A lot of professional athletes will pretend they’re not paying that much attention to the numbers or rankings, but James doesn’t dodge the question of the importance of closing in on Marcus Allen’s 12,243 career yardage mark.

“It means a lot to me because especially in this day and era, you’re not going to see too many guys moving to the 10- and 12,000 yards because of the two backs and the way the NFL is moving,” James said.

“It’s like me, LT, Fred T, Portis, we’re like the last of the dying breed of running backs. You have to embrace it. When you really look at it, you say you’re not going to have running backs that are going to actually accomplish this feat.

“I’ll maybe do it at 31 years old and I can play. It’s up to me how long I want to play and how far I want to go up that chart. That’s super important to me. I’m glad I got off to a fast start. You see a lot of these guys and they’re splitting time and not getting the opportunities and it’s going to be tough for guys to get 10 or 12,000 yards.”

James rushed for 46 yards on 16 carries last week, his most significant action since signing with the Seahawks several weeks into training camp. His career total stands at 12,226 yards.

He needs just 54 more to move past Marshall Faulk and another 33 to pass Jim Brown into eighth all time. From there, it will take 427 more yards to catch Tony Dorsett at No. 7, but James isn’t putting any limits on his sights.

“I’m not chasing the top 10,” he said. “I’m chasing all of them.”

But how much tread is left on the tires?

James isn’t buying any notion that he’s lost something. He says his late arrival with the Seahawks has forced him to play catch up on the offensive system, but he insists the game and practices aren’t nearly as physical as they were when he entered the NFL in 1999 and that he can keep going several more seasons in the right situation.

“Everything for me is based upon my kids, so I’m year to year,” he said. “But realistically, I know it’s probably two, three years. This year plus two. It’s so easy. It’s not like it used to be. It’s not a physical game any more. It’s just a matter of taking care of your body and getting in a nice situation with a coach who isn’t going to run you into the ground or just beat you down in camp or practice.

“Kids these days are different. It’s the video-game era. They’re not going to do all that stuff that used to go on.”

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In what was an otherwise glum Seahawks locker room following a 34-17 loss to the Indianapolis Colts Sunday, James flashed a few wide smiles as he thought about an afternoon he said would be one of the more memorable of his career.

James spent the first seven years of what will be a Hall of Fame career with the Colts before leaving following the 2005 season as a free agent and signing with Arizona. Now in his first season with the Seahawks, Sunday was his first game in Indianapolis since leaving town, and he was greeted with a huge ovation the first time he carried the ball, and later with a video montage of some of his Colts’ highlights to more applause.

“I’ll always look back on this day,” he said of a game in which he gained just 16 yards on four carries. “This day right here will always be special to me.”

Among the highlights shown of James was a long run against the Seahawks at Husky Stadium in 2000, a day when he gained a career-high 219 yards.

“A lot of guys on this team didn’t know I could move like that,” said James, who is the leading career rusher in Colts’ history with 9,226 yards.

One who did was former teammate Peyton Manning.

“I got a little choked up watching that highlight tape today,” said Manning. “I have never forgotten how great he was. Truly use the word great, not just good.”

James, signed after the Seahawks let go of T.J. Duckett, has just 59 yards on 21 carries this season and at age 31, is nearing the end of his career.

But standing 11th on the all-time rushing list with 12,180 yards, he said he’d like to keep moving up those rankings before calling it quits. Asked if he saw the ring of honor and envisioned his name being on there, he said “not just yet. I’ve got to play a little bit more. Got to move up that chart a little bit more.”

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Edgerrin James, the leading rusher among active NFL players, signed a one-year contract Monday night. He is expected to be at practice Wednesday.

To clear a roster spot, the club terminated the contract of running back T.J. Duckett.

The player his teammates call “Edge” comes to the Seahawks with a bit of an edge, as well. Frustrated by his reduced role with the NFC Champion Arizona Cardinals last season, James asked to be released during the offseason. He got his wish after the Cardinals selected Ohio State running back Chris Wells in the April draft.

