It might go without saying, but it takes a good amount of effort to make a 53 man roster in the NFL not to mention becoming an elite talent. We often hear about the success stories from All-Pro’s like Peyton Manning, Rob Gronkowski, Adrian Peterson, and even our very own Gerald McCoy. Many players, though find that their path to success in the pros is a tad more challenging. Alan Cross is one of those players.
Alan Cross is no stranger to adversity. After initially playing linebacker in high school, he became a walk-on in college at Memphis as a long snapper with no scholarship offers. That’s right a long snapper, but it is evident that Cross would grab hold of anything he could to fulfill his goals. Despite what any doubter had to say. He eventually worked himself into the TE spot, and set records for his school. Amassing over 1,000 yards and 14 touchdowns during his college career.
At 6ft 1in and 245lb he doesn’t give off the typical NFL player look, and even sports a ”beer gut” as he likes to call it. Nothing has seemed to be too typical for Cross, and that seems to suit him just fine. It has afforded him the opportunity to gather some unique experiences and is leveraging them now in the NFL. Outside of TE he has been used as a FB, HB, long snapper, and can plug & play at various positions on special teams.
At the pro level, he hasn’t had the full opportunity to make a decent impact after being cut twice by Tampa Bay over the last two years, but currently he seems to be progressing. Dirk Koetter has been noticing too. Saying that he doesn’t seem to be on the bubble after their week 1 pre-season game in which he caught a goal-line pass late from Ryan Griffin. It is because of his versatility that he will likely be saved from being in ”bubble” territory despite having an already talented TE corps. That said, this may be the year where Alan Cross finds his niche on this roster.
