Interesting read, it will be interesting to see how he does at Vandy. Sounds like a Shonn Greene type and I think may have (or was going to) visited Iowa this past summer. I am guessing AJ will be a be a front runner to win this award next year...
Tribune Player of the Year: Glenbard West running back Sam Brodner
Mike HelfgotVanderbilt, a member of the Southeastern Conference, the biggest, baddest league in college football, looked past the eye test, focused on the tangible — his 4.47 speed in the 40, his 39-inch vertical jump, his ability to push the pile and fall forward every time, his huge, out-of-the-blue junior season at Glenbard West — and offered Brodner a scholarship last June.
Three weeks later, Brodner accepted, but the invisible growth on his shoulder, the one that developed while only one other BCS conference school (Illinois) wanted him as a running back, remained firmly in place.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/highschool/ct-spt-1129-prep-fb-7a-final-20151128-story.html
Brodner himself didn't know what to expect. Hetlet kept him with the varsity team as a sophomore to play linebacker, but he missed most of the season with a back injury.
The plan was to use him as a secondary option to lead back Donahvon Vaughn, and only after Vaughn was injured early in the season did Brodner begin to realize what he might be capable of.
"It was all about Donahvon," Brodner said. "He is one of my best friends. When he went down I was sad. I didn't know what to expect. I was going to be a nice complement to Donahvon. I just kind of figured it out."
Some 1,950 yards and 27 touchdowns later, Brodner proved to be a high-major running back whether the establishment was ready to accept him or not.
"The whole process," Hetlet said, "I've checked out of."
If Brodner didn't become the kind of high-level recruit his profile, if not his stature, suggested he should have, the confidence from his big junior season stayed with him.
One day last summer he saw a video of a kid doing a standing backflip and catching a football on the way down.
Now there's a video of Brodner doing the same. A gymnast when he was younger, he said he nailed it on the first try.
"He's a freak," Hetlet said. "He'd be good at anything."
The plan for 2015 was not to ride Brodner even harder, but to develop other threats to lighten his load and allow him to play linebacker in the bigger games if the need presented.
Hetlet managed to limit Brodner's usage early in the season as junior Isaiah Skinner established himself as a dangerous back and quarterback Brian Cochrane gave Glenbard West one of its best passing attacks in the Hetlet era.
Of course, Brodner was on the receiving end of 23 of those passes, six of them touchdowns, and as injuries to Skinner and virtually the entire depth chart behind Brodner mounted, he became a one-man show.
When Hinsdale Central took a 10-point lead into the second half and threatened to snap Glenbard West's now eight-year conference championship streak, Brodner broke a 75-yard run, made a ridiculous, leaping, one-handed, sideline catch and piled up 261 yards from scrimmage to will the Hilltoppers to a 35-24 victory.
"He's just gifted," Gagliano said. "Kind of a freak."
When Glenbard West went into the locker room following a scoreless first half against 12-time state-champion Mount Carmel, he demanded the ball for the first time in his career, outgained Mount Carmel by himself and scored the only touchdown of West's 7-0 victory.
"It was an in-the-moment thing," Brodner said. "That was supposed to be our hardest game, the best team we ever played. We were nervous about it."
When Cochrane took every big snap the rest of the postseason, he handed the ball to Brodner — 50 times in the snowy semifinals against Cary-Grove alone.
He totaled 292 yards and two scores in that 21-6 victory and 1,065 yards and 16 TDs in Glenbard West's five playoff wins.
"If someone wants to pound the ball, who is better?" Hetlet said. "And if someone wants pure speed he's that too. Very rarely were his runs clean, untouched. The reality is you can't tackle him. I don't know how many running backs I've seen come out of Illinois with that ability."
