Posted on Sun, Jan. 05, 2003
Reggie Rucker tells of his rise to NFL
Kardiac Kids-era Browns star relates how he went `From Ghetto to God' in autobiography
By Barbara McIntyre
Special to the Beacon Journal
Reggie Rucker's rise from shocking poverty in the housing projects of Washington, D.C., to the starting lineup of the Cleveland Browns' beloved Kardiac Kids is the subject of his new autobiography, From Ghetto to God: The Incredible Journey of NFL Star, Reggie Rucker.
In the 197-page book, co-authored by retired Canton educator and councilwoman Nadine McIlwain, Rucker tells of living with his mother, Nancy, in a row house heated only by a wood stove. When the numbers runner whose quarters they shared was arrested, young Reggie and his mother became homeless.
They were taken in by a family friend, and before long Nancy had two more sons. When Reggie was 10, he learned that he had five more siblings when they and an aunt all moved into a one-bedroom house, where they lived until Reggie was bitten by a rat.
Reggie developed his athletic skills in Catholic Youth Organization sports programs, but at night he ran with a gang. ``I was trying to be both thug and ball player,'' he writes, ``but the proverbial fork in the road was on the horizon.'' The ``fork'' turned out to be Reggie's arrest for shooting street lights with a BB gun.
The arrest was a wake-up call for 13-year-old Reggie, who decided to devote his spare time to a paper route and playing basketball. As his athletic prowess grew, he also became a more serious student and earned an academic scholarship to Boston University.
His freshman year was complicated when his girlfriend, Carole, became pregnant. The couple married, but Carole remained in Washington when Rucker returned to Boston. Within a year, he had begun a pattern of unfaithfulness that continued until the marriage dissolved in 1987.
Rucker played for the Dallas Cowboys from 1969 to 1971, then signed with the New York Giants but was waived within three weeks. He joined the New England Patriots and was named 1972's Most Valuable Player, but an injury took him out of the lineup in 1974. In 1975, Rucker was traded to the Cleveland Browns. Owner Art Modell called to say, ``Reggie, you're going to love it here in Cleveland.''
Rucker did love it. He devotes several chapters to the Kardiac Kids era, describing his feelings about winning a Central Division championship. Rucker retired in 1982 but remained in Cleveland to work as a consultant and sportscaster: ``I can not think of any reason to leave Cleveland. This is how I felt then and how I still feel today.''
Rucker tells of his romance with Halle Berry, and of his religious conversion. He said he wrote his autobiography to pass on the faith and his belief in his salvation, and to ``look back on the trail I left behind.'' Rucker feels his childhood prepared him for the NFL: ``It gave me toughness, perseverance, determination and commitment.'' He now works as a stockbroker.
Rucker met his collaborator, McIlwain, at a church event. When asked why he chose her, he laughed and said, ``I don't know! I felt that it was important to tell the story to an African-American woman. It's a must-read for those families in which a woman is the head of the household.'' The book took a year and a half of meetings and recording sessions.
McIlwain works as a program officer for the Sisters of Charity Foundation. She is working on a novel, C.J. Williams' Bastard Children, in which five children of different mothers learn they have the same father and search for a sixth sibling.
From Ghetto to God is not a high-budget effort, with laminated paper cover and eight pages of photos. It is available for $15.95 from Creative Works Publishing, 4197 Fulton Drive N.W., Suite B, Canton, OH 44718.