Sacto 9-1-1

By Joe Davidson

It used to be a perfect body, except maybe a gnarled finger or two. Otherwise, it was chiseled and hard, formidable, fast and admired. Coveted.

Not now. Onterrio Smith will tell you that his physique -- his one-time ticket to achievement, a college education and wealth -- again is a work in progress.

A lot of work. After a recent three-hour workout in a Natomas gym, he was spent, slumped in a chair with sweat slowly dripping from his chin.

This is Onterrio Smith now. His Grant High School football legacy remains, but the exploits upon which it was built are far behind him. The promise of his college career and his potential to star in the NFL have been replaced by an uncertain future. Any road back to the NFL -- and to self-respect and a more promising life -- will be an exhausting one.

Smith's many mistakes -- mostly his affinity for marijuana -- put him here, struggling to shed a costly, embarrassing stigma as well as the weight that piled on after he was banned from the NFL for violating its substance abuse policy in 2005.

He said he wants to play again, to rebuild a broken career. Still 25 pounds heavier than his desired playing weight of 215 -- and yet to convince the NFL that he is a reformed citizen -- he has a way to go.

NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said simply that there is "no change in (Smith's) status. He continues to be suspended indefinitely." The league sends somebody to Smith's home 10 times a month to administer drug tests, checking his suspect promise to stay clean.

Smith says he brought himself down and will lift himself back up.

"I still feel I can be a top back in the NFL," Smith said. "I can offer the NFL a lot, and the NFL can offer me a lot."

Smith last carried the ball in an NFL game two years ago, with the Minnesota Vikings. Now he works with a 30-pound medicine ball, part of his grueling work with Sacramento trainer Al Biancani.

"He's sold his soul to me," Biancani said. "He's my project, and this will pay off."

Smith is 26 years old, and he says he can be the person and player he and others want him to be.

In February 1999, Smith was a sure thing. Piles of college recruiting letters proclaimed his greatness following the most outrageous prep career ever by a local product: 6,123 rushing yards, 99 touchdowns. He was a 5-foot-11, 205-pound mixture of ferocity, instinct and explosiveness.

In Del Paso Heights, he was embraced as the community's own. He was a celebrity and loved it.

Smith was as engaging in person as he was entertaining on the field. He signed autographs after games and listened as friends and others told him what to do with his future.

All the major schools wanted him, and he chose Tennessee, which had just won the national championship.

"Best time of my life," Smith said of his prep days. "Then ... "

It changed.

And it was his own doing.

Smith could bench-press 325 pounds a dozen times, but he didn't have strength enough to push away a marijuana pipe or say no to the next party. He said he started getting high in college with a few drinks, a few smokes with friends, becoming part of a social scene.

He was booted out of the Tennessee football program for testing positive for marijuana. He landed at Oregon, where he led the Ducks in rushing in 2001 and 2002, and entered the NFL draft after his junior season.

But no team wanted to risk a high pick on Smith, and he fell to the fourth round before the Vikings called. Nobody would say it, but his reputation was affecting his stock as a professional athletic commodity.

Instead of looking inward, Smith turned to bravado, shaving the letters SOD -- "Steal of the Draft" -- into his hair, and for a while he played the part.

He set a Vikings rookie single-game rushing record with 148 yards against Chicago in 2003 and finished with 579 rushing yards that season.

But the disciplinary action soon began at the pro level. He was suspended for four games in 2004, though he still led the team with 544 rushing yards. He hasn't gained a regular-season professional yard since.

Smith's third drug-policy violation in May 2005 resulted in his suspension for the subsequent season. About the same time, he was pulled off a plane in Minneapolis for carrying a device called the Original Whizzinator, an elaborate kit for beating drug tests that included dried urine samples and an artificial penis.

It was an embarrassment, but the NFL won't say if the incident had anything to do with his current suspension status.

Fed up with Smith's refusal to comply with required rehabilitation and counseling sessions, the NFL denied Smith reinstatement for the 2006 season. The Vikings cut him from their reserved/suspended list before the 2006 draft.

"We want guys that are squared away character-wise," Vikings coach Brad Childress said then.

Smith tried to resurrect his career in the Canadian Football League with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers last summer. He arrived at camp weighing 257 pounds and packing a sore foot.

He lost a fumble in one exhibition game, gained seven yards on two carries and was released.

People who know him best -- former coaches, teammates, family -- describe Smith affectionately, with a caveat: good guy, good family man -- poor decisions.

"The thing with Onterrio is he's only hurt himself," Grant coach Mike Alberghini said. "He hasn't committed crimes against society. He's committed crimes against himself. Doesn't make him a bad person, just someone who hasn't always made the best decisions."

Smith said that once humbled, a person either learns and changes or is ruined. He said he wants to live and learn.

"The CFL, the Whizzinator ... " Smith said, pausing. "They say you have to surrender to your problem. For the longest time, I didn't think I had a problem. Didn't believe it.

