Editor’s note: Each Sunday throughout the season, The Denver Post’s Broncos reporters help readers get to know the players on a more personal level.
As a boy growing up on the South Side of Chicago, all Joe Mays dreamed of was playing basketball. He wanted to be Michael Jordan. He wanted to play for the Bulls.
Mother Nature, it seemed, had other plans.
Mays was one of the biggest kids in his high school until he stopped growing around the age of 16. He had the body of a linebacker, not a shooting guard, and finally gave in to requests from his high school’s football coaches to give the sport a shot for the first time.
Mays may have been late to start, but he turned his short high school career into a college scholarship to North Dakota State. He turned a record-setting career there into a shot at the NFL, first as a sixth-round draft pick of Philadelphia in 2008. The Broncos traded for Mays on the first day of training camp, and he has been a key member of the Broncos’ special-teams units in the team’s first five games. Today against the Jets, he could see his first significant playing time on defense as the team figures out how to replace several injured players.
Q: Other than loving basketball, what was your childhood like?
A: It was a tough situation. You’re forced to grow up in a tough situation, in a tough neighborhood. But it helped me become the man I am today, so I wouldn’t give any of it back. I had a single mom, but my dad was around sometimes. He started coming around more when I was in high school and playing football, but I always stayed with my mom.
Q: What clicked that made you finally want to play football?
A: At first, it helped me stay out of trouble, and then once I realized there was a scholarship opportunity, that’s when I started getting serious, with football and school too. Not many colleges knew about me. (Coaches from North Dakota State) happened to be in Chicago and stopped at my school, and they saw me. As soon as I talked to them, I knew that’s where I wanted to be.
Q: When did you realize that you might be able to make it to the NFL?
A: Going into my junior year, one of my coaches was talking to me about the progress I had made from my freshman to sophomore year, and they kept saying if I could continue to progress, that I would have a chance.
Q: What’s your family life like now?
A: I’ve been married (to Latoyia) for three years. We have two kids (daughter Joi is 5; son Jai is 2). I just try to get home in time to spend some time with them before they go to sleep. I’m the more laid-back type. I like to play around with them. She’s the enforcer, and I have to follow her lead. But if I need to enforce something, she’s got to follow my lead too. That’s good teamwork. You take what you learn here as far as teamwork and apply it at home.
Q: Did marriage and fatherhood change you?
A: Definitely. It helped me mature. We had my daughter when I was a freshman in college, and you have to mature fast then. You can’t think about yourself anymore. You have to think about your little kids now when you make a decision.
Q: What was your reaction this summer when you found out you were being traded?
A: I was surprised. I had just started training camp in Philly, and they called me out of meetings that night to tell me they had traded me. But the first thing I saw was that it was a coaching staff that actually wanted me to come here and play. It was different than in Philly; I was pretty much third string. That was the first thing, just to have coaches that want you and think you can contribute to the team. That helped me go out and play and perform.
Lindsay H. Jones: 303-954-1262 or ljones@denverpost.com
About Joe Mays
Height: 5-feet-11
Weight: 246 pounds
Hometown: Chicago
College: North Dakota State; set a school record with 159 solo tackles; Great West Conference defensive player of the year in 2007.
NFL experience: Third year; 2008-09 with Philadelphia.
2010 stats: Three special-teams tackles; could see first defensive action today against the Jets.
