Do the Right Thing : Canyon Tailback Chris Peery Has Conquered Numerous Obstacles, but the Toughest ChallengeLies Ahead: What to Do With His Future

Getting a handle on Chris Peery, literally and figuratively, has never been easy. Will he play? Will he quit? Is he overweight or physically fit?

More importantly, will Peery, Canyon High’s 6-foot-2, 214-pound All-Valley senior tailback, with his bludgeoning legs and blurring quickness, ever carry a Division I college football?

Or has high school--and prep football stardom--already proved to be too heavy a load for him?

Pinpointing the plight of Peery often has been as difficult as tackling him. Sometimes, even Peery can’t make the call on Peery.

“Everybody thinks I’m going to college and I’m going to be this big star and stuff,” he says, shrugging his massive shoulders and fumbling with his huge hands. “But that’s not what I want to do, really.”

Yet, that’s exactly what he wants to do.

“I do,” he says. “It’s just open right now. I just want to make my own decisions and do what I think is right.”

Peery’s wont has never been to reason why, but to carry the load. For the past three seasons, he has been the No. 1 hombre in Coach Harry Welch’s Cowboy Football offense, rushing for a school-record 3,577 yards and 52 touchdowns.

“He has size and great strength and deceptive speed and magnificent vision,” Welch said. “He can see a hole and cut now! And it’s beautiful. He is the greatest running back I have ever coached in high school.”

Peery, who joined the varsity as a defensive end in his freshman year, has indeed been spectacular. In 1987, he rushed for 1,290 yards and 15 touchdowns, and was selected the state sophomore player of the year by Cal-Hi Sports. Last season, he set school rushing records with 1,418 yards and 22 touchdowns.

But this season might qualify as Peery’s best. Sidelined the first three weeks after undergoing groin surgery, Peery returned sooner than expected and has rallied valiantly, rushing for 869 yards and 15 touchdowns to lead the Cowboys (6-3-1), who were 0-2-1 in his absence, into the opening round of the Southern Section Division II playoffs tonight against visiting Santa Monica.

“When he came back from his operation, it was a real lift for the team and I know it was a real lift for me,” wide receiver Clint Beauer said. “He’s a leader.”

Peery has rushed for at least 100 yards in five consecutive games and has scored 12 touchdowns in the past three. He rushed for 139 yards and five touchdowns in a 42-6 win over Palmdale and 135 yards and three touchdowns in a 29-0 win over Saugus.

“I feel like I’m a sophomore again,” Peery said. “I’m holding my weight down and I’m starting to sprint.”

Not surprisingly, Peery has attracted the interest of several Division I colleges, including Nebraska, USC, UCLA, Miami, Notre Dame, Washington and Colorado. Yet, for all his success, his career has been a case of five yards and a cloud of doubt and discontent.

He quit the team, along with running back Cam Cross, during his sophomore year. Cross never returned. Peery returned a week later and never missed a game.

After his sophomore season, he became bored with football, fell out of shape and severed his relationships with coaches and teammates.

“Everywhere I’d go, people wanted to talk about football,” he said. “I didn’t like it. I didn’t want to hear that, so I started hanging around other people and didn’t think about sports all the time.”

His apathy led to falling grades, academic ineligibility, involvement with “the wrong crowd” and his placement in a specialized program designed for troubled students. His grade-point average tumbled below 2.0. His weight soared to 238 pounds.

“Oh, geez, I didn’t want to listen to nobody, not my father, nobody,” Peery said. “I think about that every day. Every day. Where I was going. . . .”

After conquering personal and academic problems, Peery eagerly awaited his senior year. But one week before the opener, he awoke in the middle of the night with an intense pain in the groin area. The unexplained injury led to emergency surgery and speculation that Peery’s season, perhaps his career, might be over.

“I was shocked, but I said, ‘It’s just another obstacle that I have to go through,’ ” he said. “It was very important for me to come back, to show people that I could come back and play on a Welch-coached team. I felt like I had a lot to prove.”

Indeed, Peery has proven himself, shaping up instead of shipping out and generally displaying all the Spartan-like qualities of sacrifice and dedication that Welch, Canyon’s longtime deacon of discipline, strives to instill in his players.

Yet the question of college remains. Under the guidelines of the National Collegiate Athletic Assn’s Proposition 48, which took effect in 1986, high school student-athletes must maintain a 2.0 grade-point average in core-curriculum classes and a achieve a Scholastic Aptitude Test score of at least 700 to ensure eligibility as a freshman.

Peery’s grade-point average stands at 2.2, but it is below 2.0 in core-curriculum classes. He has failed in one attempt to score a 700 on the SAT. And, as all concerned readily admit, academics are not Peery’s strong suit.

“As long as I’ve known him, he’s never been a good student,” Welch said. “He is not motivated academically. I love the young man and I would give anything for him. But I’ve stopped trying to make him feel guilty about not being academic.”

George Peery hopes that his son will still be offered a Division I scholarship. But to be eligible to play next fall, Chris must first post a successful SAT score and complete six college core classes in the spring. And, most importantly, he must buckle down and crack the books.

“He’s my son and I don’t think, I know he’s a little lazy when it comes to academics,” George Peery said. “But I also know he can do it. He still has a chance to do what he wants to do, but it’s not going to be easy.”

TAKING A WRONG TURN

In the Spring of 1988, “football was the furthest thing from my mind,” Peery said. But it seemed to be the only thing on everyone else’s.

Everywhere he went, there was no escaping the blitz. Even while he was working part-time as a supermarket box boy.

