Bowers Takes His Shot

The football player pictured in the magazine has a gash above his eye and blood streaming down the right side of his face.

"I would always get cut by my helmet," Jamie Bowers says. "It fit too snug. I was too stubborn to put a Band-Aid up there, because I figured it would always fall down in front of my eye."

Jamie Bowers dealt with the cut. Just like he dealt with being a 135-pound sophomore football player in high school. Just like at the age of 12 he dealt with losing his 44-year-old dad to a heart attack.

Bowers, who graduated from Warsaw Community High School in 1994 and Wabash College in 1998, is on his way to becoming an NFL football player. No longer the "scrawny little sucker" he once saw himself as, today he is a bruising 6-foot-3, 240-pound 23-year-old.

The New England Patriots invited Bowers and eight other unsigned free agents to their April post-draft minicamp. When minicamp ended, they signed Bowers to a contract. They plan to use him as a fullback.

How the Patriots heard about Jamie Bowers at tiny Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Ind., he cannot tell you himself. He never played a true fullback position, not even in college. Yet the Patriots knew he played H-back - combination of tight end and fullback - for Wabash and think enough of him to ask him to play fullback in the NFL.

Bowers offers theories. That's it.

After college, he tried out for two Arena Football League teams, New York and Houston.

He did not bother with the NFL.

"Nothing came out of those things," he says. "Then I got a call out of the blue. Right when I was getting ready to decide to give this a shot next year, I get this call and end up going to the Patriots camp."

That call came from Patriots General Manager Bobby Grier on April 20.

"The only thing I do know, when I was a junior in college, a guy from a scouting agency came down - he was going through Purdue," Bowers says. "My coach called him up, and he took my height and weight. I ran a couple of 40s. My height and weight were the same as what they had in New England. Evidently, that's how they got the information on me."

Players do not wear pads at the three-day April minicamps, which serve as introductions to the offense and defense. Bowers spent two hours on the practice field. The rest were spent in film sessions.

Bowers estimates 90 percent of the Patriots attended the April minicamp. He saw little of head coach Pete Carroll. Offensive coordinator Ernie Zampese led the offensive sessions.

Bowers does not know what 40 time the Pats have on their sheet but does know he bench pressed 225 pounds 17 times. A far cry from the high school sophomore Bowers called "a scrawny little sucker."

But even as a high school sophomore, Bowers had lived several years without his dad.

"It made me grow up quicker," he says. "It made me become more responsible for myself, more disciplined."

It did something else.

"It made me hunger for something," he says. "I wasn't sure what it was then. I needed something to one, get my mind off of it, and, two, something to excel in to fill the gap. I kept at sports."

The 5-6, 135-pound sophomore developed into a 6-0, 175-pound junior. The football skills blossomed as well.

At Warsaw, Bowers played tight end and earned All-Conference and team MVP honors his senior year. From there he went to Wabash College, where he earned spots on the All-Conference team his last two years and the team MVP award his senior year.

When interviewed, Bowers was at his mother's home in Warsaw, between Patriot camps. His mother, Jean, is now married to Max Reed. Bowers attended minicamp in April then returned to Warsaw. The next camp is not until June 11, another minicamp.

But he returned to Massachusetts last Sunday. For the next several weeks, up until the June minicamp, he will train with other team members by lifting weights and running. When the June minicamp ends, he will lift weights and run for several more weeks, provided he is still with the team. The Patriots' official camp opens July 30.

"Right now, I'm just taking clothes," he says. "It's not worth my while to take more, because there still is the possibility of getting cut. You get injured, they can cut you."

If he wants to make an NFL team, he figures he's in the right place.

"They released their whole backfield," he says. "They will have five fullbacks in camp. We will be fighting for two to three spots.

"I played special teams in college. I hope that serves as an advantage."

While his special teams experience is a plus, the minus is the switch from H-back to fullback.

"Switching to a true fullback will be different," he says. "I rarely carried the ball in college. I was a pass receiver and blocker."

If this does not work out with the Patriots, he plans to keep trying for a pro football career at least two more years. He would consider being an NFL practice squad player, a paid position.

"If it doesn't work out, there comes a certain point where you have to get on with things," he says.

For Bowers, that would be teaching high school physics, something he did at Warsaw from January through March.

Teaching physics or playing football, he knows his dad is by his side.

"I assume he's looking down and knows what going's on," he says. "I find myself wishing he was here. Then again, I knew he's here in spirit. Just not in flesh and bones."

The odds are stacked. Then again, Bowers knows odds. This is why he mentions his high school days as a "scrawny little sucker." And if it's toughness the Patriots are looking for, they need look no further than a player who wore a helmet that continually sliced his forehead open.

"I'm a longshot," he says. "It's tough coming from a smaller school. I consider myself lucky just to get this chance.

"It's my one and only shot for right now."