The Legends All-Pro Football Camp was successful once again this year as 102 participants improved their skills on the football field Thursday at Bogalusa High School.
“I think it’s great,” camp director Bruce Plummer said Thursday. “We’ve got a whole lot of kids out here. A whole lot of new faces, a whole lot of coaches, the kids are doing great, it’s hot and it seems like the man upstairs is blessing us without any rain. We’ll continue to have fun, teach these kids the fundamentals of football and teach them about life.”
Terrence Jones, who was a quarterback for Tulane University and in the Canadian Football League, worked with the participants on quarterback footwork, how to avoid getting sacked, holding your head up while looking at your receiver and throwing accuracy.
“All of those drills are good that can carry on if you continue to play that position,” Plummer said. “You see the running backs going through the ropes, which is another good drill, getting your knees up. The DBs (defensive backs) are learning to back pedal. The wide outs are learning to catch with their hands.
“All of the stuff that you should see in a camp you see at this camp here, but the only difference is this camp is free. It’s a free camp and once again, I want to thank all of these guys for coming, taking the time out of their day to come — especially Chris, who came here from China. He came a long way to see how this camp operates so in turn, he can take this back to China and help those kids in China.”
Plummer is referring to Chris McLaurin, who is the commissioner of the Chinese Football League. He was helping out at the camp.
“I’m the commissioner of the American Football League of China,” McLaurin said. “I met Bruce Plummer and Jerry Hardaway, the two coaches that run this camp probably last year. I’m excited to come out and be a part of what’s American football, like the real deal.”
McLaurin is from Michigan and played linebacker at the University of Michigan. He was an All-American in high school and is trying to build the same game in China that is played in the United States, with NCAA rules.
McLaurin has been running the league for four years. It has about 850 players in nine Chinese cities with 16 teams.
Thursday’s camp featured football drills in the morning, followed by lunch, and then the coaches spoke to the participants in a life skills session.