'That's when the true character comes out': How 35-year-old DB Antoine Bethea forges on in Giants' trying season
Let Antoine Bethea tell you something about the good, bad and ugly of the NFL.
The veteran Giants safety broke into the NFL as a rookie starter for a Super Bowl champion, but that was so long ago. Bethea now is toiling for a team carrying the NFL’s longest losing streak into Monday night’s matchup at Philadelphia. Talk about extremes.
“It’s easy to come to work when you’re winning,” Bethea, 35, told Paste BN Sports. “When it’s not going well, that’s when the true character comes out.”
Eight losses in a row. That brings a lot of character tests.
This predicament also underscores one of the reasons the Giants signed Bethea last offseason to a two-year contract. In his 14th NFL season and with his fourth team, he’s a wise, steady leader for a rebuilding team. Bigger on one-on-one interactions than speeches, Bethea is like the laid-back, big brother-type that every locker room needs.
“It’s part of my role to keep guys on the right track,” he said. “But we all have a job to do.”
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In a sense, Bethea passes along messages similar to those he received while breaking in with the Colts as a rookie in 2006. He pointed to the impact from two veterans in particular – Reggie Wayne and Gary Brackett – then went on to name eight other players from those teams who showed him the way. If not urging him to get in the cold tub after practices, it was, “Get your butt in the house and get your sleep,” he recalls.
“I was fortunate to come to a locker room that had a lot of veterans, to see a lot of guys doing it the right way.”
Now, beyond kicker Adam Vinatieri, he’s the last player standing from the Colts team that won Super Bowl XLI.
Bethea was poised to suit up for his 206th regular-season NFL game on Monday night, a longevity measure that in itself reflects a remarkable journey that proves why some underdogs can never be counted out. After the Colts drafted him from Howard in the sixth round (207th overall) in 2006, he was sixth among the seven safeties on the depth chart. Then-GM Bill Polian and Tony Dungy figured they could break him in at safety, then eventually move him to cornerback for the Cover 2 scheme.
A knack for making plays during his first camp, though, altered the plan and Bethea’s personal history. The switch from safety never happened.
“I just remember that every tipped ball that was in the air, he caught it,” former Colts quarterback Peyton Manning told Paste BN Sports. “There are just certain guys, I don’t know why, but they are around the ball, the fumble always goes to them, they catch the tipped ball. He was just like that. If Polian knew that, coming out of Howard, that’s a credit to Bill. But I just think he is one of those guys with a knack for it. Smart. And he’s kept himself in great shape, obviously, to play this long.”
No, he didn’t always seem destined for this. Bethea wasn’t heavily recruited coming out of Denbigh High School in Newport News, Virginia, landing as a walk-on at Howard, where he majored in criminal justice. Asked what he would be doing if football didn’t work out, he said, “Hell if I know. I think about that to this day. I’ve kept up with some of my former classmates with their careers, but I’m not going to sit here and lie and say that I would have pursued that.”
He seems so down to earth. While he swears by his disciplined routine and various body-maintenance measures as keys for surviving in his rigorous profession – Mike Adams, a 16th-year vet with the Houston Texans, is the only active safety with a longer NFL tenure – Bethea will quickly acknowledge what he can’t control.
“There’s luck involved, too,” he said.
Mention Bob Sanders and it hits home. Sanders starred alongside Bethea in 2006 and was one of the few safeties in history to earn NFL defensive player of the year honors. But his brilliance didn’t last.
“Bob was one of the top safeties in the league, between him, Ed Reed and Troy Polamalu,” Bethea said. “I was trying to emulate everything he was doing, the way he impacted the game. It was just the injuries that got him. This game is so taxing on the body.”
Sanders officially played eight NFL seasons but lined up for more than six games in only two years. He spent the majority of his career battling injuries.
That’s just one more reason Bethea speaks with conviction about appreciating the game.
Another reason: Chasing championships. He insists that is the ultimate motivator, but this 2-10 season with the Giants is similar to so many other campaigns in recent years – including three years with the 49ers and two with the Cardinals – with the playoffs nowhere in sight.
“I was spoiled,” he said. “Seven out of my first eight years in the league, we went to the playoffs. After winning the Super Bowl my first year, I thought, ‘I’m going to get a few of these.’ It has smacked me in the face during the latter part of my career.”
Bethea, signed through 2020, won’t touch the question of whether this will be his final season.
“It’s one day at a time,” he said. “I can’t look into the future and think about what will happen.”
Still, he said, “I’ve got to be real with myself, knowing I don’t have much longer.”
He’s seemingly well-prepared for non-football endeavors. Bethea and his wife Samantha are parents to a daughter, and he’s become quite the active businessman. He owns a trucking company. He’s invested with Brackett in an Indianapolis sports bar. Earlier this year, he opened District 41, a sports bar in Hampton, Virginia, a few minutes from his old high school. He’s especially proud of the latter venture because he wants to be a stakeholder in hometown community, providing jobs and leaving a legacy.
He’s come a long way from being a college walk-on. It’s no wonder Bethea preaches this theme to the kids who come into the NFL: Embrace your story.
“Everybody’s story is going to be different,” he said. “But everything that happens, good or bad, you have to learn from it. So, embrace everything that comes with it.”
And it might provide the foundation for staying power.
Follow Jarrett Bell on Twitter @JarrettBell.