Go to the mobile version of this Web site.

Login | Contact Us | Site Map | Paid archives | Electronic edition | Subscription Questions | Extras

TORKELSON: Torah transforms ex-NFL lineman

By Jean Torkelson, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published March 10, 2008 at 12:30 a.m.

Text size  
Former NFL player Alan Veingrad conducts a gym workout and talks to Jewish kids Sunday about how to preserve their faith in the everyday world. The kids, from left, are Mendel Brackman, Issiah Worthman and Meir Asher Miller.

Photo by Photos By George Kochaniec Jr. / The Rocky

Former NFL player Alan Veingrad conducts a gym workout and talks to Jewish kids Sunday about how to preserve their faith in the everyday world. The kids, from left, are Mendel Brackman, Issiah Worthman and Meir Asher Miller.

Alan Veingrad gives instructions to Schurler Jacobs while running some football plays in the gym at Academy Charter School in Westminster. "Good catch - touchdown," the big man was heard to shout. "Listen and learn, right?"

Alan Veingrad gives instructions to Schurler Jacobs while running some football plays in the gym at Academy Charter School in Westminster. "Good catch - touchdown," the big man was heard to shout. "Listen and learn, right?"

More News Columns & Blogs

More stories »

Map my news

The tall, tall man with the long beard and yarmulke - that's the rabbi, right?

No, that's Alan Veingrad, onetime NFL offensive lineman for the Green Bay Packers and Dallas Cowboys, who retired in 1992. Now sporting a foot-long beard to go with his 65-pound weight drop, Veingrad, 44, jokes that when he sees former teammates he feels he should show his ID.

But he had no problem proving himself Sunday to a scrimmage line of young boys, all about 10 years old, who belong to Chabad of Northwest Metro Denver. The kids surrounded the 6-foot-5 Veingrad to soak up some football lessons, and later to hear how Veingrad journeyed back to Judaism.

"Hut hut - go, go, go, go!" boomed Veingrad as he ran some plays in the gym at the Academy Charter School in Westminster.

"Everybody loves football, especially in Broncos country," says the Chabad's leader, Rabbi Benjy Brackman. On the lookout for good ways to educate Jews about their heritage, Brackman found Veingrad through a speakers bureau.

Veingrad tells groups about becoming a Torah-observant Jew after years in the privileged world of pro sports. This visit was also his honeymoon. He came with his wife of four weeks, Chaya, whom he met - where else? - at a talk he gave in south Florida, where they both live.

"I talk about my journey," says Veingrad, whose beard barely obscures a quick smile and boyish face. Veingrad grew up, like many American Jews, with "a bar mitzvah and some Hebrew schooling."

His real journey began about 10 years ago with a Sabbath dinner at his cousin's home. That led to joining a Torah class. From there, a revelation: The Torah "isn't a history book - it's an inspirational road map for Jews on how to live."

So a guy who once never passed up a (nonkosher) lobster or a slab of baby back ribs, who traveled on the Sabbath - and did some partying, too - decided to change his life.

His journey has had unexpected repercussions. One time a former Packers teammate came to visit Veingrad and was, first, taken aback by his appearance ("I knew you were Jewish, but . . .!") He was more astonished when Veingrad declined to go out on the town that night, drinking.

The next day, his buddy, who's not Jewish, called to talk more about Veingrad's faith. What he heard, the buddy said, made him think of returning to his own church.

Judaism, Veingrad says, "has given my life purpose and meaning." For the kids, there's an extra message: "Grow at your own pace, don't grow at my pace. Challenge yourself and feel your relationship with God."

The message was sweetened by the workout, which sent yarmulkes flying everywhere. "Good catch - touchdown!" the big man crowed, then added to the wide-eyed kids, "Listen and learn, right?"

torkelsonj@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5055