James, 31, will get to play the Cardinals twice this season – Oct. 18 at Qwest Field and Nov. 15 in Arizona.

The former NFL rookie of the year had two 100-yard rushing games last year, the second coming against the Seahawks in the regular-season finale.

James will serve as the backup to Julius Jones with the Seahawks, who have averaged 2.9 yards on 56 running plays in their first two preseason games as the linemen and backs adapt to the zone-blocking scheme that offensive coordinator Greg Knapp is installing.

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But James had another commitment and couldn’t attend.

So in typical Edge fashion, he just showed up — at Thursday night’s camp, instead.

James, who was released by the Arizona Cardinals last month, has been showing up all over Southwest Florida since February, when he became the first Collier County native to play in a Super Bowl. James was a high school football star at Immokalee, his hometown, before going on to star at the University of Miami and in the NFL, for the Indianapolis Colts and then the Cardinals. James is currently seeking another NFL team; various Internet reports have suggested that the New Orleans Saints are interested.

While he has never played pro football for a Florida team, James continues to spend most of his time in South Florida. He remains dedicated to helping young football players like the ones he saw at the New Hope Ministries camp, many of whom were from low-income families and allowed to attend for free, according to New Hope youth pastor Ron Arevalo.

Arevalo said James was so vested in the camp that after attending on Thursday, he invited Arevalo and camp director Andrew Perez, a longtime Pop Warner coach in Collier County, to his house next week, to give them pointers about how and when to best run the camp.

“Having Edgerrin at the camp was a big encouragement for the kids, even a big encouragement for myself,” Arevalo said. “He just walked up and starting walking around the field with the kids and talking to them. It was a lot more of (James) wanting to play with the kids rather than give a speech to them.”

“Especially the ones that are really into football, their mouths just dropped,” Arevalo said, adding that one camper asked James to sign his forehead.

James’ appearance was a big accomplishment for the New Hope camp, which is in its first year with 40 campers: four 8-year-olds and 36 players from ages 12-17. Perez, who coached James in Pop Warner football in Immokalee from age 8-10, had the idea for a football camp at church after coaching youth football in Collier County for more than 25 years. Perez and Arevalo are the main camp instructors, with help from other local football luminaries, including Naples High’s Bill Kramer, who came earlier this week, former Chicago Bears running back Mark Green and 2008 Immokalee grad Carl Elie, who now plays running back for Louisiana-Monroe.

Saturday, at a cookout to wrap up the camp, which is not open to the public, Arevalo said he’s expecting Naples High grad and former NFL fullback Fred McCrary to attend, along with James’ cousin, Javarris James, who was a standout at Immokalee and now plays for the University of Miami, 2009 sixth-round NFL draft pick and former Naples High/University of Miami linebacker Spencer Adkins, and NFL free agent/former Gulf Coast and Florida Atlantic cornerback Corey Small.

Arevalo said having the coaches and local NFL and college players attend the New Hope camp did a lot to encourage the campers, especially those who may not otherwise have a chance to attend football camps because of the expense.

Churches don’t often hold football camps, but New Hope has a sports focus and is currently in the process of constructing a multi-function gymnasium on the church campus. Arevalo said the church is hoping to hire a coach to work with kids on sports such as football, basketball and baseball.

“We really do want to encourage the people from around our neighborhood to know that we are here for the community. We’re out there too to have fun with sports and stuff like that,” Arevalo said.

[Show as slideshow]

Source: Naples News

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The moves clear salary cap space for the Cardinals, who want to sign new deals with linebacker Karlos Dansby and safety Adrian Wilson, and eventually with unhappy wide receiver Anquan Boldin.

James had 794 carries for 2,895 yards and 16 touchdowns in his three seasons in Arizona. He topped 1,000 yards in 2006 and 2007, and his resurgence during last season’s playoffs gave Arizona the running game it had sorely lacked.

