One night last winter, Gene Kidwell looked up in the balcony at a Sandusky (Ohio) High School basketball game and said, “Is that Orlando Pace sitting up there?”
“We’ve had athletes come back from college to our games, and if they could walk across the court in the middle of the game, they’d do it to call attention to themselves,” said Kidwell, the former principal at the school. “Orlando comes in a little late. He goes to the corner of the balcony and he sits there. Not a word out of him.”
But before long, the attention in the gym had shifted from the game on the floor to the solitary hulking figure sitting high above the action. Within minutes a line of autograph-seekers had formed next to Pace.
The shy 21-year-old behemoth chuckled at the recollection.
“I just came in to watch the game, no big deal,” Pace said. “It was hard for me to hide.”
As a rule, offensive linemen don’t have to worry about drawing attention. But necks tend to crane when you stand 6 feet 6 inches and weigh 330 pounds; when you can knock a defensive tackle off the television screen; when they devise a statistic–pancakes–to keep track of the defenders you flatten; and when you play for Ohio State, where they revere big men with big numbers on their mud-splattered jerseys.
And it’s even harder to hide when your name is inscribed on the Silver Football, given each autumn to the Big Ten’s Most Valuable Player.
Older than the Heisman Trophy, the Silver Football has been presented by the Tribune since 1924, when the trophy went to Red Grange. In voting by coaches, the conference office and the Tribune’s sports staff, Ohio State’s junior left tackle easily outdistanced runner-up Steve Schnur of Northwestern, which split the conference title with the Buckeyes.
There have been many upsets in college football in 1996. This isn’t one of them.
Pass the syrup, please.
It will be an upset if Pace wins the Heisman Trophy Saturday night. More on that in a moment.
Former Illinois coach Lou Tepper once compared Pace with Tony Mandarich, who was an awesome college player before his pro troubles. Veteran NFL talent evaluator Gil Brandt said Pace “can be Anthony Munoz. He’s that good.”
And Kidwell? He likened his former student to “Mister Rogers.”
As principal at Sandusky, Kidwell started a volunteer program for his students. The idea was to instill a sense of community in the teenagers, a tough task in a blue-collar town struggling to overcome social problems such as drug abuse, gangs and economic hardship.
A couple of days a week Pace would visit the 6th graders at nearby Mills Elementary School. He could be found in the library, sitting on the floor with a dozen children, books open on their laps.
“He had a very quiet, subtle message for the kids: Yes, I have some athletic ability and talent, but studying is what’s really important,” Kidwell said.
The students could identify with Pace. He grew up without a father and was raised by his mother, Joyce Caffey, who worked two jobs since he was old enough to remember. Pace wasn’t an ace in the classroom, but he did his best.
“He was requested more than any student we ever had,” Kidwell said.
During a recent telephone interview, Pace seemed hesitant to discuss his visits with the 6th graders. “It was a good experience,” he said.
Pressed to elaborate, Pace downplayed his efforts. “I don’t think I’m a role model,” Pace said. “Maybe kids see me doing something and it’s positive. But I don’t think, `Hey, do it my way.’ I’m trying to do the right thing.”
That comes easier on the football field, where the right thing is knocking the stuffing out of the man across the line. That’s assuming there is a man across the line.
Pace is so dominant that opposing defenses this year began to concede the territory immediately in front of Pace. Why serve him pancakes on a plate?
Wisconsin linebacker Tarek Saleh said his strategy against Pace was “just basically stay away. For that split second after he gets his hands on you, if he gets his legs underneath him, then he’s going to body-slam you. And then you’re done.”
Pace usually finds someone to hit. In a 38-26 victory at Iowa on Oct. 26, Pace rambled 50 yards downfield with tailback Joe Montgomery trailing him, looking for a Hawkeye to pancake. Pace finally nailed defensive back Plez Atkins at the goal line.
Most of the time, Pace does his IHOP jobs at the line of scrimmage. That has impressed NFL scouts more than his work with 6th graders.
