He’s Always on the Mark : Chargers’ Young Is Hit With Defenders and Kids

On Sunday night, 267-pound Duane Young, a tight end for the Chargers, took a running start before hurling his body full throttle into Howie Long.

“We call it a ‘wham’ block,” Coach Bobby Ross said. “Duane asked for an opportunity to do that, and let me tell you, there are not a lot of people that would ask to do that.”

Play after helmet-bumping play.

“Sometimes you see the stars and stripes,” Young said, “and sometimes they see the stars and stripes.”

Terri Ruiz apologized for her excitement, which had encouraged her to rattle on and on about Duane Young’s extraordinary skills.

“Absolutely amazing,” she said. “I’m still on such a high after what I have seen.

“I don’t know if you understand how tough this is. I mean I told him, I warned him, I did. I teach a different type of child. . . . We had something like 30 celebrities here, but they were signed up for the traditional classes, and Duane was talking to kids with social and emotional problems.”

Tuesday morning. Two days after the Chargers have recorded an emotionally stirring victory over the Raiders. It is Duane Young’s day off.

“I called the night before and wanted to know if he was sure he really wanted to do this,” Ruiz said, “and he told me no problem, but these kids have problems. Sometimes they are excused three and four days at a time from school because of their behavior.

“They don’t have any attention span; anything goes as far as what comes out of their mouths. A lot of these kids are on medication. Sometimes we have to take these kids for a walk because they just can’t control themselves. . . . We were combining two classes for this, too, and that’s something which we never do.”

Duane Young, the elementary education major, stepped in front of the youngsters and he was prepared.

“An afternoon against Derrick Thomas is easy compared to a half hour with 30 kids and nothing to keep them busy,” Young said.

Ruiz, an instructional behavior technician, retreated to the rear of the Farb Elementary School classroom with teacher Hank Sullivan.

“Duane just takes over, and these are kids who cannot control themselves, and they don’t move.

“We were flabbergasted. He asked the kids why is it important to know how to read and then he started writing the reasons on the chalkboard. The kids responded: ‘I won’t know what kind of dog food to buy my dog. . . .’ These are kids with learning disabilities, and he has 32 reasons on the board and the kids would have gone on and on if he would have let them.

“Then he read some poetry, and these are kids who can’t sit still, and they just sat there and listened. Not a sound. One little boy, who has a hard time expressing himself, raised a hand and asked if Duane would read a certain poem.

“I crossed my fingers, because I thought: Here we go, he’s making this up. You know, he does that, and I’m sure that’s what the other kids were thinking, too.

“But Duane brought him up to the front, told him to find the poem, and sure enough it was there. Duane read it for him, and with such expression: It was a Shel Silverstein poem about a bee that stings someone on their rear, and when Duane read it, the kids laughed and laughed. . . . I’m telling you, he really needs to go into teaching.”

The Raiders, Broncos, Chiefs and everyone else who has to play the bruising Charger tight end every year might agree: The children of America need Duane Young.

In time. The Chargers presently have first dibs on the “Big Boy,” as he is known in the locker room.

“Our unsung hero,” Ross said. “A big part of our ground game is centered around Duane’s blocking.”

Duane who? He’s the Chargers’ starting tight end, maybe the best blocking tight end in the game. But raise your hand if you noticed.

“He’s the best blocking tight end I’ve ever seen come out of college,” General Manager Bobby Beathard said.

The man who counted noticed.

“That drives me,” Young said. “I want to be as good as Bobby thinks I am.”

He lines up next to the offensive tackle, although he also can be found in the backfield sometimes. He will go in motion, and then suddenly like an animal who has spotted his next meal, he will dart fearlessly into the defense.

“It’s who delivers the blow first, and at the lowest level,” Young said. “It’s leverage, and power. I thrive on trying to get movement. . . . I want to move the line of scrimmage two or three yards. I want to hit a guy, and crumble him.

“Think about it: First they have to stop me, and then they have to stop (Marion) Butts and all in a matter of seconds. Good luck.”

Bo Jackson, Deion Sanders, Duane Young. It might have been.