He was benched for seven games earlier in 2008, the first time that’s happened in his career, and he asked the team to release him then. The Cardinals refused, and he was reinserted into the lineup late in the season.

Despite it being such a difficult year, it led to James’ only Super Bowl.

James had sought his release early in the free agency period, but the Cardinals held off until after last weekend’s draft, where they chose Ohio State running back Chris “Beanie” Wells in the first round, the No. 31 pick overall. Wells and second-year pro Tim Hightower are expected to be Arizona’s featured backs in the coming season.

James, 30, had one year left, at $5 million, on the four-year, $40 million deal he signed with Arizona before the 2006 season. He recently experienced a personal tragedy with the death of his longtime girlfriend, and mother of his four children, of leukemia at age 30.

In his 10-year career, James has rushed for 12,121 yards, 11th on the NFL career list and first among active players.

Coach Ken Whisenhunt wasn’t available for comment, but issued a statement through the team.

“It’s never easy to release veteran players who have contributed to the team’s success, and these three individuals certainly fall into that category,” he said. “But like every decision we make, it simply comes down to what is in the best interest of our football team and what gives us the best chance for success. We’re grateful to all three of them for their contributions and wish them nothing but the best in the future.”

The team’s minicamp starts on Friday.

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After a terrific freshman season (802 yards, 4.7 per carry), Javarris battled injuries and mustered 582 yards (3.7 per carry) in 2007 and 286 yards (4.2) in nine games in 2008. The Immokalee High alum thought he would be at UM for three years and admits that turning pro was “tempting, but I didn’t have a healthy season and I didn’t really accomplish nothing here.”

Javarris said his freshman year was “good,” his sophomore season “average” and “last year was my downfall year.” Coach Randy Shannon has challenged him to rebound.

“He had early success and everything was so easy,” Edgerrin said. “You’ve got to continue to have that hunger. The hunger is more than just showing up and putting in the workout. … Life is challenging him. I was working out and I said, ‘Man, you see what I’m doing? I’m working without someone telling me I have to be here.’ I told him he’s got to work much harder than in the past.”

“Maybe I need to work out harder. I don’t know how that’s possible,” Javarris said, adding that Mark Whipple’s offense “is going to be fun,” with more chances in the passing game.

Said Edgerrin: “Whipple understands the type of player he’s dealing with. I never thought Javarris’ style was shotgun and gadget stuff. His thing is line up like the pros do.”

Competition is fierce, with Lee Chambers, Mike James, Damien Berry and eventually Lamar Miller pushing James and Graig Cooper.

“My job is to make sure they don’t take my job away,” Javarris said.

Edgerrin, the Immokalee grad who is the NFL’s active rushing leader and 11th all-time, wants out of Arizona after losing his starting job in November, despite postseason playing time. Though many expect Arizona will cut him instead of paying him $5 million in 2009, general manager Rod Graves told The Arizona Republic that until “we feel it’s prudent to release him, he’s here. He’s still very effective.”

Said James: “The sooner the better. That’s not what I came there for (to be a backup). I may never get the credit, but I’ve only been involved in one losing season. I’ve carried myself the right way. To run for 1,200 yards in Arizona — that’s not easy. (Some) say I’m average. It’s a joke. I’m 30, but I take care of myself. I’m going to come out on top.”

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“He wrote a check to upgrade our facilities, our field, a big number like $100,000,” Israel Gallegos said.

The restaurant manager thinks of James when it gets crowded.

“He didn’t go to New York for the big NFL Draft party — he stayed here and threw a party for everyone,” Linda Lozano says at the Mexican restaurant, Lozano’s. “It was packed. People waited outside.”

The cousin thinks of James when she goes home, considering the house was a gift from James. And when she goes to their grandmother’s home at Second Street, considering the renovations made by James.

“That used to be a nightclub,” Tammy Means says, pointing at a redone stucco home. She points to the similar home beside it. “That used to be a crack house.”

