Femme Fatale
Christina CaldwellIssue date: 4/2/09 Section: News
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In the middle of the field, dozens of women stand ready, outfitted in oversized t-shirts, sweat pants and gym shorts, for one of their three-times-weekly practices. They almost go overlooked among the swarms of kids practicing in neon colors.
It’s time for football, and not in the way the British mean it.
When Phoenix Prowlers players are asked about their experience playing football with the team, the ignorant assumptions of people amuse and aggravate them.
“Oh, so it’s like flag football?”
A few players discuss this in a small group, half laughing and half scoffing. The notion that only huge, burly men can take a hit is asinine to them. They’re out to prove the naysayers wrong.
To clarify, the Phoenix Prowlers don’t play touch football. They don’t play flag football. This isn’t the male fantasy of the Lingerie Bowl and this isn’t a grown-up version of sissy high school Powderpuff. This is full-contact, tackling, grunting, sweating, full-gear, high-endurance football. And yes, they’re women.
KICK OFF
The team was started in 2007 as a merging of the Arizona Nighthawks and Caliente, two former Phoenix women’s football teams, into one cohesive group. The demand for professional women’s football around the country helped form the Women’s Football Alliance, a 38-team American league split into six divisions by region, which the Prowlers are a part of. As part of the Pacific Southwest region, the Prowlers play against the Las Vegas Showgirlz, Ventura Black Widows, California Lynx and fellow Arizonans the Marana She Devils.
And the competition is fierce, despite all preconceived notions that women can’t play full-contact football. The 35-woman team can hit, tackle and run with the boys. They even play by NFL guidelines and rules.
“Women can pretty much do anything they want to do, including playing football,” says Debbie Martin, Prowlers general manager and a former player. “We may not be as fast, we may not be as strong as the men’s teams, but if you come see a game you’ll see some amazing athletes out there.”
Martin would know. Before she realized there was a Phoenix women’s team, she drove to Tucson to play. The passion of Martin and the entire team for football is obvious. She received numerous injuries in her five-year football career, playing mostly offensive line, including a broken ankle that left her with a plate and 12 screws permanently, making it unwise for her, at 42, to play anymore. That’s when she took on the job as team manager, not willing to give up a football career.
Summer Meservy, defensive back and safety coach for the team, says the best way to get an idea of what the Prowlers do each week is to do it with them. With the encouragement of the team, the College Times staff and my own stupidity, I headed out to Grand Canyon University to see if I have what it takes to make the cut.
THE PRACTICE
To give you an idea of what I’m working with, my 5-foot-8, 140 pound (if we’re being honest) frame is not as hefty or strong as it might sound. I have wussy lady arms and I haven’t exercised for longer than an hour-and-a-half in years. Up until this point, I have never caught a football that wasn’t delicately tossed to me during a flag football game on Super Bowl Sunday. I am, after all, a girl.
When I get to the practice field, I’m the only player wearing shorts above the knee. And they’re bright pink. Oh no.
7:08. I arrive at Grand Canyon University, slightly late for practice. Luckily I’m a journalist, because I don’t want to cross Coach “Zeus,” whose real name is Ron Reddic, by being late. He looks like he can crush me with his pinky finger. The smell of real grass gets me excited to try my hand at the gridiron. I greet Meservy, who tells me to jump in with the team as they’re stretching.
7:15. “P-R-O-W-L-E-R-S,” shout the players as they do jumping jacks. Stretching our arms and legs, I feel a bit timid about the practice. Most of the women on the field look like they could easily kick my ass in a fight, which, granted, wouldn’t be difficult to do. The girls I meet are surprisingly open with me, mostly because they want to know what the hell I’m doing there, why I’m dressed like that and why someone is taking pictures of me. “Are you a player?,” some players ask skeptically. I laugh and say, “Oh no. I’m with College Times. I’m writing a story about you guys and I wanted to see what you do.”
7:30. We’re done stretching and I’m feeling fine. I did similar things my freshman year of high school in dance class. If this is all the practice is going to be, this is going to be very, very easy.
7:34. The coaches and a few players set up five stations where the team will practice drills. One station has two rope ladders set on the ground, the second is free of equipment, the third is some kind of heavy ball, fourth has no equipment and the fifth has three coaches with footballs in their hands.
7:38. Drills begin. I start at the third station with two other newbies, 20-year-old South Mountain Community College student Dana Poindexter and 39-year-old Carmen Esnal, who tells me playing football is on her life’s “bucket list.” Being with other newcomers makes me feel a little less foolish when I don’t know what the “heavy ball” is called or what the hell I’m supposed to do with it. As it turns out, it’s called a medicine ball, and we’re supposed to pick it up, twist, lift it above our heads and slam it into the ground. It makes me feel powerful. The other stations consist of ab twists, running through the rope ladders, being tossed a football while you stand on one foot and what turned out to be the most painful of all five drills, squats. Amanda Weber, a 25-year-old ASU student, shows up to practice late and joins our team. She’s incredibly fast and knows exactly what she’s doing. Although she’s new to the Prowlers she says has football experience in her home state of Michigan and it’s obvious. I officially feel football inferior.
7:54. We’re done. We’ve run through each drill station five times and I’m feeling incredibly tired. My quadriceps are already pathetically sore. Although I don’t consider myself especially out of shape, I look around and even the self-proclaimed “linebacker types” are looking less exhausted. At this point, I start to assume practice is over. It must be. I ask photographer Ryan Ruiz for the time, who informs me that I’m less than an hour into it. No one else looks tired.
8:03. We get a short break for water, then it’s back to the field. Earlier in the practice I informed the coaches that I’d like to also practice Saturday so I get the “full experience” of being a Prowlers player. I nix this idea. I’m not going to put myself through this again. I’m a writer and there’s a reason for that. The coaches split the team into two sections – “linebacker types” and “skinny bitches.” I’m a skinny bitch.
8:06. The skinny bitches are told to line up in two lines where the coaches will throw the ball to us and we’ll run to catch it. By throw, I don’t mean toss. They hurl the ball at you and you’re expected to catch it without fail. Luckily I have huge hands. This should be cake.
8:07. I run when the coach says “go,” running only half speed since I’m able to blame my sore quadriceps. I miss catching the first ball by a long shot, but I think that might be a good thing. It was going pretty damn fast. I’m told to run to the other line and to do the same thing. Someone yells at me to “stop running like a girl,” to which I can only retort the way I did in third grade. “I am a girl!” I don’t feel as bad when some of the other newcomers miss the ball as well.
8:12. The lights on the field go out. All of the players are disappointed, but I see it as a sign from the heavens that it’s quitting time. I secretly hope the practice has to be called off. Thank you, God! In the darkness, the girls ask me how I’m doing and I can only say “Tired. Very tired.”
8:22. The lights are back on. I might be an atheist. We’re in line and ready to have a football chucked at our heads once again.
8:25. HIT IN THE BOOB. The ball luckily misses my head, but I’m starting to think that would be a better place to be hit It stings! It stings! It got the side of my arm too. I pull a Peter Griffin and let out about eight painful “ahhhh’s!” That’s it!
8:30:45. I quit. An hour early. I tell Meservy about my “lady injury” and she says, “Oh, well that’s good. It’ll swell up now.” I didn’t think of it like that. Now I’m sad the ball only hit the right one.
If you think you can make it past the hour-and-a-half mark at a Prowlers practice and have what it takes to get on with the gridiron, the team is currently looking for new talent for the 2009 season and hosts open tryouts.
You can head to Grand Canyon University every Tuesday and Thursday at 7 p.m. or Powell Junior High in Mesa on Saturdays at 8 a.m. to see how you fare.
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