He was an all-state baseball player at Kalamazoo (Mich.) Central. Still holds the school record for most home runs in a season.

“I was a pitcher, too,” he said. “I threw gas. Damn good control.”

He continued his football career in college only as a means of gaining a full scholarship. He picked Michigan State over Indiana because the Spartan coaching staff promised he could play both baseball and football.

By his junior year, he was starting tight end and starting first baseman.

“He was a tough son of a buck,” Michigan State football Coach George Perles said. “In football, there wasn’t anybody he couldn’t handle. I saw him play on a bad ankle, and he manhandled people.

“If he wanted to box, he could have done it. A great baseball player, he could do it all.”

He was a punter in high school. Played basketball, put the shot.

“I always thought he was a better baseball player than football player,” said Curtis Young, his father.

He did it all, and at the same time he was taking a full load of classes. Dorothy and Curtis Young insisted on it.

“I never had a chance,” he said. “My mom is a principal at a junior high school, and my dad is a principal at a rival junior high. I was going to get a good education, and I was going to leave Michigan State with a degree.”

In his senior season at MSU he excelled in football, and the professional scouts wanted to watch him practice in private workouts. They also required him to attend the NFL scouting combine tryouts, and back at school it was time for him to begin 10 weeks of student teaching. And then there was baseball.

“If there was something that was going to come up short, I thought it was going to be the degree,” he said. “I’m a young kid, I’m thinking big money from football or baseball, and someday I’ll come back and buy me a college.

“But mom and dad were pushing for the degree. I get drafted by the Chargers and they are happy and in the same sentence they are asking me how my student teaching is going.”

He gave up baseball, taught fifth grade at Lansing’s Allen Street School, and in June he walked across the stage and received his college degree.

“When he crossed that stage,” recalled Dorothy Young, “I said, ‘Thank you, Lord.’

“I knew he was hurting when he gave up baseball, but I also knew in the long run the degree was the better choice.”

The Chargers also were thrilled.

“I’m serious,” Young said, “I think my mom would have written a nice letter to the Chargers: ‘Duane won’t be reporting to training camp, he will be working on his degree. When he gets it, he’ll show up.’ I can see her doing that if I hadn’t graduated. Education was that important to my mom and dad.

“I never played the lottery, you know why? If I had won, she would have made me give all that money away and still go to college. So why play?”

He was named outstanding academic athlete in high school, and received as much attention from his parents for his grades as he did his touchdowns.

“My dad wanted me to be a doctor,” Young said. “He had me meet this doctor once with the idea of giving me a role model. I listened, but I was thinking, dad, if you really want to do something for me, introduce me to O.J. Simpson.”

It’s been several years since he gave up baseball to complete his education, but dreams die hard.

“I haven’t given up the thought of trying it again,” said Young, and he’s already knocked a few out of San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium, sneaking a few swings in before the Padres took batting practice. “My dad told me to go down the hall and talk to the Padres, but really, I’ve got my hands full with just trying to be a good football player.”

The motto at Hillside Middle School, Dorothy Young’s school, is “Believe, Achieve, Succeed.”

As principal, she oversees academics, but she is also in attendance at every athletic event.

“I’m a sports enthusiast,” she said, “but the children know how I feel--academics are No. 1.”

When her son went off to school at Michigan State, she followed.

“I was redshirted my first year in football, so I’m not playing,” Young said. “We’re at Iowa and I come out of the locker room and there’s my mother. She’s taken a bus from Kalamazoo to Chicago and then to Iowa. Eight hours.

“I tell her, ‘Mom, I’m not playing.’ But she says, ‘You’re here, and you have our support.’ I’ll never forget that. . . . In five years she missed one game.”

Dorothy fell and injured her knee the week before the Spartans were headed to Florida. She couldn’t walk, but yes, “I thought about making the trip,” she said. “My husband went instead.”

Dorothy and Curtis Young will be in Phoenix on Sunday to watch the Chargers take on the Cardinals. They were in Indianapolis earlier, and Cleveland, and they have been to San Diego on several occasions.

