Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 10, 1995 TAG: 9509120107
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DOUG DOUGHTY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Clearly, the pros aren't concerned with reputation or football pedigree.
Of the 45 NFL players who went to high school in Virginia, only 10 were ranked among the state's top five college prospects by The Roanoke Times and a total of 23 made the Top 25.
Some of the players who did not make the Top 25 included Bruce Smith, Herman Moore, Gary Clark and Charles Haley.
With Smith, who went to Virginia Tech and won the Outland Trophy as the nation's top lineman, and Moore, an All-America wide receiver at Virginia, it was a case of poor evaluation.
However, it's hard to blame the media for not recognizing the potential of Clark or Haley because neither received a Division I-A scholarship offer before signing with James Madison.
They are among 13 NFL players from Virginia who played below the Division I-A level in college.
One of those is former Ferrum College running back Chris Warren, although Warren began his college career at Virginia and was highly recruited out of Robinson High School in Fairfax.
There were 18 former Cavaliers on season-opening NFL rosters, not counting free-agent rookie Randy Neal, who has joined Green Bay's practice squad. That's up from 16 last year, when the UVa alumni included San Diego linebacker David Griggs, killed this past June in an automobile wreck.
Three players from last year's UVa team were drafted and all made NFL rosters, including fullback Charles Way, a sixth-round draft pick who started Monday night for the New York Giants against Dallas. Wide receiver Tyrone Davis had one reception in his New York Jets debut, while Mike Frederick was credited with a tackle for Cleveland.
Virginia Tech had 10 players in the NFL last year and has the same number this year, counting Philadelphia running back Vaughn Hebron, who is on the injured reserve list. Linebacker Ken Brown, a rookie for the Denver Broncos, replaces wide receiver Ray Crittenden, who was waived by New England and failed a physical with the Carolina Panthers.
Tech and UVa have emphasized in-state recruiting, but only three of Tech's players in the NFL are from Virginia. Nine of UVa's pros are from Virginia.
By comparison, the University of North Carolina has five players in the NFL who went to high school in Virginia and Penn State has three.
Two of the Penn State pros are former teammates Matt Darby and Keith Goganious from Green Run High School in Virginia Beach. No Virginia high school has as many as three players in the NFL and only seven have two.
One of those seven schools, John F. Kennedy in Suffolk, has been closed since 1990.
The 45 state players in the NFL come from 38 high schools, including Mathews and Rappahannock, neighbors in the Group A Northern Neck District. Both sent punters to the NFL.
While there are pros such as Ben Coleman, who went virtually unnoticed before he was signed by Wake Forest out of Park View-South Hill, there are others such as Terry Kirby, who was the Gatorade national player of the year while at Tabb High School.
Other Roanoke Times Top 5 choices in the NFL are Darby, Goganious, Reuben Brown, Mike Compton, William Henderson and Chris Slade, Kirby's former high school and college teammate. The paper picked an ``Elite 8'' in 1983 that included Warren, running back Eric Metcalf and offensive lineman Andy Heck.
Many highly recruited in-state players have enjoyed outstanding college careers without making a mark in the pros. Two players who fit that category are former Martinsville quarterback Shawn Moore, who holds almost all of UVa's passing records, and former Bassett quarterback Maurice DeShazo, whose 47 touchdown passes are a record at Virginia Tech.
Moore, to his credit, did spend parts of four seasons in the NFL with Denver and Arizona.
Taking everything into account, however, it is hard to overlook the number of relatively obscure players from Virginia who have gone on to enjoy success in college and the pros. The Roanoke Times started rating the top 100 players in Virginia in 1984 and, still, there are 17 players in the NFL who didn't make any of the paper's lists.
by CNB