James bought both, re-did both and called them the “Fun House.” It’s a summer place where kids can lift weights, watch TV, play on computers or play basketball on the outdoor court. James bought them and re-built them years ago.

He holds a summer celebrity basketball game that brings a couple dozen NFL players to town. It was played at Immokalee High the first couple of times, but James didn’t like people having to pay to watch, Means said. He moved it to the Fun House.

“It’s free,” Means said.

The sports world is full of people who left their hometown and never came back. Never gave back. Never even looked back, because it was too twisted and painful and rife with riff-raff. James’ past is no different.

His father kept his distance. The family ate off food stamps.

Three brothers and an uncle are in prison, the result of drugs, violence or some volatile combination of the two. Immokalee isn’t the land of opportunity, what with the agricultural-based economy and 46 percent poverty rate for children under 18.

Role models? James had his mother and grandmother. He also had the guys with a wad of money from selling drugs who paid him $100 for every touchdown he scored in high school.

“I scored five touchdowns a few games,” he said.

Now, two hours south of the Super Bowl he’ll play in Sunday, James still makes his mark. Just last week, he was in town. On Second Street, where a teenage James bought crack cocaine for addicts and watched them get high for entertainment, he paid a couple junkies $20 to spot weights for him in the Fun House. Just to get them off the street.

The stories pile up like that. He filled up a semi-truck of food and water when Hurricane Wilma buckled Immokalee in 2005, then helped pass out relief to anyone who needed it. He bought rings for the Immokalee High State football champions in 2004, then showed up to present them to the team.

A weekend for 60 kids to Disney World? School clothes for kids who need it? Uniforms for Pop Warner teams?

“Lots of things people don’t need to know about, too,” Means says.

She sits in her teen-counseling office and tells how she was woken up one night several years ago by a phone call from James. He had bought a home for her. She could move in immediately.

“You know how many homes he has bought for people?” she asks.

She counts seven families from his family tree he’s bought homes. But here’s the kicker to this: The homes are in Orlando. He didn’t want to just give them a house. He wanted to give them a chance, where there better jobs and upgraded dreams.

That was finalized when his younger brother, Cherron, returned to prison in 2006. Cherron had moved to Indianapolis to live with Edgerrin, who was then a Colt. Things were going well. He then returned to Immokalee for two weeks and assaulted a police officer.

“That broke my heart, him going to prison again,” James said in Tampa.

James is 30 now. He’s 10 years in the league from the University of Miami. He has had the strangest of years, benched, forgotten and then rising like the city where he plays by rushing for two 73-yard games in the playoffs. Some think he’s the key to the Super Bowl. James thinks of the road up I-75.

“I’d like to bring all of Immokalee up for this one,” he said.

At the sheriff’s office, Tim Howell, says James already has. Look who he’s helped. What he’s done. Even the crime rates decreased in the area since the Fun House opened. Then again, the gifts don’t surprise the deputy.

He was James’ high school coach, after all. When James made the Pro Bowl as a rookie, he told Howell to pack some luggage. Howell was going to Hawaii with him. All expenses paid, of course.

- Dave Hyde, Sun Sentinel

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Not Edge.

The Arizona Cardinals running back special ordered a brand new Lamborghini, silver exterior with crushed red velvet interior, the color of his Cardinals.

“My first time seeing it was the day it got here, so I had to kinda learn how to drive it and everything on the fly,” James said. “I bought it out of Miami and had it shipped up here. The day we had off last week, Thursday, we went by the Lamborghini store and scoped it out.”

But in preparation for the Super Bowl, you wouldn’t think the Edge had much time to be toolin around Tampa taking in the sights.

“I drive it after practice and whenever we get some free time,” he said.

So, Edge, why the Lamborghini?

“Because it’s a special car. It’s somehthing no one has,” James said. “It’s fast and it’s one of those cars that you don’t drive all the time. I don’t like to really drive that much so it’s fitting, it’s perfect for someone like me.

