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Coach helps kickers from his wheelchair

Kevin Seifert, Star Tribune

May 9, 2004VIKE0509

Thirty minutes. That's all Doug Blevins needs, one half of one hour of one day, 30 minutes to evaluate and improve just about any kicker who comes his way. "I don't know how to explain it," he said. "I just see things."

In the highly specialized world of professional football, there are coaches, assistant coaches and assistants to the assistant coaches. There are video editors, speed trainers and team chefs. Doug Blevins is a kicking consultant, a man of exacting detail and plain language who has parlayed the curses of life into professional prestige.

He has never kicked a ball, caught a snap or even walked. Cerebral palsy has confined him to a wheelchair since birth, but like a blind man with superior hearing, Blevins has honed his observation skills -- so sharply, in fact, that a kicker's every movement plays out like a slide show in his mind.

That talent has helped him develop a number of NFL kickers and punters, among them Super Bowl hero Adam Vinatieri and current Vikings placekicker Aaron Elling.

Hired this spring by the Vikings as a part-time consultant, Blevins has proved to be the most unique character this weekend at minicamp.

"Anybody that comes in to work with him might be a little hesitant at first," said Elling, who began attending Blevins' kicking camp in Florida seven years ago. "But after you kick with him for a half-hour, you say, 'Man, this guy knows what he's talking about.'

"I used to go down there, and someone new would say, 'Uh, is this guy for real?' And I'll say, 'Just wait. Kick 15 balls and tell me how much he helps you.' It's unbelievable."

A lifetime of study

Blevins, 40, began his football "career" as a four-year-old in his hometown of Abingdon, Va., where local Little League organizers made him a "Junior Commissioner." He spent his childhood watching football games from his wheelchair, taking mental notes of the way players moved and how coaches instructed.

At 13, he wrote a letter to Ben Agajanian -- a longtime kicking coach for the Dallas Cowboys -- asking for any and all pointers on special teams. A box of instructional pamphlets and diagrams soon arrived, and a passion was born as Blevins absorbed every aspect of kicking theory.

He volunteered as a student assistant at Abingdon High School and later at the University of Tennessee. His first job as a kicking coach was at East Tennessee University in 1986.

"Some guys might be hesitant when they first see me," Blevins said. "But then they work with me and see the results immediately."

Elling, for example, struggled with kickoffs last season despite a strong leg that should have given him greater distance. During an offseason consultation, Blevins watched Elling kick off and then provided a quick suggestion: Move six steps further from the ball to speed up the approach, then place the plant foot a few inches forward upon contact.

The result this spring has been kickoffs consistently reaching the 2-or 3-yard lines with ample hang time.

"He's studied the art of kicking so thoroughly that he can really diagnose problems well," Vikings special teams coach Rusty Tillman said. "He's just really fine-tuned the thing, and can zero in on what the problem is."

Said Blevins: "I've got a God-given ability to analyze what people are doing, to pick it up in real time. I don't need to watch the tape. I can see everything as it happens, and then I can get with them on how to fix it."

For Elling, Blevins' efficiency is no longer a surprise.

"They say that great coaches see all 11 players on the field at the same time," Elling said. "Well, [blevins] can see every mechanical thing you're doing on a kick, all at once."

Pressed for an explanation, Elling shrugs.

"Think how good your eyes would be if all you could do is sit," he said. "That must be how it is."

It is a theory embraced by Blevins, who calls cerebral palsy the "Cadillac of handicaps" as a way to describe the high level of performance its victims can achieve. "Your other senses just become sharper," he said.

Analyzing other sports

The skill translates into other sports as well. Blevins has begun studying baseball pitchers, watching their motions and analyzing the cause and effect of various fundamentals. It even came into play recently in the swimming pool.

The water's buoyancy helps Blevins support himself enough to swim, and his wife, Nancy -- a former world-class swimmer in Colombia -- has been teaching him strokes during the past four months.

One day, Blevins was watching Nancy swim and pointed out a hitch in her stroke. Nancy was stunned at how quickly her husband's sophistication had grown.

"He never walked," she said, "so his brain cells are connected for that type of thinking, of watching people [and processing the information]. So what he does is make a different connection, one that goes only between his eyes and his brain. That's the way his brain is wired. That's the way he thinks."

Blevins will return Monday to Virginia, where he will continue working individually with clients at nearby Emory & Henry College. He and the Vikings will resume development camp in June, and Blevins will remain with the team through training camp, when coach Mike Tice said he will re-evaluate the position.

Return to the NFL?

Blevins was a full-time kicking coach for the Miami Dolphins from 1997 to 2002, and he hopes to join the Vikings or another NFL team in a similar capacity. In the meantime, he gives motivational speeches and has even held discussions about a movie based on his life.

But Blevins turned down a recent proposal, he said, because the writer wanted to dramatize his life.

"They don't want to hear about how Doug Blevins and Adam Vinatieri kicked field goals in the snow," Blevins said. "They wanted to hear about how Doug Blevins cried himself to sleep in Abingdon, Virginia, because no one would ever give him a chance. But it never happened that way."

No, Doug Blevins has found detours around every obstacle -- sometimes literally, while trying to find his way into and around NFL stadiums and locker rooms. "There's always a loading dock," he said. "I'm the king of the loading dock."

For Dolphins road games, Blevins made a deal with a company to have one wheelchair waiting for him at the team hotel and another at the stadium. He typically rode the team bus to and from the stadium, boarding with the help of two assistants, and coached from the sideline; if other coaches and players block his view of the field, he watches the stadium big screen.

"Once you get it worked out, it's not a problem," he said. "My situation is a little bit tougher, but I've been through it and can work out the logistics. I don't need a lot of special stuff."

Or a lot of time.

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