Gerhard de Beer's American Dream at the Buffalo Bills

Former South African athlete Gerhard de Beer is chasing a career in gridiron, writes MARK ETHERIDGE in the lastest issue of SportsClub magazine.

In 2017 Gift Ngoepe made headlines by becoming the first African-born player in Major League Baseball history. Almost a year later, fellow South African Gerhard de Beer is making his own mark, but in American football.

Coming from an athletics and rugby background, the 23-year-old from Pretoria signed a professional contract with the Buffalo Bills in May.

South Africans haven’t had much of an impact on the bruising and hugely popular code; only the names of Gary Anderson and, to a lesser extent, Springbok rugby player Naas Botha, are bandied about in gridiron circles. Anderson played mostly for the Pittsburgh Steelers in the 1980s but there’s a link between him and De Beer, with Anderson himself having started off at the Buffalo Bills.

De Beer is a Commonwealth Youth Games discus gold medallist and won a bronze medal at the World Youth Championships in 2011 in Lille, France, and another bronze medal at the World Junior Championships in 2012 in Barcelona, Spain.

It was his athletics prowess that prompted US colleges to put out feelers, but the sheer size of the stadiums used for American football saw him switching codes once he got to the US.

‘One coach showed me a bird’s eye view of the campus and I saw the huge football stadium,’ De Beer recalls. ‘I said, “That’s awesome! Do we compete in that?” She told me no, it’s only for football. I asked her if I could play and she said no, so I started looking for schools that would actually let me play football.’

Once the University of Arizona gave him the opportunity to play in such a stadium, the choice was automatic. The chance was grabbed: De Beer went from not knowing how to strap on his pads, to being a starting offensive lineman for the college side.

Upon graduation, De Beer was picked up as a free agent by the Buffalo Bills as part of a maximum 90-strong squad. That gets cut to 53 after the last pre-season game.

De Beer is keenly aware of the pressure: ‘I look at the NFL as the most cut-throat business there is. They start off with twice as many players as they need and go down from 90 to 53 just a few weeks later, so the need to perform is on from the beginning. That 53 also doesn’t include practice teams of 10 players. In terms of timeframe, the final 53 should be announced at the end of August or beginning of September. They replace you very quickly if you perform badly in too many consecutive games.’

He’s been asked countless times to compare rugby to football. ‘The only similarity is the physicality, but football is more physical, especially for the position I play.’

Physical and De Beer go hand in hand, though. One doesn’t mess with someone standing 2m tall in his socks and rocking the scales at 145kg. ‘The offensive linemen tend to be the biggest, tallest and heaviest guys on the team, although there are some defensive linemen who could be heavier.’

Hitting people and hitting them hard is De Beer’s bread and butter, so he says it’s difficult to single out one hit. ‘The thing is, a lot of times you hit people who are trying to go for the ball and they don’t see you coming. Those are big hits but I think of them as cheap, even though you’re still doing your job. My favourite thing to do is when you take a guy and drive him on to his back. That’s a great thing to do as an offensive lineman.’

He also soaks up knowledge by learning from the best. ‘My favourite guy to watch is Joe Thomas, who recently retired from the Cleveland Browns. He’s going to be a Hall of Famer. I also like Lane Johnson of the Philadelphia Eagles. He’s got such good technique, is extremely athletic and has great all-round ability. What makes them so good is that they are so consistent and that’s something I’ve been working on.’

The big guy has signed a three-year contract with the Buffalo Bills. ‘I got a small signing-on bonus and am on the minimum standard for three years. The first year is $480 000, going up to $560 000 and then $650 000 in the final year.’ None of that is guaranteed, though.

De Beer is currently in his off-season. ‘Right now we only have football five days a week. You have to take off Saturday and Sunday, according to the rules. But you can go on your own to the gym and train. At the moment I’m doing lifting four times a week, and then there’s fitness training twice a week, too, and positional meetings, because there’s a lot of technical stuff.’

One of his hobbies (like so many sportsmen) is golf. ‘We have a Top Golf centre here. It’s a three-storey driving range where you can play a game with a scoring system. I really like Top Golf but it’s quite expensive, so I can’t go there that often,’ he laughs.

And when it comes to choice of living mates he has opted to be different. ‘I don’t stay with the football players as it’s the same guys you see all day, every day. When I go home that’s my time to kick back and relax. So I’m staying with some athletics guys.’

Something he’ll be doing in the next while is hammering home a point that he’s good enough to make South Africa’s name proud on the American football scene.