“You don’t have to drive it all the time, you know … it’s one of those things where less is more.”

And why this week?”

“Why not?” James said. “Because it’s the Super Bowl and this is a fun week. Why not have it.”

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James is especially compelling at a time when we have become used to seeing sports stars complain about playing time and statistics, team be damned.

James, the Arizona Cardinals’ 29-year-old running back, was put on ice for much of the regular season in favor of the rookie Tim Hightower. James made it clear that he wasn’t pleased — he said he would not return to the Cardinals next season — but he never sulked, never pouted. He worked hard and practiced as if he were starting.

When Hightower faltered late in the season, the Cardinals called James’s number, and he responded with a string of performances that, as much as Kurt Warner’s laser throws and Larry Fitzgerald’s gravity-defying catches, catapulted Arizona into the Super Bowl.

In the divisional round of the playoffs, James rushed for 57 yards and a touchdown in the Cardinals’ upset victory over the heavily favored Carolina Panthers. A week later, James rushed for 73 yards in the Cardinals’ 32-25 win over the Philadelphia Eagles in the National Football Conference championship game.

Asked how he persevered, James said: “At the end of the day, it boils down to availability. You have to be available, and you have to go out and play. If you take care of the football side, everything else is going to take care of itself.”

For those who have watched him since his days at the University of Miami, then in the N.F.L. with the Colts, James never has lost — or lost sight of — the core values that carried him from Immokalee, Fla., to the Super Bowl: hard work and a dedication to doing what is required to help the team, a belief that when the team flourishes, the individual flourishes.

“Some guys focus on the business side more than the football side, and it doesn’t work out,” James said Tuesday. “Whenever I talk to a young guy, I always say: ‘Make sure you put football first, do everything the right way, as far as being a football player. Everything else is going to come.’ ”

Linda Ayre, the activities coordinator at Immokalee High School, met James when he was a freshman there.

“He was always very quiet,” she said Tuesday by telephone. “He was not a rah-rah; he wasn’t an instigator. He didn’t like the limelight.”

“He’s always been that way,” Ayre added. “He’s not been one to seek the limelight. Every time I hear him speak, I think about how he’s grown.”

The Indianapolis Colts selected James in the first round of the 1999 draft, and he was named the N.F.L. offensive rookie of the year. James won the rushing title his first two seasons, then tore a knee ligament in 2001.

After a mediocre 2002 season, there were whispers that James’s days as an elite N.F.L. back were over. But he re-established himself over the next three seasons, then signed as a free agent with the Cardinals in March 2006.

When the Colts drafted running back Joseph Addai a month later, James reached out to him to ease his transition.

James showed Addai everything possible, from how to run the stretch play to how to pick up the Colts’ complex blitz protection and, along the way, how to be a pro.

“We became good friends, we still talk to this day,” James said. “As an N.F.L. player, you got somebody younger that wants to learn, and is eager to learn, you want to always be able to help.”

They never played together, though. And after the Colts won the Super Bowl following the 2006 season, the organization presented James with a championship ring for what he had meant to the franchise.

“You understand that it’s not personal, it’s business,” he said. “This is business, regardless of what anyone may say or think, the N.F.L. is a business, and that’s the approach I’ve always taken.”

Really, until this month, the marriage of James and the Cardinals had not been what either party had hoped, and this season it hit its lowest point. James went through a stretch of eight games in which he carried the ball a total of 11 times.

Asked about his willingness to sit and watch and wait, James said his reaction was rooted in Immokalee, a rural, migrant community where luxuries were nonexistent and the lifestyle he now has was unthinkable.

Sitting on an N.F.L. bench was not that big a deal.

“You go back home or you know people that worse things are happening to,” James said. “You say, this right here is really not that bad.

