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Amateur football team gives players chance to play

Clark County Vipers don't get paid to play football, but still get much out of game

By Matt Calkins
Published: June 14, 2011, 5:00pm
4 Photos
Vipers players Igor Ivanov, left, and Michael Ivanov pull down a Southern Oregon Renegades player during a football game at Kiggins Bowl on Saturday.
Vipers players Igor Ivanov, left, and Michael Ivanov pull down a Southern Oregon Renegades player during a football game at Kiggins Bowl on Saturday. The team has two remaining home games. Photo Gallery

Marques Cross says it should be spelled SEMI-pro.

Cross is a 34-year-old lineman for the Clark County Vipers, an amateur football team that is part of the Pacific Football League and plays home games at Kiggins Bowl in Vancouver.

Not including the playoffs, PFL teams suit up for 13 games a season, and considering that Cross is a 10-year veteran, he has now made … let’s see … $0 in his playing days.

Hence his explanation.

“The semi should be in caps and the pro lower-case,” said Cross.

Cross has a missing tooth that he lost a few hours after enduring a concussion in an amateur football game, when he passed out and planted his face into the ground.

Once again, he has made $0. In fact, before this year, members of the Vipers (formerly the Vancouver Vipers) had to pay more than $200 to put the pads on. So why does he do it?

Perhaps his teammate David Lambo explains it best.

“Love of the game,” said Lambo, a 26-year-old lineman who played his college ball at Central Washington. “I want to play until I can’t play anymore.”

And with that, welcome to the world of amateur football, or semi-pro football, or SEMI-pro football, or whatever you want to call it. For at least 13 games a season, a sampler platter of personnel comes together on the gridiron for a multitude of purposes.

Sometimes you get players such as Tre Moreland, a 19-year-old defensive back who used his time with the Vipers as a springboard to play college football.

It worked. Moreland recently signed a letter of intent to play at College of Redwoods in Eureka, Calif., right after a game with the Vipers. Even so, he is still intent on finishing out the season with the team.

Other times you’ll get a guy like Nick Crawford, a 24-year-old wide receiver who received no offers from colleges, but straps it up with the Vipers “for the adrenaline rush.”

“I’ve broke the tip of my elbow, which put me out for the season. I broke my collarbone, and every time it happens, I say I’m done,” said Crawford, whose Vipers next play on Saturday at Bremerton. “But I just love that feeling. It’s that same feeling you had in high school, when you catch the ball going full contact, and go into the defender and see who the better man is.”

And every now and then, you’ll get a top-caliber athlete such as Ty Lang, a receiver who won the Class 4A state 100- and 200-meter championships as a senior at Heritage High in 2008. It was his first year running track.

Lang played a little football at College of the Siskiyous in Northern California before coming home. Now he is trying to get back into shape and return to college football, regardless of the level.

“I really don’t care where I play,” said Lang. “Wherever I’m at, I’m going to do what I have to do to get the job done. Division I would be nice, but I’ll play for anyone.”

Also on the roster is Romeen Abdollmohammadi, who was a placekicker for Washington State last year.

This is anything but a textbook team. But if the Vipers were a book, they’d all be on the same page.

After suffering a loss amid a series of injuries last week, the Vipers are now 9-1 on the year — a surprising start given their sub-.500 season in 2010.

Tom King is the chairman of the board of directors of the Washington Athletics Association, which owns the Vipers and selected him as the team’s director of football operations.

King, who was a part-time college football coach at Arkansas and Texas in the 1960s, said that he removed more than 20 players from last year’s team due to attitude problems (many of whom failed to pay their financial dues) and almost completely revamped the coaching staff.

The only remaining coach is Reggie White, last season’s defensive coordinator. White is joined by offensive coordinator George Obryan, who has coached at the high school and college level.

Sometimes only half the team shows up to practice. Maybe it’s because they’re working a job, or maybe it’s because they don’t feel like going.

You won’t see coaches up in their face about it, though, because as Cross says, “There aren’t going to be too many people showing up to get yelled at for free.”

“It’s doesn’t have the intensity of a college program … but this league has been around forever,” White said. “The sad thing is that nobody knows about it.”

Tickets for games are $10 for adults and $5 for kids 5-12. The next home game is June 25 against the King County Colts.

White’s case for fans to come out is that it is something to do on a Saturday night and can satisfy the football junkie’s fix.

Lambo said that fans make the atmosphere infinitely more fun. King, meanwhile, asserted that if enough tickets are sold and the Vipers turn a profit, he is planning on using the money to buy football equipment for needy children.

Maybe he’ll throw in a tooth for Cross, too.

Matt Calkins can be contacted at 360-735-4528 or matt.calkins@columbian.com

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