crazy to see how everything can change.”

‘He has a rock on the shoulder’

The recruiters would see the vision with Ward.

I only thought he played in the Wing-T offensive of Columbia High School, which limited his launch opportunities, a strong dose of five-step falls in the play book to take advantage of his skills set.

“We did not do the open offensive open because, in general, our team was not configured that way. We did not have that kind of children around them to execute that type of offensive,” said Brent Mascheck, coach of the WARD High School, Fox Sports. “We cannot recruit boys to fit those [roles]. We have to play with the boys we have. “

Between the Junior and Senior seasons of Ward, Columbia even hero several days of 7 against 7 periods for university coaches to see closely the talent of their arm. The SEC and Big 12 trainers sat on the Mascheck couch. But everyone said Ward was too slow. They did not like their body type. It was too heavy (in its last year, Hey weighed around 240 pounds). A Campo de la Sec coach told Mascheck that he believed Ward would be a star, but said that the offensive coordinator and the chief coach did not want him.

The schools that said they had come to see him play never appeared. Others would tell Ward to visit, but they wouldn’t give him the time of day in the person.

“He has a rock on his shoulder,” said Ward’s mother, Patrice, Fox Sports. “Many people give them false hope.”

But when Ward went to camps that presented four and five field marshal, he is his. Hey was just as good, if not Betterthan them. That is all the validation I needed to stay safe.

A family friend who trained Ward and his older brothers would remember their reality as athletes from West Columbia, a city with less than 4,000 people about 60 miles from Houston.

“You are from the country. Boys outside of Houston, out of Highway 6 in Houston, nobody believes you can play. So, when you have your opportunity on stage, when the lights are lit, you have to play,” Ward’s pattern. “And it was regardless of whether it was football or basketball or baseball.

“This is how your mentality [was shaped]”He continued.” “No one thinks I can play. No one thinks I’m good enough. But when I can go against some of these children in the city, they are about to discover it.” “

“It’s as if Cam played in slow motion …”

The opponents found out in Miami, where he led three victories back after continuing for at least 10 points in the second half. The single -season records of the Air Yardas Program (4,313) and TouchDowns (39). He broke the record of division I (FCS and FBS) for the race touchdowns.

Behind the scene, Ward was arriving at the hurricane football facilities at 5:30 am to watch movies. Around 1 or 2 pm, he ran home to take care of his dog, take some food, return to the facilities and stay there until 9 pm 10 pm

His preparation was nothing new. In Encarnate Word, Ward immersed himself so much in the offensive that Morris trusted him to make checks in the scrimmage line as a first -year student. In high school, during training sessions with Quarterbacks Steve de Meder, Ward wanted to release routes and returns from the middle of the field and the distant hash. For an additional challenge, from the meter configuration exercises in which Ward came out of the pocket on both sides. I would have to return to the side arm balls on the middle of the field, which has it in the habit of layers of passes on possible supporters.

When I was a child, I saw bad behavior in class as a route to punishment. The bad brands of behavior in the school meant that he could not practice later with the female basketball team of Columbia High School that his mother trained.

For the early morning training in which Meean was leading to the north side of Houston, he woke up to his father, he would tell him it was time to leave.

“It took us a long time as parents learn, probably their second year in the state of Washington. We are like,” Cameron is more difficult on his own than anyone who can be, “Calvin Ward told Fox Sports.” We honestly had to start approaching things in a different direction … [It was,] “I missed this reading here.” “Ok, friend, you had 34 of 40 for 400 yards and five touchdowns and everyone got the victory.” [He’s like,] “Yes, but I missed the thesis two readings here.”

The intense Ward approach between lines contrasts with whom he is out of the field. His former coaches describe their fun behavior and fun of fun in the previous game of the costumes. But that behavior would turn a “murderous instinct” at the time of the game.

Ward’s evolution, according to Morris, has come to know when to rely on the different aspects of his personality.

“I think it has grown a lot in the last four or five years,” said Morris, who also trained Ward in the state of Washington as the offensive coordinator of the Coupars. “And being able to know that he has to take a different standard. He is a silly child from the heart. He likes to have fun. He likes to joke. But he understands that he will carry a lot of weight with the standing and players of the players and players of the players of the players and.

“He was the head of Day 1 in the state of Washington. He had to win a costume. He was also a headline of day 1 in Miami. He had to earn a costume. So I think that a lot of those things and experiences have allowed him to grow and really the room of the room and I really set out. AAAA A CULTA OR RADY AND A AB AUAU

Your intelligence will also help.

In high school, the defensive coordinator Earnest Pena, convinced that Ward knew the crime and the offensive coordinator. His lunmen turned to him previously in the scrimmage line for reminders of his responsibility in the game call. He told Columbia coaches the vulnerabilities he saw in defense of the opponent.

At the University, he showed a special ability to recite what had just seen coverage in the previous series and then propose adjustments and adjustments. His presence of pocket was developed at an early age: his time as a basketball player and launching of weight and discumbia cools a strong basis in spatial consciousness.

“It’s as if Cam played in slow motion,” he said, “and everyone else runs as fast as they can run.”

‘Will work’

Calvin Ward couldn’t lie.

Reflecting on the difficult process of recruitment of your child, all the false hope and the dead ends and the phone calls and the cold and the efforts to obtain offers that never materialized, do not know that it would do it again.

“For any father to check it,” said Calvin Ward, “I would love to give them the knowledge of how the process really is, because it is difficult when you are of a small area.”

He was also frustrating for Patrice Ward. All work with coaches that were not recognized. University coaches that do not seem to listen.

However, his son seemed unchanged.

“Cameron was the one who said:” Mom, don’t say anything else, “said Patrice.” It will work. “Then I said:” I’m going to leave it to God. ”

“And that’s what happened.”

Ben Arthur is an NFL reporter for Fox Sports. Previously worked for the network Tennessean/USA Today, where it was the Titans Beat the writer for a year and a half. Hey covered the Seattle Seahawks For Seattlepi.com for three seasons (2018-20) before moving to Tennessee. You can follow Ben on Twitter in @BENYARTHUR.

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