The Line of Great Persistence : Football: After being released and rejected, Blaise Winter sold the Chargers on himself.

They removed tumors from each ear, but on one side he remains deaf.

A cleft palate made it difficult for him to speak, but not impossible.

Nothing is impossible.

“When I was going into the sixth grade, I was placed in a class for the partially to severely retarded,” said Blaise Winter. “I remember thinking, ‘Why am I here?’ I ran home crying. My mom told me to keep going and not let anybody stand in my way. She told me, ‘You’re special, and the world will see that someday.’ ”

One year ago at this time, however, Blaise Winter was nobody special. He was out of work. Twenty-eight NFL teams answered his incessant letters, phone calls and videotapes with silence.

“I sat for hours writing letters, trying to have every word look impressive and encouraging,” he said. “I had everything typed professionally so just maybe it might catch one person’s eye . . . motivate one person to take a chance and give me another break.

“I just refused to accept I was done. At times I’d be folding these things up, the tears would be running down my face, and I’d be saying: ‘I got to get back on the field. I belong there.’ And my wife, my buddy, my best pal, would give me a kiss, and tell me, ‘You’re going to do it.’ ”

Blaise Winter on Sunday makes his third consecutive start at defensive tackle for the Chargers. The Charger defense--with Winter’s impressive play--has allowed the opposition an NFL-low 2.6 yards per rush.

“I’ve done something people couldn’t dream of doing,” Winter said. “I’ve taken myself off the scrap heap and put myself back in the National Football League, and not just as one of the guys on the 47-man roster, but as a productive starter.”

When the Green Bay Packers released Winter on July 19, 1991, he should have gotten the message. August passed, and no one called. September. October. November. December.

“I was calling them, every team, every week,” he said. “I had a $500-a-month phone bill. I was sending letters, doing anything I could.

“I had friends telling me, don’t call this week, don’t bother them. They said I was such an annoyance. I said I didn’t care. One thing they were going to know, Blaise Winter was not going to roll over and die. They were going to have to lock the door and say, ‘Blaise, we’re going to call the police if you don’t leave.’ ”

When letters and phone calls drew no response, he invested several thousand dollars with “Image Works,” a Green Bay production company, which produced a 4 1/2-minute videotape of his workouts.

“I sent it to all 28 teams and that cost more money,” he said. “It was my last chance. . . . It had one line running throughout the video: ‘Blaise Winter wants to play football.’

“After the videos went out, my wife and I began driving to each team. We drove some 7,000 miles. We went to Chicago, Indianapolis, Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, San Diego, Anaheim, San Francisco . . .”

He didn’t get past the receptionist in Chicago. He was told the coaches were busy in a meeting in Indianapolis. No one was home in San Diego. The defensive line coach agreed to meet him in Phoenix, “but he wasn’t listening,” Winter said. His weight-lifting equipment, shoes and sports gear were stolen from his car in Anaheim.

“I offered to run in my underwear and bare feet for the Rams,” he said.

He simply didn’t get it. He was closing in on his 30th birthday and no one was interested. He had sat out the entire 1991 season, and it wasn’t like teams lost his phone number. He had been released by the Indianapolis Colts, and what does that tell you?

The Chargers had shown him the door, too. They sent him to Green Bay in 1988 for past considerations, a “repayment for a cup of coffee,” as Steve Ortmayer, the Chargers’ former director of football operations, explained it at the time.

“Hey, when I came out of high school, I had to travel with my mom, dad and brother to the universities I always wanted to play,” Winter said. “Nobody was calling me, so I went to Penn State, Pittsburgh and Ohio State and I pounded on doors, handed them films and asked them to watch me.

“I would put on four or five sweaters so I would look bigger to people. It’s funny now, but it was nerve-racking at the time. I went to Syracuse and they told me they’d call if something opened up but they had no scholarships. I was heartbroken. That was my last chance to play Division I football. Fortunately, someone declined to accept their letter-of-intent and they took me.”

Four years later, Winter was named Syracuse’s team captain and most valuable player. He became the 35th player selected in the 1984 draft and led all Colt defensive linemen his rookie season with 92 tackles.

A change in head coaches, a serious shoulder injury and the addition of more high-round draft picks ended Winter’s career in Indianapolis in the middle of the 1986 season.

“People have been trying to deliver me that message in some form or another for several years,” Winter said. “All the labels have been slapped on me. I’m that overachiever, the blue-collar guy, not a great athlete, blah, blah, blah. I don’t pretend to be Philadelphia’s Reggie White, but I’m not the bottom of the barrel.

“You get labeled in the NFL and there’s no changing it. There’s no room for development, improvement. You are what they think you are.

