For Lawrence Taylor, It’s the Season After

Mention Lawrence Taylor and the New York Giants take a deep breath and speak in measured words.

“The next guy who asks me about him is going to have trouble getting up,” Coach Bill Parcells warned reporters a few weeks ago.

“I’m just a ballplayer this year, not an interview,” Taylor says, responding to requests to talk with a firm “no.”

For Taylor, this is “The Year After,” his first season back following treatment for substance abuse. The substance was never revealed.

It’s no ordinary year for his teammates, either.

After an outstanding 1985 season, the Giants are burdened with preseason predictions of a possible Super Bowl appearance next January.

“If you viewed Lawrence on the practice field in the preseason, I would think that would remove all doubt from your mind,” said defensive end George Martin, the team’s player representative. He added that only “outsiders” have questions about Taylor.

“Lawrence Taylor is definitely in a class by himself and I am proud as heck to play with a person who I think is going to be considered a legend.”

An All-Pro in each of his five NFL seasons, the 27-year-old outside linebacker is often called the best defensive player in the National Football League and is seen as a certain Hall of Famer.

But even as he was making All-Pro last season, he didn’t seem to exhibit the dominance he had in previous years. He had one outstanding mid-season game against Washington, announced that he had put his problems behind him, and then continued his ordinary play.

“He didn’t have a Lawrence Taylor-type of year,” said John Madden, the CBS sportscaster and former Los Angeles Raiders coach.

“A couple of years ago, I thought and I said that Lawrence Taylor is the best defensive player in the NFL, a dominant player who by himself can win a game, and he did. Last year, he wasn’t that guy,” Madden said. “He didn’t slip where he was a bad player and he didn’t slip where he was mediocre. He was above mediocre, but he wasn’t a dominant player.”

The statistics were still impressive.

The former North Carolina star made 83 solo tackles, assisted on 21 others and registered a career high 13 1/2 sacks as the Giants finished 10-6 and beat San Francisco in a wild-card game before being knocked out of the playoffs by the Chicago Bears.

Two months later, Taylor said in a prepared statement that he was undergoing treatment for substance abuse.

“In the past year, due to substance abuse, I have left the road I had hoped to follow both as a player and a public figure,” he said.

Gary Kovacs, his agent, later said that Taylor was treated on an outpatient basis.

This summer, Taylor reported to training camp at his playing weight of 245 pounds and has practiced hard.

“He’s intense,” guard Billy Ard said. “He’s coming to the line with his chin strap on. Last year, he let it dangle.”

But Bill Belichick, the team’s defensive coordinator, says people are focusing too much on how Taylor looks in training camp.

“He’s always had a good training camp,” Belichick said. “There have been other times of year that people have questioned, and when those times of year come, that’s the time to ask questions.”

There were no questions about Taylor in a 0-16 victory over the Jets. He had a sack, five tackles, and was all over the field, even racing quickly downfield after an interception by teammate Harry Carson to obliterate two Jets with a crushing block.

The biggest question seems to be whether Taylor can regain the form that separated him from the rest.

St. Louis Cardinals linebacker E.J. Junior, who overcame a cocaine problem in 1982 and later earned All-Pro status, thinks Taylor can.

“I can tell you Lawrence Taylor is a better man than I am,” Junior said. “I had to go out and get arrested before I confronted the problem. Lawrence grabbed the bull by the horns. He said I’m probably not playing as well as I can and decided to get help.”

Junior said he hasn’t spoken to Taylor and doesn’t know what Taylor was treated for, but he said he understands what Taylor is going through.

“It’s not easy to talk about,” Junior said. “It’s very embarrassing because you feel you let a lot of people down. Eventually, there will be a time and place and he will talk.

“It may be a couple of months,” he added. “Right now, he’s trying to prove that he can be as good as ever.”

That’s something Giants nose tackle Jim Burt has noticed.

“He looks like he wants to prove something, don’t you think?” Burt said. “So far, he looks very good.”