"But something was always getting me in these situations. My mom would tell me to stop partying. She knew me. Finally, I knew I had to get back to family, get back to my comfort zone. What was I running for? I needed to get back home. It had all caught up with me."

Smith said he could handle the smirks and jokes that spread across late-night television. He even chimed in with his own.

"They pulled me off that plane and thought the dried urine capsules were cocaine," Smith said. "I tried to crack a joke -- Don't taste it!

"No one laughed. That was really weak of me, embarrassing. I felt for my kids and my mom. Those are the people I hurt, too."

After Canada, Smith returned to Malibu and re-entered drug rehabilitation. Back home in Sacramento, he attends counseling three times a week and no longer fights it.

That's the key, according to Eason Ramson. The Christian Brothers graduate was a tight end on the 49ers' first Super Bowl team in 1981, and his career crashed around him amid drug and alcohol abuse. Ramson now is a drug counselor.

"My advice to him, now and whenever, is, "Get out of the way of your own problem, throw your hands up and surrender,' " said Ramson, a counselor and administrator at Ella Hill Hutch Community Center in San Francisco. "If he's done that, it's a huge step. And family support is huge because recovery isn't just about abstinence, it's about changing your behavior."

Smith surrounds himself with friends and family. He has three young children, whom he sees but who do not live with him, and scores of cousins who adore him. He said he watches the company he keeps.

Favorite foods such as steak, gumbo and sweets have been replaced by fish and salads at his mother's place.

"That's one way I can tell he's really serious about this," said his mother, Terri Garrison. "He never ate like that before."

Moral support is plentiful, and Smith, who earned more than $380,000 a year in the NFL, insists he doesn't need financial support.

He attended every Grant game in the fall. Fans urged him to keep his head up, and players showed their respect, thrilled he was there. He shared his insights with the high school players.

"He tells me to be smart, more than anything," said Grant's Tim Lang, The Bee's 2006 Player of the Year.

Aaron Garcia, a former Grant great and Arena Football League star, said he talks to Smith daily. They work out together.

"If he can come back, it'll say a lot about him because he'll prove that you can come back," Garcia said. "I think he's past the hard part now. ... He is so competitive that he thought he could beat the NFL system. I'd tell him, 'Don't even try. Don't even do it.' He realizes that now."

Smith also is on the minds of neighborhood old-timers, those who watched him lead their beloved Grant Pacers.

"Onterrio comes up quite a bit," said Eugene Washington, a local pastor who has owned a barber shop for 30 years. "We're all pulling for him. We want to see him on TV again."

Connell Johnson Jr. is Smith's uncle and a former coach. His son, Jevon, is a Grant player who reveres Smith.

"For me, it means a lot," Johnson Jr. said. "He's my nephew, and I'm a huge fan of his."

Garrison said: "He's doing fine, and he has that smile back. If he never plays football again, he'll still be my child, and I'll love him just the same. We all will."

Smith wrote a letter to the NFL pleading for reinstatement last year. He has yet to receive a reply.

"I expect Onterrio to get back into the NFL," said Doug Hendrickson, Smith's agent. "He's come a long way. He knows what he's done wrong. We haven't heard anything (from the NFL), but I think we will."

Smith said he hasn't thought much about what happens if his NFL days are over. He said he'd remain in Del Paso Heights to be near family and possibly coach area kids. But he has been defined mostly by football. It has been his only job and has again become the familiar spark that has lit so much of his life.

"There was a time I lost all the love for the game," Smith said. "I wasn't playing. I was frustrated with myself. I should have been a No. 1 back in the league. But it was all me.

"I can't be mad at anyone but myself. No one did anything but me. It's all my fault. I made the mistakes. Do the crime, do the time. It's sunk in. And I'll be back. I can feel it."

And if not, perhaps the sweat and hard work characterizing his current path will result in something else that a man seeking redemption and respect can live with.

THE RISE AND FALL OF ONTERRIO SMITH
HIGHLIGHTS
* Led Grant High School to three-year record of 34-4-1 from 1996 through 1998.
* Rushed for a Northern California season record of 3,154 yards and scored 60 touchdowns, 53 rushing, as a senior in 1998.
* His 6,123 rushing yards and 99 total touchdowns set NorCal career records.
* Rushed for 2,199 yards and 19 touchdowns in two seasons at Oregon in 2001 and '02 after transferring from Tennessee.
* Rushed for 579 yards and five touchdowns as a rookie with the Minnesota Vikings in 2003 when he deemed himself "the steal of the draft."
* Led the Vikings with 544 rushing yards in 2004.

LOWLIGHTS
* Suspended from Tennessee for marijuana use in 1999.
* Violated NFL's anti-drug policy three times.
* Suspended for 2005 season (and later released by Minnesota).
* Detained at Minneapolis airport in 2005 for carrying the Original Whizzinator, a device used to beat drug tests.
* Cut by Winnipeg of the Canadian Football League in 2006.
* Denied reinstatement to NFL in 2006 for not complying with mandated drug counseling.