BOULDER — After a at inside linebacker, Colorado’s Addison Gillam got sick and tired, then broken and discouraged last season as a sophomore.
He came down with mononucleosis in fall training camp, which sapped his energy, but tried to fight through it and just got more tired. He separated a shoulder and hyperextended an elbow before the first game.
“That,” he recalled last week, “was just the start of it.”
He suffered a concussion Sept. 20 in a home game against Hawaii. He kept getting sick, requiring intravenous injections before games. Difficult “family issues” weighed on him toward the end of the season, too.
He played in 11 games, starting 10, but wasn’t after becoming the first first-year player to lead CU in tackles since the school started tracking that statistic in 1964. He was named the team’s most outstanding defensive player.
Some heart-to-heart talks with coach Mike MacIntyre finally helped him snap out of his struggles last season.
“I was kind of questioning if I really loved playing football, just going through all that personal stuff,” Gillam said. “I had a lot of distractions. He helped me distract myself, I guess, from the distractions, which was big. I was wrapping myself up in it and was really hard on myself.
“He helped me get out of that mental state and helped me walk through it. I re-found my passion for football, and I’m happy again.”
MacIntyre originally recruited Gillam out of Palo Cedro, Calif., to play at San Jose State. When MacIntyre left there to take the CU job, Gillam followed him.
Gillam got so far down last season, he felt like he was failing the coach who put so much trust in him.
“Those are the moments why I coach — period — to help dive into a young man’s heart and soul and mind,” MacIntyre said. “College football, it’s awesome, but it’s gotten so commercialized, so much television, especially in a pro environment like we’re in here. When young men sign a scholarship at 17 or 18 years old, when they walk on that field, most people think they’re (like) a 25- or 26-year-old Denver Bronco. They’re a 17- or 18-year-old kid.
“They’ve got school, they’ve got all these different pressures, they might have issues at home. It’s my job to take them through that journey. My job is to win football games, but if I don’t capture their heart and soul first, we’re not going to win many football games. Then all I’m doing is using a kid to win football games. That’s an empty feeling, I would imagine.”
MacIntyre now sees “Addison coming back to Addison.” New defensive coordinator Jim Leavitt, who was brought in to fix a defense that ranked 116th in the nation last year (yielding 39 points per game) likes what he’s seen so far in Gillam, too.
“I love him, everything about him,” Leavitt said. “The way he handles himself, his demeanor, his personality, his thoughtfulness, his ‘sponge’ to be great. The respectfulness he gives you is unbelievable.”
Gillam is happy, he’s healthy, and he can’t wait for the season to start. He has also put on about a dozen pounds of muscle in the weight room this summer.
“I’m excited,” Gillam said. “I love the defense, love the energy Coach Leavitt brings.”
Gillam’s trials last season reinforced that he did the right thing joining MacIntyre in Boulder.
“He always talks about how he cares about the team, not just us being football players,” Gillam said. “He cares about us being good men, men with character. I saw that when he was recruiting me, and that was something I wanted to stick with.”
This summer the Buffs have been wearing shirts with the word “Trust” printed on them. It’s a trait MacIntyre has been stressing in the preparations for his third season. The bond of trust between Gillam and Mac Intyre was strengthened last year.
“Taking him through that and working through that with him and seeing how he’s coming out on the other side is really a neat situation,” MacIntyre said. “He and I look each other in the eye and can smile. Now I know somebody’s going to be a productive father, productive husband one day. He’s also going to be a good football player for us.”
John Meyer: jmeyer@denverpost.com or twitter.com/johnmeyer
