Qwan’tez Stiggers sat alone in a darkish lodge room, a thousand miles from something acquainted. He drew the curtains tight to dam out the world so he may give attention to the avalanche in his head.
It was spring 2023, and two weeks earlier, he’d left his fiancee and household in Atlanta and flown to Canada for a chance he by no means noticed coming — the one the place he was going to get all of it again.
Stiggers’ thoughts fixated on the clock and the phone. The previous stored ticking. The latter stayed silent. He missed house. He apprehensive this complete factor was silly. “You don’t get do-overs in life,” he thought. Typically, it’s simply too late.
“They forgot about me,” Stiggers advised himself. “Once more.”
The soccer world did neglect about Stiggers. It additionally rediscovered him — however not earlier than he rediscovered himself. Now, with Stiggers on the sting of a possible spot within the 2024 NFL Draft, his story reads like a significant movement image with all of the bells and whistles.
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In that room, although, it was simply darkish.
The decision Stiggers was ready on was from the Toronto Argonauts. When Toronto’s coaches bought their 2023 camp tryout roster, they requested each other why the child from Georgia had no school subsequent to his title. They’d quickly study their new DB did obtain a soccer scholarship out of highschool, however he walked away from it, crushed beneath the load of despair and tragedy.
When Stiggers bought to camp, he figured he’d be the primary man lower. He’d made two buddies in follow, each of whom had performed within the NFL; neither made the group. Stiggers was finished ready. He put the lights on, grabbed some footwear and headed to the coaches’ room.
“What’re you doing right here?” a puzzled coach requested when he arrived.
“What’s happening?” an aggravated Stiggers replied. “No one known as me.”
The final three years of his life had been a whirlwind. He’d gone from a heartbroken school dropout driving for DoorDash and washing vans to the sting {of professional} soccer within the blink of an eye fixed, all with out ever having performed a snap in school. Earlier than he bought on the airplane to Canada for his tryout with the Argonauts, Stiggers advised his boss on the truck wash to clock him out, figuring he’d want one other shift upon return. The GM of the group had first reached out to him through Instagram.
This couldn’t be actual. They’d forgotten about him. Identical to everyone else.
Besides …
“We don’t name you,” the coach replied, “in the event you’ve made the lively roster.”
Each participant’s path to the draft is exclusive, particular and unforgettable. However for Qwan’tez Stiggers, the child who went professional straight from highschool (form of), the journey — not less than the half he’s in now — is an precise fairy story.
Kwanna Stiggers misplaced monitor of what number of instances she’d solid her son’s title on a sign-up sheet. A minimum of a dozen. In late 2021, with the world beginning to reopen post-pandemic, Kwanna spent hours on-line trying to find something football-related within the Atlanta space that may very well be attended in individual.
She didn’t care what it was — a camp, clinic, exercise group, pickup recreation, fantasy league …
If it had soccer within the title, she signed up Qwan’tez. “Whether or not he wished to or not,” she remembers in that stern, caring tone of affection and braveness — the one reserved for moms and their sons.
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Qwan’tez Stiggers first fell in love with soccer at age 8. He and his older brother, Qwantayvious, performed pee-wee ball for the Georgia Rattlers. Youthful brother adopted older brother to The B.E.S.T. Academy, a small, all-boys public center and highschool in northwest Atlanta.
By Qwan’tez’s sophomore 12 months, he was 5 toes 5. His solely full-time position was because the kicker, one quick sufficient to chase down returners. He grew 4 inches forward of his junior 12 months and moved to defensive again. By his senior season, he was almost 6 toes tall and beginning to thrive on the sector.
Stiggers performed for a tiny highschool, limiting publicity, and caught an excellent late progress spurt, limiting it additional. He nonetheless managed to garner consideration from some small colleges within the area, touchdown on Division II Lane Faculty in Tennessee forward of the 2020 season.
Then, simply earlier than the world stopped in February 2020, Stiggers’ father, Rayves Harrison, was concerned in a automotive accident that left him in a coma. At the same time as Stiggers headed to high school within the fall, his father’s situation hadn’t improved. Throughout a go to house in September, Stiggers was along with his girlfriend (now fiancee), Cheyenne McClain, when Kwanna known as with the message they’d all feared. Rayves, to whom Quan’tez referred as his greatest fan, had died.
Soccer not mattered. Nothing actually mattered. By the top of that weekend, Stiggers had determined to give up faculty and keep house to assist his household.
A minimum of, that’s what he wished to do.
In actuality, he couldn’t do something.
“I couldn’t focus,” he says. “It was like a time frame the place I’d attempt to do one thing — something — after which an image of my dad would simply pop up in my head. Didn’t matter what it was. And it could simply shut me proper down.”
