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Sidelines
Kalani Simpson
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Rego, Manley outnumbered and loving it
THE last time we saw Jayson Rego, he was too good for the competition, running for 212 yards in the 2004 state championship game. Included in that total was a 79-yard run -- he tossed off two tacklers in the home stretch -- that helped seal the title for Kamehameha. He was the hero, he carried the ball 39 times. He was the Star-Bulletin's All-State offensive player of the year.
Yesterday, at UH spring practice, he was getting buried. He was hit so hard his helmet popped off. And then he was crushed under an avalanche of humanity.
And the defensive coaches cheered.
This is life on the scout team, this spring: punching bag with a pigskin.
"It looks worse than it actually is, actually," Rego said.
Of course. This is still a long, long, long way from full contact. But Hawaii's spring session has seen many more four-car pileups than it has in a long, long, long time.
These days, a coach's usual scout-time credo -- "Stay up! Stay up!" -- is really more of a suggestion.
Instead, UH defensive coordinator Jerry Glanville has taken to whipping his guys into a frenzy by shouting "It's Alabama! It's Alabama!"
And then they crush Rego again.
We've decried the lack of hitting at UH practices in recent years. This spring, it looks like that's changed. Slightly.
You can hit Rego.
And you can hit his friend Jimmy Manley, a junior walk-on from Compton Junior College, the other scout-team back.
Play after play these guys run into a rock wall of a defense just waiting to tee off.
"We're paying our dues," Manley said.
"Yeah, paying our dues," Rego said.
What they're doing is playing the part of a Timex watch.
Take the time yesterday when Manley made a nice jump to the outside, then eluded four tacklers with nifty moves, only to finish with a blindside spin into a speeding Fale Laeli, who weighs 311 pounds.
Manley is 160.
It was a hit that had sound effects.
That's got to add up after a time.
"We've probably got a little more nicks than most of the guys," Manley said.
"I ain't complaining, though," Rego said.
"We still wake up," Manley said.
No comas. Good.
No, they're young. They bounce back. They run right into the wall, again and again. And in the end, they smile. Big smiles. They're young and running with the football. Not too many things better than that, on a cool morning in the spring.
They're even friends with these defenders.
"We laugh all the time," Manley said. "We end up joking more with them guys than with the 'O' because we're down here all the time."
"We're real cool. They don't try to cheap shot," Rego said.
"Me and my man Adam Leonard, he'll see me sometimes --"
Around campus, and tackle you just out of habit?
No, no, Manley explained. Leonard will have him lined up for a knockout, and not take it. Just wrap up instead.
(Let's hope Glanville isn't reading the paper today.)
The defenders, naturally, are loving this new level of contact. The coaches are loving it. Bystanders? Loving it.
Of course, it looks a little easier on their end.
"It's making us better, yeah, Jim?" Rego said.
"I don't mind. It'll pay off eventually," Manley said.
This is the brotherhood of the scout-team backs. They meet each morning, each asking the other if he's ready to go to work, to run into that wall. They take that long walk back to the locker room together every day.
It's different, this spring. Last year, when both were redshirts, there were lots of guys to throw to the lions. Now there is just the two of them, hit after hit, play after play. This is their job. The two of them, imagining how all this hard running is going to make them that much better when they finally get to the real thing.
They love it, but it can be tougher, with only two.
"Take for instance, if one of us was to go down ..." Manley said.
It would leave just the other to take hit after hit, to take the beating all on his own.
Which leads to some good-natured encouragement between partners after one of those particularly ugly hits.
As in, "Eh, get up, man!"