Boulder – Colorado junior linebacker R.J. Brown isn’t one to drop his jaw or feel the need to stomach a queasy case of the butterflies when he walks into a mega football stadium for the first time.
Nebraska’s Memorial Stadium can feel intimidating, but Brown has experienced more heat. As a 9-year-old, he refused to let Saudi Arabian sandstorms ruin his day.
There’s another big stadium down in Austin, Texas. But Brown ordered noodles on a busy street in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam – when he was 11. The son of an itinerant Marriott hotels executive, Brown has walked amid wonders of the world. How could anything else compare?
“If you’re riding on the back of a camel and you see the sphinx on one side and the pyramids are right there, a sea of red (at Nebraska) doesn’t mean as much to you,” Brown explained.
“It’s still going to be a little overwhelming because it’s a different atmosphere. But it doesn’t quite throw you off as much.”
Neither does a new challenge. A former walk-on who was voted special-teams captain for 2007 by his teammates, Brown has yet to play a down at linebacker during a game. Coaches are certain he will adapt. He has all his life.
“For a kid that had everything, maybe growing up in other places, he was disadvantaged being a foreigner,” linebackers coach Brian Cabral said. “R.J. is more mature than most guys. He does not take anything for granted.”
Undersized for an inside linebacker at 6-feet-1 and 225 pounds, Brown moved atop the depth chart before fall camp when projected starter Michael Sipili, a 250-pound sophomore, was suspended indefinitely until legal issues are resolved regarding an off-campus fight in June.
Sipili was charged with second-degree assault and criminal mischief Aug. 1, leaving his availability for the season in question. He is practicing with the team but will not play in a game while suspended, coach Dan Hawkins said.
An opportunity appears to have opened for Brown, although not the way he would have liked.
“You play football to get the most reps you can,” Brown said. “If things go one way (with Sipili) and I get to start, I don’t know there’s a greater feeling in the world.”
When Brown says he’s still trying to get a feel for “this gridiron sport they call football,” he isn’t joking.
“If you would have asked me when I was 15 who the Super Bowl champion was, I wouldn’t have had a clue, not a clue,” he said.
That’s before his father moved the family from Sydney, Australia, to work at a Marriott hotel in Honolulu before R.J. entered the ninth grade. Until then, Brown never had played organized football. Usually attending international schools, often taught by English citizens, Brown played soccer in Saudi Arabia and Vietnam and rugby in Australia.
“And it seemed like we could get baseball going everywhere I was,” Brown said. “But that would be a ‘league’ of only three or four schools. Not a big deal.”
Brown was excited to try out for the football team at Honolulu’s Punahou School. Although he didn’t know much about the sport, having played rugby gave him an appreciation for contact and effort.
“They put me on defense, where everything I did was pretty much instinct, not really understanding the concepts,” Brown said. “I remember when my dad had to explain to me what an offensive guard was.”
Brown became a two-year starter and an all-conference selection. But 200-pound defensive ends don’t attract much recruiting interest.
He turned down a non-athletic scholarship offer to Division III Whittier (Calif.) College in 2004 to be an invited walk-on at Colorado on the advice of Jeff Cabral, an assistant on the Punahou staff and brother of CU’s Brian.
Brown was put on scholarship by Hawkins before the 2006 season.
“I love the guy, I really do,” Hawkins said last week. “When he asked me why I gave him a scholarship I told him: ‘Because you’re a tough guy, hard worker, a good leader. I wanted to reward that.”‘
Senior linebacker Jordon Dizon also enjoys playing on special teams, although he is one of the team’s top players. Dizon, a native Hawaiian who played against Brown in high school, said special-teams coach Kent Riddle frequently shows a highlight reel of Brown’s kamikaze-like heroics during meetings.
“He hasn’t played a snap at linebacker, but he was named a captain of the team,” said Dizon, who captains the defense. “That’s self-explanatory. The whole team respects him.”
Coaches say they have no concerns about Brown’s ability to handle the starting job at inside linebacker in Sipili’s absence.
“Certain guys like R.J. have it the moment they step on the football field,” Riddle said. “That’s what we’re looking for, guys that have it.”
Carrying a tattered passport is optional.
Staff writer Tom Kensler can be reached at 303-954-1280 or tkensler@denverpost.com.
