REDEMPTION IN THE RING
Former Eskimo now a boxer
QUEBEC During the salad days of Adam Braidwood’s professional football career, the former first overall draft choice of the Edmonton Eskimos earned $90,000 as a rookie.
And when he recovered a Henry Burris fumble for a touchdown that season during a September 2006 game, everything seemed possible.
Braidwood squandered that money and every last bit of salary he earned from the Eskimos. The defensive end missed two seasons with knee injuries, got addicted to painkillers and was out of the Canadian Football League by 2011. He also spent two years in prison for sexual assault and a firearm violation.
“I think I crashed and burned and took a lot of people down with me. It was ugly,” Braidwood, 32, said on Wednesday. “I don’t make excuses. I made some bad choices. Not only did I ruin my career, I ruined a big part of my life.
“I thought the money would keep coming in. It definitely didn’t. Whatever potential I had, I flushed down the toilet.”
Braidwood, now a heavyweight boxer with a 6-1 record including five knockouts, has a 12-round bout Friday night at Centre Vidéotron against Quebec’s Eric Martel-Bahoeli (11-6-1, 7 KOs) for the vacant title of the World Boxing Union — an obscure sanctioning body based in the United States.
The bout’s on the undercard of the 12-round main event between former world super-middleweight champion Lucian Bute and Eleider Alvarez. It’s an elimination bout, with the winner scheduled to eventually meet World Boxing Council light-heavyweight champ Adonis Stevenson.
Braidwood, an imposing 6-foot4 and 250 pounds, has no difficulties discussing his past, often volunteering information. It’s both cathartic and therapeutic for him to address; to admit there were demons in his life that consumed his existence.
It was a vicious circle. The knee injuries and subsequent surgeries resulted in Braidwood taking painkillers, to which he became addicted. His cocktails of choice were Valium, Xanax and Benzodiazepines, a tranquillizer that serves as a muscle relaxant — high doses of which can cause amnesia and dissociation.
Braidwood believed he required the drugs to manage his emotions. But then, because he was constantly tired, he began taking cocaine as a stimulant.
“If you don’t like who you are, you start to self destruct,” said the Victoria resident, whose raspy voice makes him sound more menacing than his imposing physical stature.
“That’s what happened. I was on so many painkillers, I was out of it most of the time.
“There wasn’t a game or practice I wasn’t messed up, 100 per cent. And my judgment was messed up because of the painkillers.”
Following his third surgery in 2009, Braidwood said he sat on his couch for six months, barely mobile. He was spiralling out of control, quickly on a path to selfdestruction.
In December 2010, he was arrested following a disturbance in Edmonton.
He and his former girlfriend were involved in a dispute that quickly escalated. According to testimony, Braidwood threatened to kill her, producing a firearm during the argument. He choked and sexually assaulted her, the court heard. He loaded his gun with one bullet and then decided to play “Chicken,” shooting at his foot. The gun didn’t discharge. Then he put it in his mouth.
“I take responsibility for everything that I did,” he said. “Whatever people think ... it doesn’t matter. I put myself in that situation. I wasn’t functioning properly. I made some really, really bad choices.
“I have guilt about the whole thing. A lot of other people have to live with the damage (he inflicted). I hurt a lot of people, people I care about. I’ll never really be proud of myself.”
In April 2013, Braidwood pleaded guilty to sexual assault and was sentenced to 4½ years. He also received six months for careless storage of a firearm. The sentences were served concurrently at a medium-security facility in Agassiz, B.C.
Braidwood was out on parole two years later, but had no house, car or money — nothing more, he said, than the clothes on his back. He lived in a homeless shelter for two years and turned to boxing, a sport he admired from his youth.
Braidwood said there are mental and physical similarities between football and boxing, although it took him time to learn the subtleties of the Sweet Science.
Anyone can throw a punch, although balance and awkwardness are characteristics that many burgeoning pugilists struggle to overcome.
“It’s almost like dancing. You go there, I go there and we dance. It’s full-contact dancing, but it’s still dancing,” explained Braidwood, who works six days a week as a commercial carpenter on construction sites, training at night. “If you can’t do it right, you’re going to look stupid. You have to be smooth and relaxed.”
Eric Tillman, the Eskimos’ former general manager who came to Braidwood and advised him to retire, remained in touch after the player’s release and has continued to support him, realizing people make mistakes.
“Life isn’t a straight and perfect ride,” said Tillman, now the Hamilton Tiger-Cats’ general manager. “Young people deserve fresh starts and second chances instead of being cast aside like disposable razors.
“He was embarrassed and very uncertain what the future might bring. He didn’t want that mistake to be his defining moment.”
And now, Braidwood might become a champion, completing the redemption story, although his opponent is vastly more experienced.
“I’m doing this so people will treat me normally,” he said. “That’s the best I can do.”