Witt fights for chance at UAB
By By Todd Thompson, Hartselle Enquirer
It’s been almost three years since Jeff Witt last stepped on the football field in a game that meant anything.
Now the 2005 Hartselle High School graduate hopes his long wait to play college football pays off this fall when the walk-on cornerback hopes to make the transition to Division I college football at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Witt is one of 10 cornerbacks in camp this fall for the Blazers and is seeking to make the team’s travel squad as a special teams player.
Witt wasn’t recruited out of high school and he had planned on walking on at the University of Alabama.
A two-year starter, Witt admits his prep career had its share of tough times as well as its success.
His struggles didn’t come from a lack of effort at Hartselle, where he had some big interceptions in two years as a starter for the Tigers.
Witt took a year off of school after graduating from Hartselle and then started to work on getting into playing condition the next year. He walked on at UAB in the spring of 2007 after training in his garage in Hartselle.
Witt’s father, a former football coach at Butler High School, developed a strength program that helped Witt get into top condition.
I used his program and saw some big jumps in my upper body strength,” he said. “When I walked on, I was stronger than I’d been my whole life. I was on a real strenuous workout.”
Witt asked the UAB coaches about playing on the special teams units this fall and he hopes to get that opportunity. “I think I have a good shot at that,” Witt said. “I love hitting. I think that goes back to realizing that it hurts less to hit the other guy than to let him hit you. Going in full for the hit feels good.”
Sitting out his freshman season at UAB didn’t diminish Witt’s desire to play college football, but it did test his perseverance.
At least good enough to walk on.”
Witt’s father got in contact with UAB head coach Watson Brown and he was offered a spot on the team as a walk-on. But Brown left the program to head for Tennessee Tech and in stepped Neil Callaway to head the program.
After several attempts to contact Callaway, Witt found that his spot as a walk-on was safe.
But that is only the first step in Witt’s battle to play college football on the Division I level. It’s a fight he accepts as a challenge.
Still, Witt understands that he faces a tough challenge as UAB enters the fall with a long list of cornerbacks.
Witts’ facing an uphill battle to earn a spot in the Blazers’ secondary rotation this fall. But he hopes his speed - he’s the third or fourth fastest cornerback on the team - will pay big dividends in the future.
