Every night, the routine was the same. After tucking his daughter into bed and completing his household chores, Kareem Leary headed out the door at 10:30 to a parking lot near his apartment, and there he drew a deep breath, reared back and threw the ball high into the night sky. Staring upward, trying to find the ball in the darkness, he shuffled into position underneath it, awaited its return, and caught it. Then he threw the ball again, over and over.
"You're nuts," neighbors said as they passed by.But there he would be the next night. Throw and catch. Throw and catch. For an hour or more, he played this one-man game of catch. On the rare occasions when he dropped the ball, he muttered to himself. "Concentrate!"
The routine began a year ago, when Leary was a football player without a team.
Sidelined for the season with a back injury, he practiced and trained whenever and however he could.
He was always throwing himself onto the floor of his apartment for a set of pushups and situps until, by the end of the day, he had done hundreds of them. And then at night he was out there in the parking lot throwing that darn ball again, with only the dim street lights to see by. It was a way to sharpen his catching skills, and the darkness was part of the exercise; it demanded more concentration.
When I get a chance next season, he told himself, I'm going to catch the ball because of this.
Which is precisely what he has done this fall. Heading into today's game against Air Force in Colorado Springs, Leary, the University of Utah's senior cornerback, has intercepted six passes this season, tying teammate Ernest Boyd for No. 1 in the Western Athletic Conference and No. 3 in the country. He has returned two interceptions for touchdowns and would have had a third touchdown last week if the play had not been nullified by a penalty against a teammate.
Leary has yet to drop an interception this season, but then he did have a lot of practice catching the ball in that parking lot virtually every night from September of '93 until the opening of training camp last August. It was perhaps just the cure for a player who dropped five would-be interceptions two seasons ago, including three he probably would have returned for touchdowns.
Air Force quarterbacks won't throw many passes against Utah today, but when they do they would be well advised to throw away from Leary, who also has broken up another 14 passes this season (tied for second in the WAC).
A coach once called Leary "Ball Hawk" because of his penchant for soaring to the ball. When a teammate gave Leary a small 14-karat gold hawk, Leary employed a Salt Lake jeweler to add BALL HAWK to the ornament and turned it into a necklace, which he wears everywhere except onto the field.
Leary has been called another avian nickname, as well: Birdlegs, which is an accurate description for a man who is supported by two broom handles. Taken in the whole, Leary appears to be no one an opposing quarterback would fear. He has the physique of a Kenyan distance runner - 6-foot-1, 165 pounds, all sinew and sharp angles - or a basketball player like his father, William, who once tried out for the old ABA.
"I'm definitely not built for football," he says.
Right down to his hands, which are smallish and slender, with noticeably short fingers. A slight webbing between the fingers makes them even shorter and prevents him from spreading them in any measureable way. Which leaves one to wonder how these hands have intercepted nine passes in less than two seasons at Utah.
Leary also possesses only average speed, but he does bring several assets to the field. He has uncanny strength for his size (he has bench pressed 340 pounds, 175 over his weight, which accounts for his 45 solo tackles, one short of the team lead). He also is both an intuitive and studious player who has mastered the footwork, reads and other techniques for covering pass receivers and monitoring quarterbacks.
On Tuesday nights at 10 you can often find Leary in Utah's football office alone, watching film. On other nights he watches film at home, from 11 until past midnight, looking for tendencies that could tip him off about his opponents' intentions.
He noticed on film that the CSU quarterback dipped his shoulder a particular way when he was about to throw to the inside receiver - Leary actually showed the tendency repeatedly to a teammate before the game - and then picked him off twice, on one occasion actually leaving his assigned receiver to pursue another receiver before the ball was even thrown. He noticed that whenever the Oregon quarterback did a half-rollout he threw to a post route, which resulted in another interception. He noticed a San Diego State receiver chattered his feet and hunched his back just before breaking a quick out pattern. He noticed an Oregon receiver liked to break a slant pattern back toward the sideline, and he jumped him for an interception.
Leary, a senior from Sacramento, studies film at night because his evenings are filled with other duties. A double major in sociology and family studies, he gets considerable practice in the latter. He and his wife, Jennifer, have a baby, and Dad does his share of the cooking, cleaning up, changing diapers, and playing with his daughter.
"She's the best thing in the world," says Leary.
Even for a guy dedicated enough to play midnight games of catch, there are times when football must wait.