He started to float. Stiggers labored for DoorDash and InstaCart earlier than touchdown at a Blue Beacon truck wash close to house. His despair deepened. There have been instances when he tried to play soccer once more; he even reached out to colleges, trainers, coaches — anybody he’d identified from when he was recruited. Nobody had time.
When it got here to his place within the soccer world, Stiggers felt like a pebble on the backside of the ocean. Anxiousness, concern and grief had left him in a perpetual state of feeling caught.
Kwanna continued her seek for something which may reignite the smile soccer gave her son, serving as one half of a rock for Qwan’tez that by no means budged. Cheyenne fashioned the opposite half. Sadly, she understood all the pieces Qwan’tez was going by.
In October 2019, Cheyenne’s sister, Jessica Daniels, was murdered. After waking to the sound of gunshots outdoors her southwest Atlanta house, Jessica bought away from bed to get on the bottom and was fatally shot by a stray bullet. She was 18. Cheyenne’s world collapsed. PTSD, nervousness and waves of despair left her numb, a sense that was nonetheless there the morning Kwanna known as Qwan’tez to inform him his father had died.
Despair may be like a deep gap with steep sides and no ladder. Typically, the one approach out comes when another person falls in. When Cheyenne noticed that acquainted ache start to take over the individual she cherished, she began climbing.
Motivated to assist Qwan’tez battle the identical kind of grief she was nonetheless attempting to course of, Cheyenne started working with Kwanna to help him and assist him discover pleasure once more. Which, for Qwan’tez, meant restarting his soccer profession.
Cheyenne advised him to be courageous and daring. “By no means surrender,” she’d say again and again when the concept turned too troublesome. They’d sit within the automotive each night time and speak for hours — about his dad, about her sister, about their futures. In shedding herself within the quest to assist somebody she cared about, Cheyenne started therapeutic from her personal loss.
Qwan’tez says he’s just like the male model of Cheyenne, and she or he the feminine model of him. Collectively they simply match. They’ve identified one another perpetually. Every thing she likes, he likes. His passions are her passions. He loves her, and she or he loves him. Unconditionally.
How’d she handle to search out the power to select herself up, nearly in a blink, so she may assist choose up Qwan’tez? She simply did. Her individual wanted her. Typically, that’s all it takes.
“Seeing him being sturdy made me sit again and suppose,” Cheyenne says. “(I used to be with) somebody who was (dealing with this), and it was form of me having to assist him develop into sturdy. And that made me sturdy.”
The small excuses stopped, and Qwan’tez turned impressed once more. He stored lifting and operating. He known as anybody he knew who would possibly be capable of assist him practice. If he couldn’t discover anybody, he did it himself. One foot in entrance of the opposite, sooner or later at a time.
Then, after greater than a dozen failed sign-ups, Kwanna lastly discovered a winner whereas scrolling by Fb: Fan Managed Soccer (FCF), an indoor, semi-pro, seven-on-seven soccer league housed in Atlanta. It accomplished its debut season in 2021, and because the 2022 season approached, Qwan’tez Stiggers was again in taking part in form.
Qwan’tez Stiggers restarted his profession by taking part in within the Fan Managed Soccer league. (Jonathan Bachman / Fan Managed Soccer / Getty Pictures)
FCF was a good distance from the NCAA or NFL, however it was soccer. And each time Stiggers buttoned his chinstrap, he felt like he may breathe once more. There was no strain, simply an opportunity to play once more. He made a group instantly and, because the youngest participant within the league, returned a choose six in his first recreation. Shortly, he earned a rep as one of many FCF’s high defenders.
One of many coaches concerned with Fan Managed Soccer in 2022 was longtime school and professional coach John Jenkins, who spent a big chunk of his five-decade profession within the Canadian Soccer League. When Jenkins found Stiggers’ story, expertise and age, he made a name and despatched some tape to a contact within the CFL.
Then, throughout a shift on the truck wash, Stiggers’ cellphone buzzed. It was an Instagram message from Vince Magri of the Toronto Argonauts, asking him for some fundamental data and a contact deal with. Days later, a tryout contract appeared in his mailbox. Stiggers despatched it to everybody he knew, attempting to verify it was actual. It was.
When Qwan’tez put pen to paper, Kwanna knew two issues to be true: A mom’s drive remained undefeated, and her son was smiling once more.
“It was like, ‘OK, sure,’” Kwanna remembers. “He bought his struggle again.”
There’s an outdated saying in soccer: For those who’re adequate, they’ll discover you.
They may take some time, however they’ll discover you. Qwan’tez Stiggers resides proof of it. He’s stated folks have advised him he has “the proper story,” an precise fairy story of somebody who was misplaced and located once more.
