Former Cal teammates Harris, Kush reunite with Raiders
Courtesy of California University
Erik Harris, left, and Eric Kush were teammates at California University from 2008 to 2011. Now, after eight seasons apart, the two are teammates again for the Las Vegas Raiders.
Courtesy of California University
Erik Harris
Courtesy of California University
Eric Kush
Erik Harris had left his belongings at his residence in Canada.
It was late January 2016, when Harris came back to the town where he grew up, New Oxford, a borough in Adams County in central Pennsylvania. The former California University walk-on defensive back had finished his third season with the Hamilton Tiger-Cats of the Canadian Football League a few months earlier.
He was just visiting, planning on returning back across the border to Hamilton, a city located on the shore of Lake Ontario and just north of Lake Erie, for the offseason.
“I liked it up in Canada,” Harris says. “I usually moved my stuff back to the States for the offseason. I figured, instead, that I could just continue to live, train and play up there until I was done playing football. So, that’s where I just decided to keep all my stuff.”
That, however, is when the call came from a New Orleans phone number. A call, and an opportunity, Harris had been waiting for most of his life.
“I was driving to the gym and that’s when I got the call,” Harris remembered. “The Saints wanted to fly me down for a workout. I had like a week to get ready and a bad snowstorm hit. I was stuck for two days, not able to work out and was shoveling the driveway in intervals trying to stay in shape.”
The phone call for Eric Kush, who was in the same recruiting class at Cal and spent four years as Harris’ teammate, came almost three years earlier.
After receiving a medical redshirt his freshman season with the Vulcans, Kush went from a reserve offensive lineman in 2009 to making 32 starts at either center or tackle over the next three years.
“I was a late bloomer through high school, at least compared to some of the other guys,” Kush, a Chartiers Valley graduate, said. “It took me time to build up and be ready to play. I just worked my butt off every day and focused on what I could do to get better.”
It was April 27, 2013, the third and final day of the NFL Draft, when Kush received a phone call while having a cookout at his father-in-law’s house.
“We were all just watching the third day and I got the call,” Kush remembers. “It was John Dorsey of the Kansas City Chiefs. He said they were going to draft me.”
Kush was selected by the Chiefs in the sixth round, the 170th overall pick.
Harris and Kush have defied the long odds for NCAA Division II players and created nice careers in the NFL.
They also remember a phone conversation they had had with one another a little less than three weeks ago. It was a conversation about a situation neither would have thought possible last year, one in which they gushed about being teammates again.
Kush agreed to terms on a contract with the Las Vegas Raiders, a team that is transplanting from Oakland. Harris has called Oakland home for three seasons.
“This is awesome,” Kush said. “We haven’t played together in eight seasons. Holy cow, it’s incredible. I remember Erik as just an incredible person, a guy you can always count on. He’s always working his tail off and is a happy person to be around.”
“I remember that (Kush) is still the only offensive lineman I’ve seen run down and cover kickoffs,” Harris said with a laugh. “He is super athletic, a great team guy. He is always all in. He has no filter and will keep it real with you.”
Of the 49 Division II players to make the 53-man NFL roster cuts in 2019, four were from Cal. Cornerback C.J. Goodwin recently re-signed with the Dallas Cowboys and safety Rontez Miles is currently a free agent.
But the paths Harris and Kush took to Vegas couldn’t have gone in more opposite directions after leaving Cal.
As Kush prepared for the NFL Draft, which included an impressive showing at the East-West Shrine Game, Harris was still trying start his football career.
After a senior year in which he made 71 tackles, three sacks and three interceptions and also was the Vulcans’ punter, Harris went back to New Oxford and began working 11-hour shifts at a local Utz Potato Chip factory. He lugged around 50-pound bags of corn flower in 110-degree heat and put them into the mixers. He then became a night-shift manager at the United Parcel Service prior to making a four-hour drive to Buffalo for a CFL tryout that changed his life.
“It was my last go-around at trying to make it work,” Harris said. “I worked out and Hamilton called me the next Monday. I went back to UPS and put my two weeks in.”
Fast forward more than three years later and Harris’ workout for the Saints — his first pro workout of any kind after not being invited to rookie minicamps — turned into an NFL contract. But his journey back to Canada to get the belongings he left behind was rockier than his one to the NFL.
“I got a $2,000 signing bonus but owed rent to the landlord,” Harris remembered. “We didn’t have enough money to afford a U-Haul, so we drove up and put everything in a 6-by-12 trailer. Whatever we couldn’t fit we left. I sold some of the stuff to my landlord to help with the rent. I sold game-worn jerseys and gloves for money to get back into the States.”
His time with New Orleans didn’t last a full season before he tore the ACL and meniscus in a knee. Harris signed with Oakland in 2017 and has started 18 games in the Raiders’ secondary each of the last two seasons.
Kush has grown accustom to moving his belongings as a journeyman on the offensive line.
After getting drafted by Kansas City, where he spent his first two seasons, Kush played a year for the St. Louis Rams prior to the franchise moving back to Los Angeles. In 2016 and 2018, he appeared in 23 games and started in 11 for the Chicago Bears. Last year, Kush played in all 16 games for the Cleveland Browns, including seven starts.
“For me, I’ve played for like 25 percent of the league,” Kush joked. “It’s just been about learning how to be a pro, just trying to do my job. Getting released sucks but it’s just part of the business.”
Now, after eight seasons, and both at 30 years old, the two guys who played large roles in Cal’s dominance in the PSAC West Division are eager to reunite.
“This league is crazy,” Harris said. “It’s all about timing and and opportunity. I’ve always wanted to play in the league, and I remember people saying to always have a backup plan. That went in one ear and out the other when I was younger. Then you say to yourself, ‘OK, not everybody makes it.’ When you are young you don’t realize how small that percentage truly is. I have always been self-driven. I have the type of personality that when somebody tells you that you can’t do something then I want to prove them wrong. Not too often do former D-II players on the same team get that chance again. It’s going to be a fun opportunity.”
“I’m super excited to see him and maybe hit him a little bit, too,” Kush joked.