Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, November 4, 1993 TAG: 9311060087
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV5 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: RALPH BERRIER JR. STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
It's a condition that can make a usually sure-fingered wide receiver look like he has oven mitts for hands.
A guy goes across the middle on a pass pattern. He leaps for the ball. He hears the fast-approaching footsteps of a salivating linebacker or defensiveback. He realizes he's going to get the stuffing knocked out of him . . . and he drops the ball.
A wide receiver who doesn't hear the footsteps is an all-star. A guy who does spends game day on the sideline.
Blacksburg's Shane Beamer is a good wide receiver. Yet, there's not a player around who hears more about footsteps than he. Beamer is faced with the heavier burden of following those footsteps rather than avoiding them.
It's not just that he is the son of Frank Beamer, the Virginia Tech football coach, who was a pretty fair player himself during his days at Hillsville High School and at Tech. He also is following in the cleat-prints of some outstanding Blacksburg receivers of recent years.
All-State players such as Matt Smith and Kevin Schug are gone, and the baton has been passed to Beamer. He clutches it like a pass across the middle.
"It's kind of exciting to be mentioned in the same breath as those guys," said Beamer, a junior.
Beamer is making a name for himself this season. His 20 receptions lead the Indians, and he has become more of an offensive force during the last half of the season for the New River District champions.
"He seems to catch everything thrown to him," said Dave Crist, Blacksburg's coach. "He has great hands and he gets open. Some kids have a knack for doing that. It's not something you can coach."
Coaching actually is part of it. With an offense that features strong-armed junior quarterback Greg Shockley, Timesland's third-leading passer, Crist keeps things up in the air. Shockley has thrown for more than 1,000 yards for the second year in a row.
"Coach Crist is different than a lot of high school coaches," Beamer said. "He's not afraid to pass. We spend extra time in practice just working on the passing game."
The Indians are as deep in the receiving corps as they've ever been. Beamer, Jay Safford, Todd Perdue and Tim Brown provide helping hands, and each would be a star on most teams.
That goes double for Beamer, who could be a starting quarterback at many schools. He threw for more than 700 yards with Blacksburg's junior varsity last year.
"He'd probably rather play quarterback," Crist said, "but his talent is as a receiver."
That talent showed during a 13-7 win over Radford this season, when Beamer caught six passes for 52 yards. It was one of his first big games. Coincidentally, because of an opendate on the Hokies' schedule, it was the only Blacksburg game Frank Beamer had a chance to see this year.
"I wanted to have a big game," said the younger Beamer. "The number of catches didn't affect me. I just wanted to play well."
While Frank Beamer has few opportunities to see his son play, Shane Beamer has a sideline view when his father is working. Shane spends most of his Saturdays holding the cord to his father's headphones during games.
The job makes for a busy weekend for Shane, who has traveled with family members to games in Pittsburgh and Morgantown, W.Va., this season after playing in a high school game a few hours earlier.
When Shane is on the sideline holding his dad's headphones, it is the only time the elder Beamer makes sure his son is following his footsteps. Otherwise, Frank's influence is more subtle.
"I don't put pressure on him to play football," Frank Beamer said. "I don't talk football with him unless he brings it up. Then I just tell him to play hard, have some fun and enjoy it."
Occasionally, the Beamers find time to throw the football around in the back yard. It gives Frank an opportunity to relive his days as an All-South high school quarterback.
"He still talks about how good he was in his college and high school days," Shane said of his dad. "He still throws the ball pretty well, but he's a little slow, now.
"Dad has helped me with the mental things. He's gone during the season, so I don't see him very much. My mom [Cheryl] has been a big influence on me. She's at all my games, cheering."
Last year, there was little cheer in the Beamer household as the Hokies struggled to a 2-8-1 season and Shane listened to the nasty complaints of disgruntled fans. This year, Tech is 6-2 and talking of a bowl bid.
"Because of his job, I've enjoyed a lot of things," Shane said. "There have been ups and downs, negatives and positives.
"Now that I'm older, I've become friends with some of the [Tech] players. They'll ask me how I did Friday night. If they see me on TV, they'll tell me, or if they see me drop a pass, they'll rag me about it.
"It's fun being around [college football]. I've been a part of it all my life."
by CNB