Ahmad Bradshaw - NY Giants Draft Pick Hoping to Outrun his past

Giants draft pick hoping to outrun his past
BY ARTHUR STAPLE

Ahmad Bradshaw knew the questions would come on Saturday, his first day on the field as a pro football player. Not football questions, but questions about character, that new NFL buzzword.

The 21-year-old running back answered them all Saturday, and again yesterday. But this time there were more football questions, more questions about his future rather than his past, because the seventh-round pick, No. 250 out of 255 selected two weeks ago, might have made the biggest impact of any player at the Giants' rookie minicamp.


"You'd have to say Bradshaw had a noticeable morning," coach Tom Coughlin said between practices. "He's been back on kickoff returns, on punt returns. He caught the ball coming out of the backfield. You saw a couple runs where he was able to turn the ball north-south. It catches your eye, for sure."

The 5-9, 198-pound Bradshaw put his name into the NFL draft after his junior season at Marshall, and one way to look at it is that he did so at just the wrong time. New commissioner Roger Goodell made character a hot-button issue, suspending Titans cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones for a minimum of 10 games next season and Bengals wide receiver Chris Henry for six games for off-field incidents.

Bradshaw has been arrested twice, once for underage drinking while in summer school at the University of Virginia before his freshman year and again last January for taking a PlayStation 2 console from an unlocked dorm room at Marshall, where he walked on after leaving Virginia.

But another way to view Bradshaw's situation is that he's come to the NFL at just the right time. He was projected as a third- or fourth-round pick based on skill alone, and he had his comeuppance when he lasted through two days and nearly every pick in the draft.

"It's a very humbling experience, knowing so many people saw me a certain way," Bradshaw said. "It's a motivating factor to make people see me differently. This is my dream; this is where I want to be. I've seen guys get here and hurt themselves by making dumb mistakes. I feel like I learned from my mistakes."

Bradshaw could fill a very valuable need for Coughlin and the Giants. They have big, bruising running backs in Brandon Jacobs and Reuben Droughns but lack a smaller, speedier back who can do what Tiki Barber did his first few seasons: provide a change-of-pace running style, catch the ball out of the backfield on third down and perhaps return kicks and punts.

General manager Jerry Reese had a brief but serious chat with Bradshaw on Saturday. "It was just a conversation where he said, 'This is the last time we're going to go over it, but character is a big thing around here,' " Bradshaw said. "I told him that I plan on backing him up as much as I can. This is a fair game. If you're able to do what you do out there, you'll get a chance."

#44 AHMAD BRADSHAW

Position: Running back.

Height: 5-9.

Weight: 198.

College: Marshall.

Hometown: Bluefield, Va.

Drafted: Seventh round, No. 250 overall.

Finished as Marshall's fifth all-time leading rusher, with 2,987 yards in three seasons ... Rushed for 1,523 yards, second in school history for a season, as a junior, and had 19 rushing touchdowns ... Caught 17 passes for 129 yards as a junior, and finished his college career with 86 catches ... Also returned punts and kickoffs as a freshman.