“I was one of the lucky ones,” Duane said. “I grew up in a two-parent household, and that made growing up a lot easier. My parents were always there for me and my sister. That makes a big difference.”

Curtis Young is principal at Milwood Middle School, and Duane Young has advice for Milwood’s student: Don’t trifle with the principal.

“He was still whooping my butt when I was in ninth grade,” Duane said, “and I was 6-1, 230 pounds.”

Curtis Young remembered. “We had to go down to the basement every now and then to make some point.”

When son became bigger than father, they went fishing. “He’d rather fish than do almost anything else,” Curtis said. “So when I wanted to talk with him, I took him fishing.”

Duane nodded. “He’d give me these serious talks because I was in the boat and there was no place to go.”

Curtis Young admired his son’s athletic ability, too, but when he came home from work each night, his first words were always the same: “Do you have homework, Duane?

“He always said, ‘Can’t you say anything else other than that?’ But that was my job, and I told him when he ceased having homework, my job was done. When he earned his degree at Michigan State, he no longer had homework and my job was done.”

Charger tight end Derrick Walker was at the University of Michigan at the same time Young was at Michigan State. Michigan always beat Michigan State.

“The guys at Michigan State are always mad when somebody from Michigan does better than them,” Walker said, “so they’re always mad.”

The Michigan-Michigan State rivalry has now come together in San Diego and produced a dynamic blocking tandem.

“I know Duane’s parents and they are fine people and Duane’s a reflection of them,” Walker said. “I remember talking to the guys at Michigan, and they didn’t look forward to blocking him.”

Walker, of course, dresses like a guy who went to the University of Michigan. Young dresses like Eric Moten, his former roommate as MSU.

“It’s ridiculous,” Walker said. “Look at him.”

Maybe there was a power shortage and the lights were out when he selected his clothes for the day.

“Swap meet,” defensive end Burt Grossman said. “That’s the only place you can get that stuff.”

Maybe he’s color blind. Maybe he’s a little short on cash.

“Hands down Duane is the worst dresser in here,” tackle Broderick Thompson said.

After the Cleveland game earlier this season, Dorothy Young noticed the players filing from the locker room. Each, with the exception of her son, wore a suit.

“She said something to him,” Ross said. “She asked him why he couldn’t dress like Derrick, a Michigan man.”

Ouch.

When he was a child, he took piano lessons. He learned to play the saxophone, and he began to collect record albums. He now has thousands of albums, “everything from the Beatles to Beethoven.”

“I like house music and reggae,” he said, and held up his shoulder pads with the attached “Reggae Powered” sticker.

He worked as a disc jockey. “I was ‘Hitmaster Diamond D,’ and I’d start off by lowering my voice and saying, ‘You’re listening to the Hitmaster Diamond D-D-D-D-D,’ with the ‘D’ echoing, and then the party’s jumping.

“I mixed music. We had two turntables and we’d mix songs for parties. We also made pirate tapes and sold them for $10 to $15. It was easier than mowing lawns, and kept me off the streets and out of trouble.”

Why such an interest in music?

“Kalamazoo,” he said. “What else is there to do?”

He and his friends formed a DJ club, and everybody had a nickname. Dixon Edwards, who plays for the Cowboys, was ‘Mixin’ Dixon,’ and Carlos Jenkins, who plays for the Vikings, was ‘DJ Los.’ ”

“If you’re going to get into the DJ-ing business and mix music,” he said, “you’d have to start with these three albums: Planet Rock by Afrika Bambaata and Soul Sonic Force, Bad Times by Captain Rapp and Technicolor by Model 500.”

Of course.

The phone rings most every Tuesday morning, and it’s mom.

“She knows it’s my day off and she wants me to go out and volunteer a few hours at a school,” he said. “She says, ‘you’re not doing anything, Duane, why not go help some kids?’ ”

He has, and he will.

“You know how my mom is,” he said. “Sometimes athletics doesn’t work out; most of the time athletics doesn’t work out. But I have my education, and I have another option, and when I’m done, I’ll give my time to kids.

“But I’m not done yet.”