“He likes finishing blocks,” said Vinny Cerrato, director of player personnel for the San Francisco 49ers. “He’s got that mean streak in him.”
With apologies to Buckeye publicists, who devised the “pancake” stat as part of Pace’s Heisman campaign, there are no recognized statistics for offensive linemen. Ohio State’s sports information office says that Pace has not allowed his man to sack the quarterback this year. The Buckeyes also say that Pace has not been flagged for holding all season.
Pace laughed when a reporter mentioned a photo of him with a handful of an opponent’s jersey in the 38-7 rout of Penn State this year.
“I guess (the refs) weren’t watching me too closely,” he said.
They would be the only ones. Pace has become perhaps the best-known offensive lineman since Mandarich, who sometimes made the wrong kind of headlines.
The Silver Football is the latest trophy won by Pace, a consensus All-American who recently became the first man to win two consecutive Lombardi Awards as the college lineman of the year. He also won this year’s Outland Trophy, given to the top interior lineman.
Ohio State offensive line coach Mike Jacobs said the awards haven’t made Pace ease up in practice. “A lot of kids could not have handled all the accolades,” Jacobs said. “His mental makeup is something you can’t coach.”
There’s only one award left, but it’s probably beyond even Pace’s lengthy reach. An interior lineman has never won the Heisman Trophy, the most prestigious individual award in sports. The closest is former Buckeye John Hicks, who finished second to Penn State running back John Cappelletti in 1973.
Hicks, now in private business in Columbus, said he might have fared better if Ohio State’s PR staff had promoted his candidacy as hard as it did Pace’s. Ohio State sent voters chunky refrigerator magnets with “PACE” emblazoned across a stack of buttery pancakes.
But Pace needed more than publicity in a year in which Florida quarterback Danny Wuerffel has rewritten the passing record books and two running backs, Iowa State’s Troy Davis and Texas Tech’s Byron Hanspard, have rushed for more than 2,000 yards. Pace’s supporters could only say that he was a big reason that the Buckeyes won their first 10 games and rose to No. 2 in the nation.
But Pace voters had no answer for what happened Nov. 23 against Michigan in Ohio Stadium. The Buckeyes had a first down at Michigan’s 2-yard-line. But instead of sending his running back over Pace, Buckeye coach John Cooper sent him into the middle of the line, where the Wolverines devoured him.
That was as close as the Buckeyes would come to the end zone in a shocking 13-9 loss to their archrivals. The question in Columbus these days is whether Pace’s Heisman candidacy would have blossomed had he been given the chance to lead the ball carrier to paydirt.
“The guy I worked for (Woody Hayes), he gave me the call, and everybody in the country knew he was going to give me the call,” Hicks said. “I don’t think (Pace) should be penalized because his coach didn’t give him the call.”
Pace got the call to join the other finalists at New York’s Downtown Athletic Club for the Heisman ceremony Saturday night. But his presence probably will be symbolic.
Some voters have said Pace can’t win the Heisman simply because an interior lineman has never won. It’s like telling an employer telling a recent college graduate he can’t get a job without experience.
Pace won’t have to worry about that when he enters the job market. After his sophomore year he considered challenging the NFL rule that prohibits the drafting of players until three years after his high school graduation. He decided to return for this year, but there’s heavy speculation that he’ll declare himself eligible for next spring’s draft. Pace’s stock response is that he’ll decide after the Rose Bowl.
Cerrato said that if Pace goes pro he’ll be selected in the first three picks. “You plug him in from Day One and this guy is going to play for 10 years,” Cerrato said. “He’s going to be head and shoulders above anybody who’s available at any other position.”
But even if Pace does sign for millions next year, he’ll still probably want to go home to Sandusky and take in a hoops game at his old high school. Don’t be surprised if he looks for a seat in the back row. But he ought to know by now that the folks there will be looking for him–and up to him.
“He’s so unassuming, and I don’t think that will ever change,” Kidwell said. “He’s certainly a hero here.”
