The Player | SPORTS ROMANCE | 18+

Chapter 9

TITUS REYES

Coaching football turned out to be a great distraction from actually playing football. It may have only been two weeks since the first coaching session that my brother had ambushed on me, but I could see serious improvement in the team.

The new school year had started so my work now only consisted a few hours every afternoon, but I was enjoying it more than I thought I would. The spotty, hormonal teenagers were starting to grow on me, and it helped that they looked at me like I was King.

"Coach!" Ryan, one of the wings, ran up to me. "You're late, coach."

"I'm not late." I chuckled and checked my watch to make sure I'm not incorrect. "I'm actually ten minutes early."

"We've all been here for half an hour now." He said, jogging beside me as I headed onto the field to get started with training for today.

"Half an hour?" I quirked an eyebrow in surprise. "All of you have been here for half an hour?"

"Well, I got here half an hour ago, but some of the guys were already stretching."

"I guess I'll have to start showing up sooner then." I murmured under my breath. "Has everyone warmed up?"

"Everyone but you, coach."

"Don't worry about me, Ryan." I chuckled. "Go join the others. I'll start training in a few minutes."

Training was only a few hours after school every day, but I remembered how hard it was to stay focused after a long day at work. However, these boys seemed to take it in stride as they always arrived on the field with hard work, determination, and a thirst to learn.

It helped that I had managed to set up a local game with one of our rival schools next month, so we had that to motivate us before the season started.

"Come on boys, let's get started on some drills." I ordered and joined the boys at the end of the line. They had already set up the mini obstacle course the way I liked, and I always demanded it that each boy complete it five times before we could get started with the ball.

Football was about more than just throwing and kicking the ball. It had a lot to do with stamina as there was more running involved than most people thought.

We spent the next half an hour running some drills and when we finished with that, we did some sprints up and down the pitch. It stroked my ego immensely that I out-drilled and out-sprinted all of them.

Before we got started on the actual practice part of practice, it was time for a short water break.

"What's it like being an Eagle, coach?" Herman asked, his eyes wide and flushed, still panting heavily from the sprints we had finished a few minutes ago. We really needed to walk on his stamina.

"It's the best feeling in the world." I grinned.

Nearly everyone raised their hand in the air, ready with a question and I couldn't help but laugh as I moved onto the next person.

"Did you always know that you wanted to play football professionally?"

"I was a freshman when I made it into football team in Mountbatten high, but I didn't get to play a game until my junior year. I made quarterback in my senior year and got a full ride to NYU. I've known that I've wanted to play football professionally since high school, but things really started moving when I got to college and we had scouts watching our games every now and again."

"How did you feel when you beat the world record for the number of points scored like an individual?"

"I felt like I was on top of the world." I grinned at the fond memory but as always, it was overshadowed by all the pain that followed afterward.