Truman High product Lewis considering career in football, not basketball

NEITHER ROAD is well-marked, nor particularly inviting, but they are the crossroads at which former local prep star Tyrone Lewis stands.

Should he hire an agent and try to become the next great, anonymous, undersized shooting guard in Europe?

Or should he wait and see if some NFL team, desperate for cornerback depth, snags him for its practice squad - risking life, limb and any pro hoops career?

"Would I risk it? Right now, since I don't have too many options with basketball . . . I don't really see it as a risk right now," said Lewis, a senior guard at Niagara University, where he went after a stellar, two-sport career at Harry S Truman High in Levittown.

At Niagara, as a 5-10 shooting guard, Lewis exits as the third-leading scorer in school history (1,849 points) with the record for three-pointers (286) and steals (250). He did not play football. The school has no team.

Still, plenty of pro teams remembered that Lewis was a highly regarded college prospect - not unlike Antonio Gates, the San Diego Chargers' star tight end who played only basketball in college, or George Mason forward Jai Lewis, an undrafted free agent in 2006 who washed out in the NFL.

Those were big guys; smaller guys usually don't attract NFL interest.

As Niagara got some exposure this season, Green Bay assistant pro personnel director Eliot Wolf recalled that Lewis had been a well-regarded football recruit, too, especially by schools in the Midwest. He contacted Lewis via e-mail in February, again in March and, finally, set up a pro workout day for Lewis for 4 p.m. this past Monday.

Lewis figured the Packers would be there, and maybe the Seahawks, since they'd called him, too. Then, at 3 p.m., he got a call from a buddy who was in the Niagara weight room:

"Uh, Ty, there's a guy here. From the Browns."

"Um . . . OK," Lewis replied.

Actually, it was a crowded weight room.

"There were five guys standing there, with their colors on," Lewis said.

The nearby Bills and Browns came, as well as the Chargers, the Colts and, of course, the Packers, whose scout, Lee Gissendaner, ran the workout. (The Eagles, Lewis said, have called his high school.)

Lewis came away with a 4.6-second 40-yard dash, a 34-inch vertical jump, and the feeling that he could do much better.

He spent only 10 days preparing for the workout, which included pass-coverage drills, the broad jump, shuttle runs and, of course, the 40 and the vertical.

Lewis had to practice on concrete or asphalt or the beach; his roommate, team manager Ralph Russo, threw him passes during their spring-break trip to Sarasota, Fla.

Monday, he ran the 40 outside, against the wind, on the school's synthetic turf field, which he'd never been on before. While most players have access to a Vertec, one of the more scientific devices for measuring vertical leap, Lewis rubbed some chalk on his fingertips, went over to a wall and jumped as high as he could.

"It didn't look anything like Sam Bradford's pro day, or Tim Tebow's," Lewis said with a chuckle.

Then again, he could be their teammate in a few weeks. He is being advised by Marc Lillibridge, the agent for high school buddy Steve Slaton, the Houston Texans' running back and Lewis' best friend.

"The feedback I've gotten, he did well, all things considered," Lillibridge said.

It might all come to nothing, of course.

Generously listed at 180 pounds, Lewis lacks the heft of even the smallest cornerbacks in the NFL. He would not be drafted; he would, at best, be signed as a rookie free agent, released, then re-signed to a practice squad, where he could learn and grow.

He likely would need a season or two to add weight, to learn technique and to be introduced to the concept of high-speed collisions. After all, there aren't many headhunters in the MAAC basketball conference, and there's nobody charging the lane like, say, Ray Rice of the Ravens.

"Is he ready for the contact?" asked Niagara coach Joe Mihalich, the former La Salle University assistant. "I don't know. But I can see why they're intrigued by him. I'll see him in practice, and suddenly, he's not here, he's there. His anticipation skills are so good, and he's so quick."

Raw talent won't crack an NFL squad, though. After just a few minutes of running drills Monday, Lewis, an elite college athlete, was sore for 2 days. He was using muscles dormant for 4 years. And he hadn't even hit anybody, or been hit.

"I had a hard time, in drills, not doing them like I do them in basketball," Lewis said.

The next time he runs them, he said, it will be better. Gissendaner emphasized testing Lewis' ability to react and recover, first showing a pass play then actually running the ball; testing Lewis' ability to read and cover a hitch-and-go and other double moves.

"I wanted to make sure I stayed low on my backpedal and opened up wide enough," Lewis said. "Now that I know some of the things they're looking for, my roommate and I can change the workout a little bit; backpedal, open up at a 45-degree angle; work on my reaction at different angles."

Mihalich believes Lewis should be working on his ballhandling and passing, and maybe learning a Romance language, like, say, Italian or Spanish.

"I think it's much smarter for him to pursue a basketball career," Mihalich said. "Sure, the NBA's going to be a longshot for him, but he can play in Europe, and he can live anywhere. I truly believe he'd become the fan favorite in whatever town he played in over there."

Lewis isn't so sure about his basketball future, stateside or otherwise. Several agents have contacted him in hopes of representing him to teams in Europe and elsewhere, but Lewis is reluctant to go down that path just yet.

"I've got to keep it real. I went to a midmajor school. We didn't play against top-level competition every night," Lewis said. "They look at your height before they look at your skills. I'm a 5-10 shooting guard who likes to play off the ball, and guys my height, they like to see you play the point."

It's hard to blame Lewis for looking down the football road. He hasn't been invited to any NBA predraft camps.

"I didn't think playing basketball at Niagara University would open the opportunity for me playing in the NFL," Lewis said.

It hasn't, yet. His grandmother, Margie Lewis, also of Levittown, acts as chief and candid adviser to Lewis.

"She picks everything for me. The school I go to, the girlfriends I date, everything," he said.

They had dinner after Wolf first contacted Lewis, and Lewis asked her, "How do you feel about me playing football?"

She shook her head and said, "No. I don't see you playing football."

No one else might, either. He might not have any road to travel, athletically, but with a sociology degree in hand at the end of next month, Lewis will be equipped to give single parents and their kids the leg up he and his mother could have used years ago.

Lewis knows, too, that counseling youth resonates more when it comes from a pro athlete, and that's what he wants to be, be the ball oblong or round.

"I don't want to make any fast decisions. Anything's possible with football. I want to keep my options open," Lewis said. "It's a longshot at football, but I'm not going to give up on it.''