“You have so many people who are barely making it, they’re barely surviving, some people who may not be living as long because of things that have happened to them. I have everything that somebody would want, and I’m able to do so many things.

“Why should I be complaining?”

On Sunday, Edgerrin Tyree James will represent Immokalee, Fla., on the grand stage of a Super Bowl. He will also represent a timeless truth: Many things can be coached; character isn’t one of them.

- William Rhoden, New York Times

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“It’s super important, because of how hard it is to get here,” James, completing his 10th season, said yesterday. “I’ve done everything you can possibly do, pretty much, for the running back position. To get to the Super Bowl is something I’ve never accomplished. You want to get everything. You want to taste everything the NFL has to offer. This is the ultimate goal.”

Sounds like a certain San Diego icon, who has all but molded his Hall of Fame bust through eight seasons and considers a championship to be his only remaining Everest.

But unlike LaDainian Tomlinson, James said he did not necessarily consider a Super Bowl title the end-all to be attained.

“I wouldn’t have been disappointed,” he said when asked how he would have felt if his career ended without this opportunity. “Because I know I’ve done everything the right way.”

Easy to say now. He’s here.

And, almost unbelievably, considering his role for much of the regular season, James is a big reason he and the Arizona Cardinals are here.

In three postseason games James carried 52 times for 203 yards, as the Cardinals became almost an entirely different offensive team in the playoffs.

This relative outburst of production comes on the heels of James, 11th on the NFL’s all-time rushing list, having his most trying and least productive regular season.

He carried just 133 times for 514 yards, the fewest attempts and yards of his career. He was essentially benched in November, as the Cardinals went with rookie Tim Hightower.

“(Hightower) was really showing some explosiveness,” Cardinals offensive coordinator Todd Haley said yesterday. “He was helping us more and more, and we gave him a shot to play and it happened that he had a real good game in the first St. Louis game, where he ran for over 100 yards and did a real good job. We thought that was the direction to go.”

James gained 7 yards on 17 carries Oct. 26 against Carolina, fumbling once. The 30-year-old running back was benched the next week in favor of Hightower.

After gaining 109 yards on 22 carries against the Rams on Nov. 2, however, Hightower never carried more than 13 times or gained more than 35 yards in a game. But he remained the primary ballcarrier for the league’s 32nd-ranked rushing offense.

Starting with that Rams game, James over the next eight weeks carried just 11 times for 34 yards.

At some point in that span, the man who in 2006 left Indianapolis and became the highest-profile free-agent signing in Cardinals history (only to see the Colts win the Super Bowl that season), requested a trade through his agent. And before the Cardinals’ first playoff game he told reporters in Arizona he did not expect to be back with the team next season.

Yesterday, he said, “You have to sit back and take it in stride . . . I said before that I wasn’t even going to think about anything beyond playing right now. I want to put all my energy into right now. I’m not even thinking about the future.”

As for the immediate past, James explained that he “cut out my hanging out and ripping and running (around at night)” in preparation for what he expected to be a monster season.

He entered 2008 well within reach of passing Marcus Allen, Marshall Faulk and Jim Brown on the all-time rushing list, something that was clearly important to him. (He remains 191 yards short of Brown.)

“You want to play,” he said. “I worked extremely hard in the offseason. I had a chance to pass up some of the greatest players all-time. You put up so much work and want to build on the previous year. The previous year I had 1,200 yards, and that was a new system, and I was expecting to build on it. In training camp it looked like it was going to be promising. Then we went in a different direction. That was the root of the (frustration).”

Now he has a chance to take out his frustration in the most important game of his career.

“For 10 years I’ve been playing, and to finally get here, that’s big,” he said. “You’ve tried to put yourself in a position to be in games like this, and it didn’t happen. It’s not that I didn’t do something, or that I didn’t work hard enough, or that I didn’t put up enough numbers, it’s just that everything has to work out. To get to the Super Bowl, this is something I’ve never accomplished.”

- Kevin Acee, San Diego Union Tribune

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