From a purely soccer sense, although, Stiggers’ story is just not in contrast to that of quite a lot of children dwelling in giant metropolitan areas. He was an excellent soccer participant in highschool, superb by his senior season, and gifted sufficient to play at any school within the South. Recruiting, although, is a numbers recreation in additional methods than one, and time doesn’t watch for expertise. It sounds illogical, however it’s true.
One of many greatest mix snubs this 12 months, imo, was Toronto Argonaut DB Qwan’tez Stiggers:
5113 203
30 1/4 arm
8 7/8 handStiggers, per supply, nonetheless at present has seven high 30 visits scheduled. Lions are a type of seven.
— Nick Baumgardner (@nickbaumgardner) March 2, 2024
For those who play at a college the scale of a needle in a football-crazed state the scale of a haystack, your odds of getting misplaced enhance. The churn of big-time soccer is grueling, and it forgets about folks on a regular basis.
Then once more, cornerbacks who’ve by no means performed a snap of school soccer don’t normally present up at a CFL coaching camp — at age 20 — and choose off 4 passes within the first two days. Stiggers did. He moved from third-string to the beginning lineup after a teammate suffered an damage within the first preseason recreation.
“I by no means went again to the bench,” Stiggers says.
A pure defensive again with fluid hips, burst in his decrease half and terrific ball expertise, Stiggers performs with confidence and persistence in man protection, and he’s sufficiently big at 5-11 and 203 kilos to hit and instinctive sufficient to play a number of positions in a secondary. Argonauts coaches went from pondering this entire factor was some type of joke to trusting the teenager as their high participant on the again finish.
Stiggers performed 16 video games with the Argonauts final season, making 53 tackles and 5 interceptions, incomes the CFL’s Most Excellent Rookie award. The whirlwind journey led Stiggers to the door of agent Fred Lyles, who discovered the prospect by contacts with the Argonauts.
Lyles, who now operates NZone Sports activities Administration, has repped a number of gifted corners over time, gamers similar to A.J. Bouye and Chris Harris Jr.
“This child,” Lyles says, “is pretty much as good as they had been.”
Lyles burned up the telephones over the winter attempting to get Stiggers extra consideration, which ultimately led to an invitation to the East-West Shrine Bowl. Stiggers spent every week in Dallas figuring out in entrance of the complete NFL, greater than holding his personal. By the point the sport ended, he’d heard from all 32 groups.
This can be one of the vital distinctive tales of the 2024 #NFLDraft cycle.
Stiggers, who by no means performed school soccer, when from an enviornment league to the @TorontoArgos, gained CFL Rookie of the 12 months, and has actual curiosity from nearly all 32 groups.
As a result of he by no means went by a… https://t.co/7WUGesA9Fk
— Eric Galko (@EricGalko) January 17, 2024
As of final week, Stiggers had seven formal pre-draft visits scheduled. He’s hoping so as to add extra after his professional day at B.E.S.T. Academy on March 15, one which, once more, can be attended by a gaggle of NFL scouts desperate to study the story of the child who someway skipped school soccer.
He and his household, which now features a son, Legend, can’t wait to inform it to them.
When Stiggers known as Cheyenne and advised her he’d made the Argonauts, “I cried,” Cheyenne says. “It was overwhelming. We now have a son, and it was identical to, ‘OK, my son now has a task mannequin to look as much as.’
“(Legend) loves sports activities, loves soccer. Each time he sees a soccer, he’s calling for Dada.”
Stiggers’ return to aggressive soccer introduced him construction when he wanted it. He has a tough time placing his pleasure about all the pieces that’s occurred over the previous two years into phrases, as he’s nonetheless in it.
Life continues to be arduous with out his father — soccer and so many different issues remind him of instances spent along with his dad. He’s nonetheless grieving that loss. He all the time can be. Solely now, when the waves of disappointment come, they function motivation to set a powerful instance for Legend, to ensure he cherishes each day spent with him and Cheyenne.
Stiggers is worked up about his draft prospects and hopeful to listen to his title known as this spring, maybe sooner than a number of the gamers who obtained an NFL mix invite over him. Largely, although, he’s simply hopeful.
In some methods, he has soccer to thank for that. However in additional methods, the thank-yous are reserved for the family members who continued to push him towards his future, even when it felt misplaced perpetually. It seems, life does provide do-overs to those that work for them. There are methods out of that deep gap.
And as long as you will have folks round you who’re prepared that can assist you up, hope may be eternal.
“I really feel like he may also help change the thought means of youthful folks,” Kwanna says. “It doesn’t matter what your path is, no matter you select to do in life … you are able to do it.
“Nothing is ever too late.”
(High photograph: John E. Sokolowski / Getty Pictures)
