The Wolverine

June-July 2019

The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports

Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/1123063

Contents of this Issue

Navigation

Page 44 of 51

JUNE/JULY 2019 THE WOLVERINE 45 BY JOHN BORTON J ames Hall now approaches a quar- ter century in college and profes- sional football. He still looks back at the decision to come to Michigan as the genesis of it all. The question of who made the deci- sion still produces a laugh. Hall didn't know much about Michigan, and vice versa, until coaches Gary Moeller and Lloyd Carr saw his high school game vid- eos while recruiting someone else. They became interested in the de- fensive lineman out of St. Augustine High in New Orleans. Hall, however, had his sights set on Auburn of the Southeastern Conference. "Everybody knew who Desmond Howard was, and I knew the Fab Five," Hall said. "That was my expo- sure to Michigan." His exposure was about to in- crease. He took his mother on his of- ficial visit to Auburn, where they met with diminutive head coach Terry Bowden. "He's a little bitty guy," Hall re- called. "He had this huge, beautiful, marble desk. There's this little guy sitting at this desk, and he gave us his pitch. He talked to my mom, said: 'We want James on a full scholarship.' "My mom looked him square in the eye and said, 'Coach, I appreciate that, but James won't be coming to Auburn.' I'm like, okay." It happened that Hall's mother dis- appeared midway during the official visit. Her son had no idea where she went. Turns out, she'd been investi- gating what the football program was like, how players were treated, etc. — in conversations with the janitors. Hall took a subsequent visit to Michigan, without his mom. He came away impressed by Schem- bechler Hall, the tradition and his- tory of Michigan, etc. But it wasn't until about eight years ago, at a Michigan event in Ann Arbor, that Hall discovered the rest of the story. He commented to assistant coach Fred Jackson, who recruited him, about his good choice of a school. "I was like, 'You know, Coach, that was one of the best decisions I ever made, coming to Michigan,'" Hall recalled. "And he looked at me with a sarcastic smile on his face. I was like, what? "He said, 'You really think you made the decision to come to Michi- gan?' I said, 'Yeah, I did.' He said, 'Boy, your mama called me and told me, 'James doesn't know this yet, but he's coming to Michigan. Just follow my lead.' I'm like, 'You're kidding me,' and he said, 'No!' "I'm saying this to say, mother does know best." Two Big Ten championship rings, a national title, Rose Bowl and Orange Bowl victories, and a Michigan de- gree all helped confirm that notion. Of course, nothing came easily, in- cluding adjusting to the northern cli- mate. Hall noted a bit of misdirection encountered on his visit to Michigan. "Here was about five feet of snow, and they showed me the practice field, covered in snow," he recalled. "I was like, 'What do you do when it snows?' And they said, 'We go in the indoor building.'" But the man whose name is on the building once proclaimed, "If you're going to fight in the North Atlantic, you've got to train in the North Atlan- tic." Hall found out soon enough that the indoor facilities aren't always used. "My first experience, I put on ev- ery piece of clothing they gave me in the locker room, which is not an efficient way to move on the football field," he said, laughing. "You kind of embrace it, because it's just part of football. "After a while it became less of a physical challenge and more of a mental challenge. You wanted to show, if you play in The Big House, you've got to play in cold weather." His first two years involved the chill of 9-4 and 8-4 campaigns, ex- tending Michigan's four-loss seasons streak to four. It proved jarringly un- usual at the time. "It's a nine-win season without a championship or an invitation to the Rose Bowl, and you know how that goes," Hall said. "It's not acceptable. "Next year, same deal. We won the big one [beating Ohio State, 13-9], but it was an eight-win season and a trip down to Florida. It wasn't good enough." Neither was Michigan, the media proclaimed. Carr used a particular headline to drive home the point. "I clearly remember Coach Carr bringing in the article entitled 'Me- diocre Michigan,'" Hall said. "It hit home, to a certain extent. But from day one, they instilled in us what it meant to play at Michigan, the stan- dard that had been set by the guys who played before us. "The bar is high. It's not going away. It's never going to go away." In 1997 — Hall's first year as a   WHERE ARE THEY NOW? James Hall Had What It Took At Michigan Despite being undrafted, Hall played 12 sea- sons in the NFL (2000-11) and now works as a consultant for the San Francisco 49ers. PHOTO COURTESY DETROIT LIONS Hall on the 1997 national championship team "We've been here two, three, four years, and all we've heard about is playing in the Rose Bowl. Having an opportunity to make our mark in Michigan football history, by playing in a Rose Bowl and winning it — it cemented that team's legacy."

Articles in this issue

Archives of this issue

view archives of The Wolverine - June-July 2019