Burress, Vick to renew acquaintances at Heinz Field
PITTSBURGH — It’s chic these days to draft players out of the Chesapeake Bay area in Virginia. Dre Bly starts for the St. Louis Rams. David Macklin starts for the Indianapolis Colts. James Boyd is a nickel back with the Jacksonville Jaguars.
But those players are only part of the warm-up act. The main event will take place Sunday.
With all due respect to New Orleans quarterback Aaron Brooks (and because Allen Iverson only plays basketball now), the best of the young crop of Chesapeake stars, Plaxico Burress of the Steelers and Michael Vick of the Atlanta Falcons, will renew acquaintances at Heinz Field.
Burress was a sophomore at Green Run High in Virginia Beach when he first came across Vick.
“I played against him once in a high school scrimmage,” Burress said. “That was his freshman year in high school and nobody knew who he was because he was playing behind Aaron Brooks at the time and everybody was talking about Ronald Curry back then. Nobody ever really got a chance to pay attention to Michael Vick and he came from out of nowhere.”
Vick played for Warwick High in Newport News. It was the only time his school played Burress’ school.
“I was playing safety and he threw a ball down the middle and hit his man right in stride like a dart,” recalled Burress. “I said, ‘Who in the heck threw that pass?’ I didn’t know who this guy was.
“Then I was chasing him once, and I was one of the fastest guys around, and I could not catch this guy. I thought I just took a bad angle, but I was wrong. He’s just fast.”
Vick went on to start three years at Warwick before moving on to start at Virginia Tech. Steelers cornerback Hank Poteat remembers the one quarter he played for Pitt against Vick.
“He tried to go deep on me the first or second play of the game with (Andre) Davis. Davis just ran a go route and I broke it up,” Poteat said. “A couple series later, on a kickoff return, I hurt my ribs and left the game, but I remember one time he came to his left, my right, and he reversed it for a touchdown.”
Vick started two years at Virginia Tech and led the Hokies to the national championship game against Florida State in 1999 as a redshirt freshman. Tech lost 46-29, but Vick lived up to his massive pre-game billing by rallying the Hokies in the second half to turn a rout into a close game before Florida State pulled away late. Steelers rookie safety Chris Hope was Florida State’s starting free safety at the time.
“He hurt a couple of our guys’ knees, faking them out,” Hope said. “He really showed his speed when he reversed field, crossed field, faked a couple people out and dashed down the sidelines. The play gets called back and he’ll do it the next play, too. I saw a lot of that on the films in college.”
After his redshirt sophomore season, Vick applied for the NFL draft and was taken first by the Falcons in the spring of 2000.
“I told him from Day One, this was his team and would be his team until he gives it up,” former Falcons and current Steelers receiver Terrance Mathis said. “The thing is he’s caught on to that and he’s going to beat you, however it takes. Right now, he’s playing his style of football – whatever it takes to win the game. He’s doing well at it.”
Which brings Vick and the Falcons to Sunday’s game against the Steelers. Both teams are riding four-game win streaks and are playoff contenders with 5-3 records. The Steelers are hoping their sloppy field helps slow down Vick, who’s been timed in the 40-yard dash at 4.2 seconds.
“Why did they have to change the grass?” defensive coordinator Tim Lewis said of the re-sodded field. “But it’s all relative. If it’s slower for him, it’s slower for us, too. And his slow is not real slow.”
In a brief scouting report on Vick, one word was repeated often.
“Wow,” Lewis said. “Wow. Wow is all I can say. Wow. You know, Barry Sanders used to make a lot of people miss. And I remember 10 years ago watching Michael Jordan dribble a basketball through 5, 6, 7 guys. Everyone was trying to defend him, but he was going at one tempo and everyone else was at another. That’s what this guy does. He’s a superior athlete in a game of great athletes. He stands out above the rest.”