Exclusive B/R Interview with Indianapolis Colts Wide Receiver Roy Hall

For many aspiring sports writers, your dream is to one day actually get the privilege to speak one on one with the athletes whom you most admire.

While often times that dream might appear to be a bit far away from reality, sometimes life has a way of surprising you.

A few days ago, that dream came true for me.

After spending the last few months reaching out to current and former NFL players in the hopes of conducting an interview with them, Indianapolis Colts Wide Receiver Roy Hall became the first NFL player to return the interest.

Without any hesitation, Roy was kind enough to agree to do an exclusive interview with me for Bleacher Report.

For myself as a fan, I couldn’t have been more excited because Roy is a player whom I have been following with great anticipation. So to have the honor and privilege of speaking to him directly was a dream come true for me.

I prepared myself thoroughly and made the call to Roy. He was friendly from the moment he picked up the phone and was immediately ready to do the interview right then and there.

Roy and I had a great interview which lasted a little longer than 15 minutes. After I hung up the phone, I began the process of uploading the audio recording to my computer so I could transcribe all of the dialog.

Then it happened.

My recording devise bit the dust without a moment’s notice. So I sat there just having completed a fantastic interview with one of my favorite players and within minutes, it was all gone.

I thought to myself, what am I to do?

I did everything imaginable to try to retrieve the audio data but to no avail, it wasn’t coming back. I wasn’t about to call Roy and ask him to do the interview all over again, especially considering that NFL players are busy in the heat of OTA’s right now and even despite that, he was kind enough to spare his time to do the interview with me in the first place.

I thought an email would be a bit more appropriate because I wasn’t about to disturb him during his personal time. I told him everything that happened and within an hour, he wrote back to me.

He told me to just call him at 7:00.

I couldn’t believe it, he just got done taking some of his own free time to do an interview that had since been lost to the ravages of malfunctioning electronic equipment and without any hesitation, he was willing to do it all over again to make sure the interview happened.

That ladies and gentlemen is character.

I set up two new recording devices and the second interview went off without a hitch.

Before I present the interview in its entirety, I would first like to give you all a little bit of background on the man who was so kind as to make this interview happen.

Roy Hall was selected by the Indianapolis Colts in the fifth round of the 2007 NFL Draft out of “The” Ohio State University. While he was fortunate enough to be drafted along with fellow Buckeye teammate Anthony Gonzalez, he suffered a devastating shoulder injury after a serious special teams collision put Hall on the Injured Reserve for the remainder of 2007 season.

While a season-ending injury would put most NFL players on the shelf, Hall instead chose to make an impact off the field while he took the time to recover from his injury.

People have referred to Roy Hall as “The Librarian” due to his efforts to help promote literacy by traveling to schools across America and encouraging children to enjoy and appreciate the values of reading.

Roy is also know for the “Roy Hall Football Skills Camp”  which was established to help teach High School students the fundamentals of football while also placing a strong emphasis on the development of positive character.

In 2008, Hall continued to remain active on special teams and even recorded his first career reception during the Colts’ 23-0 victory over the Tennessee Titans in Week 17.

With the departure of future Hall of Fame receiver Marvin Harrison, Hall has an opportunity to make a name for himself in 2009.

After speaking with Roy, I found his enthusiasm to be quite contagious and I know that if the optimism he shared while speaking with me is any indication of things to come, Colts fans are going to have a lot to be excited about this season.

So without further adieu, let’s take a look at what Roy had to say about his football career, the people he’s worked with, and what we can expect to see from the Indianapolis Colts in 2009…

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