PAST WINNERS
2014: Justin Hunniford, Providence QB
2013: Justin Jackson, Glenbard North RB
2012: Laquon Treadwell, Crete-Monee WR
2011: Jordan Westerkamp, Montini WR
2010: Reilly O'Toole, Wheaton South QB
2009: Matt Perez, Maine South RB/LB
Tribune Player of the Year: Glenbard West running back Sam Brodner
Mike HelfgotVanderbilt, a member of the Southeastern Conference, the biggest, baddest league in college football, looked past the eye test, focused on the tangible — his 4.47 speed in the 40, his 39-inch vertical jump, his ability to push the pile and fall forward every time, his huge, out-of-the-blue junior season at Glenbard West — and offered Brodner a scholarship last June.
Three weeks later, Brodner accepted, but the invisible growth on his shoulder, the one that developed while only one other BCS conference school (Illinois) wanted him as a running back, remained firmly in place.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/sports/highschool/ct-spt-1129-prep-fb-7a-final-20151128-story.html
Brodner himself didn't know what to expect. Hetlet kept him with the varsity team as a sophomore to play linebacker, but he missed most of the season with a back injury.
The plan was to use him as a secondary option to lead back Donahvon Vaughn, and only after Vaughn was injured early in the season did Brodner begin to realize what he might be capable of.
"It was all about Donahvon," Brodner said. "He is one of my best friends. When he went down I was sad. I didn't know what to expect. I was going to be a nice complement to Donahvon. I just kind of figured it out."
Some 1,950 yards and 27 touchdowns later, Brodner proved to be a high-major running back whether the establishment was ready to accept him or not.
"The whole process," Hetlet said, "I've checked out of."
If Brodner didn't become the kind of high-level recruit his profile, if not his stature, suggested he should have, the confidence from his big junior season stayed with him.
One day last summer he saw a video of a kid doing a standing backflip and catching a football on the way down.
Now there's a video of Brodner doing the same. A gymnast when he was younger, he said he nailed it on the first try.
"He's a freak," Hetlet said. "He'd be good at anything."
The plan for 2015 was not to ride Brodner even harder, but to develop other threats to lighten his load and allow him to play linebacker in the bigger games if the need presented.
Hetlet managed to limit Brodner's usage early in the season as junior Isaiah Skinner established himself as a dangerous back and quarterback Brian Cochrane gave Glenbard West one of its best passing attacks in the Hetlet era.
Of course, Brodner was on the receiving end of 23 of those passes, six of them touchdowns, and as injuries to Skinner and virtually the entire depth chart behind Brodner mounted, he became a one-man show.
When Hinsdale Central took a 10-point lead into the second half and threatened to snap Glenbard West's now eight-year conference championship streak, Brodner broke a 75-yard run, made a ridiculous, leaping, one-handed, sideline catch and piled up 261 yards from scrimmage to will the Hilltoppers to a 35-24 victory.
"He's just gifted," Gagliano said. "Kind of a freak."
When Glenbard West went into the locker room following a scoreless first half against 12-time state-champion Mount Carmel, he demanded the ball for the first time in his career, outgained Mount Carmel by himself and scored the only touchdown of West's 7-0 victory.
"It was an in-the-moment thing," Brodner said. "That was supposed to be our hardest game, the best team we ever played. We were nervous about it."
When Cochrane took every big snap the rest of the postseason, he handed the ball to Brodner — 50 times in the snowy semifinals against Cary-Grove alone.
He totaled 292 yards and two scores in that 21-6 victory and 1,065 yards and 16 TDs in Glenbard West's five playoff wins.
"If someone wants to pound the ball, who is better?" Hetlet said. "And if someone wants pure speed he's that too. Very rarely were his runs clean, untouched. The reality is you can't tackle him. I don't know how many running backs I've seen come out of Illinois with that ability."
PAST WINNERS
2014: Justin Hunniford, Providence QB
2013: Justin Jackson, Glenbard North RB
2012: Laquon Treadwell, Crete-Monee WR
2011: Jordan Westerkamp, Montini WR
2010: Reilly O'Toole, Wheaton South QB
2009: Matt Perez, Maine South RB/LB