Great year, Chris! Way to go, big guy! How ya gonna do next season? Where ya’ gonna go to college? Man, wish I was in your shoes!

Heady thoughts, but he wanted to concentrate on questions no more serious than “Paper or plastic?” During break time, he found sanctuary in the market’s storeroom.

“Sometimes you just get sick of people looking at you,” Peery said. “People telling me, ‘You gotta do this, you gotta do that.’ I just couldn’t concentrate. I was doubting myself. I couldn’t handle the pressure. I couldn’t handle everyone counting on me for big plays. I needed my space.”

He eventually fled to the streets of his native Inglewood, where he lived until he was 8. He started spending his spare time hanging out, rubbing elbows with old friends and “getting in as much partying as I could.”

Rumors abounded about Peery’s involvement with gangs. Welch remarked at the time that Peery was “closer to going to prison” than returning to football. Homework and football were now equally far from his mind.

JoAnn Peery, who is separated from George and lives in Newhall, has remained close to Chris and attends each Canyon game. Repeated sit-down talks with her son, she said, proved fruitless. “It hurt me at the time because I wanted him to stay with football,” she said. “Whether he wanted to play pro or not, I wanted him to at least go to college.

“I worry about everything. I worry about gangs and drugs. They’re so easy to get into.”

But Peery, his father insists, is no gang member. And he probably never will see the inside of a jail cell.

“He has never been a problem for me,” George said. “He just wanted to hang out with the guys who weren’t doing anything or going anywhere. I’d talk to him, but he’s kind of hardheaded. I had to get on him to study. I said, ‘I’m gonna make it hard for you, but pretty soon, the police are gonna make it harder.’ ”

Peery was aware of the dangers but didn’t see himself tumbling over the brink of disaster.

“I was sort of going in the wrong way,” he said, “but I wasn’t doing anything that was gonna get me into jail. I wasn’t criminal-minded.”

When Peery hit academic bottom, school administrators placed him in Canyon’s Extended Day Program, designed to funnel troubled students back into the regular program.

It was there Peery began to rebound. He was placed--and produced--under the guidance of Dick Kilgore, one of the program’s instructors. His grades improved, and so did his attitude.

“I never really considered Chris to have a lot of problems other than the fact that he had a little bit of a problem with his grades,” Kilgore said. “And he picked those up almost immediately.

“Chris was presented with a tremendous job. He started out as a guard and all of a sudden he’s one of the top running backs in the country as a 10th-grader. I think some of that pressure might have been on his mind. Peer pressure can do a lot to a kid.”

Through one-to-one counseling and games of one-on-one basketball, Peery and Kilgore developed a special rapport. “He helped me. He just talked to me,” Peery said. “He knew that I had potential and he knew I was going in the wrong direction. He talked to me about how kids mess up in life and that I have a great opportunity to accomplish something.”

By summer, Peery again wanted to be a Cowboy. He began to run. He began to slim down. He pledged his dedication to coaches, teammates and his parents.

“I think some of the guys might have lost trust in him,” nose guard Eric Hanes said. “Like, ‘Is he going to do this again in the middle of the season?’ I think a few people had their doubts, I think some people just wanted him to prove that he wanted to play.”

Said Peery: “(My parents) gave me a lot of support. They wanted me to go back. And I wanted to go back.”

A TIME IN THE SUN

One wants to root for Chris Peery. Although he is 18, it seems appropriate to say that he is a nice kid.

He is a delight to teachers, coaches and students. He flashes an easy smile and you want to smile back. He says he would rather avoid celebrity status and you believe him.

He humbly searches for words during postgame interviews. Yet he repeatedly credits the offensive line for his good performances. For his bad ones, he takes the blame himself.

“With all the attention he’s getting, he still handles himself very modestly,” Welch said. “He’s not given to braggadocio. And he’s quick to acknowledge the contribution of others.”

Yet, by Peery’s own admission, he is unwilling to help himself. “Other than athletics, I really have no motivation,” he said. “But if I really wanted to do it, I could (go to college). It’s just a matter of putting it off. We’ll have to see about that.”

College is just around the corner, Peery is as apathetic as ever and it’s time for last-ditch efforts. George Peery would prefer that his son not settle for junior college. At least not now.

“I’ve already laid the rules down,” he said. “If he doesn’t go to college, he’s going to get a job and go to work. He’s gotta learn that he has to study. If he would just dig into the books as hard as he digs into sports. . . .”

And from his mother’s standpoint:

“You can’t force him to do it, all you can do is talk,” JoAnn Peery said. “I’m real proud of him, but I’d like to see him do more than just run that ball out there. I really want him to stay in school. I’m praying for that.”

Welch stresses the importance of college to all of his players. But he said that he has found it necessary at this point to cut the umbilical cord between himself and Peery.

“With all he’s been through, I prefer that he enjoy a moment of peace in the sun,” Welch said. “He’s gone through an awful lot of pressure, personally and physically, and he’s had some real tough times. So, I prefer right now to de-emphasize grades because he’s aware where he stands with that.

“If I was pushing him away from me and toward academics that would be a sacrifice worth taking. But if I’m pushing him away from me and I’m not pushing him toward something positive, then I back off.”

Peery may never be motivated in the classroom. Perhaps he will summon that magnificent vision to find success. But there is little daylight ahead. His football career may well end with Canyon’s season.

“I don’t really know what I want to do,” Peery said. “But I know I won’t slip again. I have too many good people around me.”