They've had a ball
Timberland runner's family relishes his success
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| File photo -- If he repeats his 2007 success, Timberland's Montee Ball will graduate as the No. 2 rusher all-time in the state of Missouri. |
But his father, who is also named Montee Ball, had a different vision.
"Growing up, I wanted him to play defense," the father said. "My goal was for him to be the meanest linebacker that ever lived. I was always showing him videos of Lawrence Taylor and everybody on the other side of the ball."It was around age six that Montee first took notice of what Dad was watching on TV on a fall Sunday afternoon.
"I still remember the first day," the younger Ball said. "My dad was sitting on the couch, and I was watching the game and I was asking, 'What's going on? Why are they doing that' and he explained the whole thing to me. From that day, I loved the game, and I always wanted to play."
At age eight, when he was old enough to play pee-wee football in an O'Fallon league, Ball found out that at 122 pounds, he was 12 pounds over the limit to play running back. So he began his organized football career as a lineman, although his mother, Melissa Ball, said that career almost ended before it actually began.
"The very first day of practice, it was very hot, and he came over to the fence and told his dad that he quit," Melissa Ball said.
"He was heavy then. He was my little pudgy fat boy then, and I thought to myself, 'It's so hot out, he is not going to make it.' Sure enough, he comes over with sweat running down his face and says, 'This is too hot, I quit. I want to play baseball.' But his dad was like, 'Nope, that's not going to happen. You're going to finish this season, and if you don't like it after that, then we'll quit. But you're not going to start something and then not finish.'"
It didn't take long for Montee to get into the football swing of things, and after two seasons, he asked his dad, who was the coach of the team, what the weight limit was for a running back in the 10-year-old division.
"I told him the rule says he couldn't be over 120 pounds at age 10 to run the football," said the elder Ball. "So at nine years old, he put himself on a diet. He ate salads, no soda, no nothing, that whole summer leading up to when he was 10 years old, so he could run the football. It wasn't something that I told him to do - I wouldn't condone a parent having his child do that - but he wanted to do it, and he did it all on his own."
And when weigh-ins came prior to that next season, Ball hit the scales at 119 pounds.
"We had to strip him down to his underwear, put a towel on him, but he was under the limit," his dad said.
It wouldn't take long for Ball to excel at his new position. On his first carry in the first game, he broke down the sideline for about 80 yards and a touchdown.
"He got the football, and wow," coach Ball said. "It was like, 'OK, you're a running back.'"
It shouldn't have come as a surprise that Montee would want to play that position, as his mom said he always seemed to be running around anyway.
"He pretty much ran us," Melissa Ball said. "He was just all over the place all the time, and if the door was cracked open, he was running out."
There would apparently be no slowing Montee down, and he has put that to good use on the football field.
Montee's family moved from O'Fallon to Wentzville just before he entered high school, and after earning the starting tailback role for the Timberland varsity team two years ago as a sophomore, he ran for 1,845 yards on 297 carries, a 6.2-yard per carry average, with 15 touchdowns. As a junior in 2007, Montee led the St. Louis metropolitan area with 3,077 yards rushing on 358 carries (8.6 average) with 32 touchdowns. His single-season mark is the fourth highest total in MSHSAA history, and with another season of 3,000-plus yards, he would rank second on the career list behind Brad Hocker of Archie High School (9,193 yards).
"For him to be able to start fulfilling a dream that he's wanted for many years is just phenomenal to me," Melissa Ball said. "We are so proud of him."
And that intense pride is on display for everyone to see - and hear - whenever Timberland plays. Throughout the course of the game, Montee's mom will pace in front of the stands, following the play step by step and shouting out encouragement to the Wolves.
"When Montee's running a touchdown, I'm running with him. Now if I could just lose some weight with that," Melissa Ball said with a laugh.
"I can't sit in the stands, I can't do it, because I'm afraid of screaming over the top of somebody, and that would be rude. There are elderly people in the stands, there are kids in the stands, and I don't want to scream over the top of everybody."
But her voice definitely carries.
"I hear her over everyone," Montee said. "She actually follows where the ball goes, and she's just yelling. The good thing about it is she's not just yelling for me, she yells for the whole team."
It's certainly better, Montee recalled with a laugh, than when he first played football at Timberland.
"My freshman year, she had a cow bell, and I told her to get rid of that, because that was annoying," he said.
It's kind of funny how a son's love for something can affect his mother, because Melissa Ball had been inundated by football long before Montee came along, but it certainly didn't give her goose bumps like it does now. Montee's dad had been a linebacker and running back at Holt High School, where he and Melissa began dating, but she didn't initially take to football. It wasn't until her only son became addicted to it that Melissa said she really gave the sport a chance.
"I actually hated football until my son started playing, and then I said to my husband, 'OK, I guess it's time for me to learn this game,'" Melissa Ball said. "This game that I got so tired of looking at on television for all those years. And now I know that it's the greatest game ever."
But for all of Montee's on-the-field accomplishments, his parents do their part to make sure that Montee doesn't lose sight of what's really important.
"They are very grounded people, and they understand," Timberland coach Craig Collins said. "They carry themselves with a great deal of class, and they understand that they've got a young man who has a great deal of potential, but they keep him focused on the important things in life."
Which at the top of the list means maintaining good grades.
"I remember in fourth grade, Montee brought home his first D in math, in a progress report, and I was like, "I will pull you from football if this stays a permanent grade,'" Melissa Ball said.
Montee's world revolved around football, his mom said. But grades would have to come first.
"He understood, and he worked really hard and brought his grades up," Melissa Ball said. "That was the first and the last time that I had to mention grades with him ever again. From that point on, I never even had to look at him and say, 'How's school?' because I always knew. He always informs us, and we keep in contact with his teachers, and he's been able to keep a 3.5 GPA."
Montee - who has two sisters: Ashley, 19, and Aireanna, 8 - has already given an oral commitment to play football at the University of Wisconsin. It was not where his father would have guessed that Montee would end up, but lumped in with invites to visit big-time college campuses such as Nebraska, Florida, Oklahoma, Harvard, Tennessee, North Carolina, Michigan State, Iowa, etc., the interest shown by a Wisconsin school that the elder Montee said runs the ball "probably 90 percent of the time" was rather intriguing.
"And they told Montee, 'We have just one scholarship to give to a running back in 2009, and we're giving it to you,'" the elder Ball said.
The Ball family had already been on several recruiting trips before heading to Wisconsin.
"Enough to blow the motor in the truck and have to buy a new car," Melissa Ball said with a laugh.
"We went to about five other colleges, just walking around the campus, and Montee was very polite to everyone he met, the coaches and everyone, but he just did not have that look in his eyes. He has this smile that I know when he's happy, that everything he's seen excites him, and I wasn't seeing that smile."
Until they reached Madison.
"He fit in with the locker room, he fit in with the coaches," Montee's dad said. "He felt at home, and that's one of the feelings that we were looking for."
Little did Wisconsin know that it was getting a package deal. Along with Montee, the Badgers will be getting perhaps their most vocal supporter as Melissa Ball is making plans to relocate to the Madison area along with her son. Although Ashley has decided to remain here, Dad and Aireanna will likely make the move six months to a year later, so the family can continue to follow Montee's gridiron exploits.
"We've always had that plan. No matter where it was going to be," Montee said.
"We're really close, and I always think it's good that my family's going to follow me, because I'm their son, who's following his dream to play in the NFL, and I want them to be there to watch everything."
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