Ex-Poly Player Ends Recovery, Faces New Struggle to Make Team : Football: Richard Washington defied the odds and learned to walk again after a traffic accident. Now he faces tougher odds on the Huskies playing field.

Former Poly High defensive back Richard Washington fingers the jagged scar under his chin where a metal plate holds his jaw together and recalls what he’s been through in the last year.

Last September, the University of Washington free safety suffered multiple injuries in an auto accident. Doctors said he might be left with a limp.

Difficult as it was, Washington proved them wrong.

He recovered in time to return to spring practice and will attempt to make the Huskies’ traveling squad this fall. But he realizes that he’ll be bucking the odds. His clocking in the 40-yard dash is 0.2 of a second slower than before, and the powerful legs that made him one of the most feared tacklers in the Moore League have not yet returned to full strength.

“This accident really hurt me in football,” he said. “I think I was making a good impression on the coaches the way I played.” He had climbed to No. 3 on the depth charts at free safety before the accident.

Washington’s status as a rapidly rising defensive back took a shattering turn about 2:30 a.m. on a clear, chilly fall morning on Interstate 5 in Oregon, near the California border. Homesick and lonely, Washington and seven others were heading south for a surprise visit to Southern California when their van was struck head-on by a car heading the wrong way. Police later determined that the car’s driver, who was killed, was legally drunk at the time.

The van rolled twice and caught fire before landing in the highway’s grassy median. Rescue workers cut away parts of the van to free Washington and former Wilson cornerback Michael Steward, who suffered a broken leg and multiple arm fractures. Steward has not been cleared to resume playing.

Five other players escaped serious injury and returned to the university shortly after the accident. They were driver and former Jordan safety Joel Rosborough, former Paramount running back Leon Neal, former Carson Banning guard Eric Battle, former Pasadena Muir cornerback Reggie Reser and former Verbum Dei linebacker Douglas Barnes. The other occupant, Adriaenne Jamison, was hospitalized with multiple leg fractures.

Washington, who was seated in the front passenger seat, suffered the most severe injuries. He had internal bleeding, a fractured pelvis, a broken jaw, several broken bones in his left foot, four cracked teeth and numerous cuts.

Washington was unconscious when he arrived at a hospital in Medford, Ore. When he awoke, his legs felt like jelly and his mouth was dry, he said.

“I was spitting teeth. I still have four broken teeth in my mouth,” he said.

He underwent emergency surgery in Oregon and was airlifted to Long Beach Community Hospital, where he underwent two more operations. A titanium plate was bolted to his chin in one operation, and a steel plate was screwed to his pelvis in another. His jaw was wired shut, forcing him to eat strained food. He dropped 40 pounds from his 200-pound frame. He was also in a foot cast for 2 1/2 months.

At his parents’ Long Beach home, Washington was determined to rush his convalescence.

“The first day he came home he tried to stand up and fell over backward,” said his mother, Diane. “He wanted to walk so bad, he cried.”

It took about two months for him to walk again, first with crutches, then with a cane. Washington said he was never depressed about his situation, just frustrated. And it showed.

“There was a lot of stress on all of us,” Diane Washington said. “He wanted to do things he couldn’t do, things he shouldn’t do, and he would beg us to let him do them.”

Because he dropped out of school to recuperate, Washington will have a redshirt year and four seasons of eligibility when he returns to school Aug. 13 for football practice.

The crushed left foot still gives Washington some pain. He had it taped each day before practice in the spring. And there is some question whether Washington will be ready to return to a season of full contact after nearly two seasons cut short by injuries. In addition to missing last season, Washington played only five games as a senior at Poly because of recurring shoulder injuries.

But he is determined to put those setbacks behind him.

“I feel I’m not as strong in my legs as I used to be,” he said, “but I think that is more of a mental thing right now.”

Poly Coach Jerry Jaso says that if anyone can come back from adversity, Washington can. “He’s a very determined guy, a very classy guy and a hard-working kid,” Jaso said. “I don’t think the accident took away any of his speed permanently,” he said. “But that broken pelvis has hurt his strength and speed right now.”

On his first day of contact last spring, Washington concedes that he was hesitant, but he shrugs off suggestions that he will have that trouble again this fall.

He acknowledges, however, that he sees things from a different prospective.

“I’ve learned you don’t take life for granted,” he said. “You just don’t know what will happen to you.”