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Titans OG
Bruce Matthews
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The reports out of Nashville were that the seemingly impossible just might happen.
Titans OG Bruce Matthews had a sprained knee ligament and was being listed as
questionable for Tennessee’s Week Seven game against the Jaguars. This was
stop-the-presses news. Matthews had started 202 consecutive games at that point, the
longest active streak in the NFL.
The Titans without Matthews in the starting lineup? That’s like Wrigley Field
without the Cubs. Cable TV without ESPN. An Oreo without the filling in the middle.
The Titans without Matthews in the starting lineup? It seemed impossible to fathom.
I, for one, never bought it for a second.
Early in the week, Titans head coach Jeff Fisher said, "If it were you or I, we
couldn’t drive a car. He’s thinking about playing."
Of course he was.
There’s a toughness that runs through Matthews like blood flowing through the
veins of an average man. It’s everywhere.
I first learned this in 1993, when I took a poll of almost 20 NFL DL and OL coaches,
who were asked to rank the game’s top offensive linemen. Matthews came out on top,
prompting me to write a profile of him.
When I heard that Matthews’ streak was in jeopardy against the Jaguars, I recalled
a story from that ’93 profile. When Matthews was in junior high school, he was a
member of a basketball team for a while but eventually decided he wanted to quit the team.
So he went to his father, Clay Matthews Sr., who played end for the 49ers in the 1950s,
and said he wanted off the team.
"I just said I’d had enough, and he got all over me," Bruce said.
"He said, ‘Matthews, don’t quit!’ "
Clay Sr. said, "It’s a very simple story. I had a set of rules I could use on
all of my kids. I told all of them, ‘You can do whatever you want to. You can go play
any sport you want to. You can go out and try anything you want. But there’s only two
rules. One of them is, I don’t care if you’re the last string and sit on the
bench all the time and you’re the worst guy out there, you can’t quit. No. 2, if
I ever come see you play or practice and you’re not giving it 120 percent of what
you’ve got, I’m going to yank you out of there myself.’ "
In no way am I suggesting that Clay Sr. would have wanted his son to ignore common
sense and play on a knee that couldn’t go. That said, when I recalled the work ethic
Clay Sr. ingrained in his son, I knew that Bruce’s streak would continue if there was
any way possible.
Matthews out of the starting lineup? I never bought it for a second. I remembered the
stories Bruce and his brother, Clay Jr. (who played in the NFL from 1978 to ’96),
once told me about their childhood.
They’d play hockey in their basement with no pads, no helmet, no mask and a
real hockey puck.
They’d play a game that can only be described as baseball from hell, using a
2-by-4 instead of a bat and darts with sharp, pointy metal tips instead of a ball. The
batter got the 2-by-4. The pitcher got the darts. The idea was for the batter to try to
connect with the darts and make them stick in the 2-by-4.
"I don’t think any of us got maimed, but there were some brushback
pitches," Bruce said.
When Bruce and Clay Jr. played one-on-basketball, their father said the only rule was
if there was no blood, it wasn’t a foul.
So forgive me for sounding unsympathetic to an injury that might be a big deal to a
lesser man, but I never believed for a second that Matthews would miss the game.
By the middle of Jaguars week, Matthews was watching practice from the sideline with a
heavy brace on his knee.
He’ll play, I knew.
The Saturday before the game, Matthews did not practice and only did some exercises.
"If I’ve been at a game, I’ve always played," Matthews said.
"I thought about it, and it would be difficult to stand there and watch."
You could just hear the way his mind was working. They’d have to handcuff him to
his locker to keep him out of the lineup.
Game day arrived, and the decision still had not been made. He’ll play, I knew.
About three hours before kickoff, Matthews was warming up, and he felt a tweak in his
knee.
Might it not make some sense for him to finally take a day off? Call in sick like
people in the real world? Maybe melt in with the fans, kick back and participate in a
tailgate party?
"To be honest, I get too antsy," Matthews said. "I watch games on TV or
I watch my boys’ games, and it’s hard for me not to strike something."
The last sentence strikes Matthews as amusing, and he chuckles.
How could anyone doubt that the streak would continue?
Sure enough, on the Titans’ first offensive play from scrimmage, Matthews was in
the starting lineup. He played until victory was well in hand and then — and only
then — did he call it a night.
"He’s just a warrior, man," Titans FB Lorenzo Neal said after the game.
"What can you say about Bruce? He’s solid. He’s nails. When you think
he’s down, he’s just beginning. The guy works hard every day, comes to work and
brings his lunch pail."
Titans OG Benji Olson said, "He’s the iron man. There’s a reason why
he’s had that many starts and played in that many games. It’s really not that
big a surprise that he came out there and did that."
As I was talking to Neal, a thought popped into my head. I shared it with the
Titans’ fullback.
Until the day Matthews retires, if the Titans ever play a game and he is missing from
the starting lineup, I know the first place I’ll look for the 12-time Pro Bowler.
The obits.
"Absolutely," Neal said.
For more on the Titans, read Ron Pollack's feature "Team Resiliency," about
the team's ability to bounce back from multiple key injuries this season, in the current
print edition of Pro Football Weekly on sale at newsstands and bookstores across
the country |