“You want to make me the NFL overachieving poster child, that’s fine with me. This whole country is made up with overachievers. I have no problem being that because to me it shows a hell of a lot more character than having something given to you on a silver platter.”

Winter remains fueled by a desire he cannot completely explain. He had no guarantee that he would play football again, and yet he filled his basement with every imaginable apparatus that promised improved athletic performance.

“Where was my weakness?” he said. “Was it lateral? I bought a slide board the speed skaters use and worked hours on it. Was it my hand speed? I tried martial arts, a heavy bag and punching. Was it my explosiveness? I pulled parachutes while running for hundreds of hours.”

And then something happened. The 49ers took an interest and offered Winter a contract shortly after his “hire me” tour. The Vikings called, too, and had him participate in their April mini-camp. The videotapes, the letters and his persistence were beginning to pay off.

“Absolutely anything is possible if you are relentless and refuse to die,” he said.

The Chargers also were interested. They were switching to a 4-3 defensive alignment which was ideally suited to Winter’s skills. The defensive line was going to be coached by George O’Leary, Winter’s former mentor at Syracuse.

“He’s very intense, thorough and very competent,” O’Leary said. “I don’t think he’s a God-gifted athlete. Everything about him is self-made. I knew what kind of player he was, and all I could do was recommend. The decision was management’s.”

The Chargers wanted to wait until after the draft to sign Winter, but he had sat not-so-patiently for nearly a year waiting for this chance. And how long were the Vikings and 49ers going to wait?

“The Chargers said, all right we’ll give you a chance,” he said. “I’m sure they didn’t expect a lot from me, and maybe I was being brought in as training-camp fodder. Fine, I was willing to be that. I had another life and that’s all I wanted.

“I believed in myself, and I was not going to let anyone rob me of that feeling. When I first came into the league, I was burning a lot of brain cells just trying to survive. I let the anxiety and nervousness get to me. Do they like me? Are they going to cut me? Every glance, every comment meant something to me, and I became flustered. My skills never blossomed. I was such a worrywart.

“This time around, I was going to be calm and cool. Maybe I had matured. But I had nothing to lose this time. What were they going to do? Send me home? I’d been there.”

A few weeks after signing Winter, however, the Chargers loaded up on defensive linemen in the draft. This was Indianapolis and Green Bay all over again.

“Given the choice between keeping young players with potential and free agents who have already been bounced before, what do you think?” Winter said. “The odds were against me. Before we really got started in training camp, one writer brought tears to my wife’s eyes.

“The man wrote, ‘When Blaise Winter is in there, the defense will resemble a doughnut--nothing in the middle.’ I told him if he had written that after four preseason games or after I was cut, he would have had the right to say that. I also told him, ‘You may be surprised.’ ”

The Chargers planned to start George Thornton, a second-round pick beginning his second season, and Joe Phillips, a seven-year pro. They also had their own Reggie White, a sixth-round pick, and a Arthur Paul, a 10th-round choice, ready to play defensive tackle.

There was no room for Blaise Winter from the outset, but then Thornton played poorly and Phillips refused to come to contract terms. White and Paul needed more time.

Surprise, surprise.

“No one else was giving me a chance, but I knew I could do it,” Winter said. “I had played with Joe during the strike, and I led the whole defense (with four sacks and 20 tackles). But I wasn’t 300 pounds, and that’s why I ended up on injured reserve, while Joe ended up having a rebirth along with Les Miller. But I felt the best player at that time was sitting on the bench.

“When Joe didn’t show up for training camp, I was very fortunate to get more practice repetitions. But the bottom line is I took advantage of those reps, I was productive, stayed healthy and didn’t miss a practice. If they thought they had a weak spot, they would have found another body to fill it.”

Winter opened the exhibition season as the Chargers’ starting left tackle, and he’s maintained a death grip on the position since.

“When we played New England, I felt proud walking off the field in front of my old college coach, Dick MacPherson,” he said. “He had a chance at me again, and maybe it didn’t cross his mind, but then again maybe he said, ‘That boy can still play.’ ”

Winter’s desire to remain in the game has been an unexpected boon for the Chargers’ defense. He was convinced he could still play, and now he has persuaded the Chargers.

“If you doubt me,” he said, “I’ll go through that wall for you.

“I feel I’m here on this earth for a purpose. Maybe I’ve been smaller and slower than some people because it has allowed some people to reach out and relate to me. Maybe they can’t relate to a Joe Montana or Reggie White.

“Maybe they can relate to someone who represents hard work, determination and this attitude I have. I’d like young people to know that if they keep their value system and have this relentless attitude, anything is possible.

“I’m a living example of that.”