Football Meet Robert Rose By John Porentas
You don't tug on Superman's cape, you don't spit in the wind, and you do not, we repeat, do NOT leave your dirty laundry laying around if you happen to be Robert Rose's roommate.
"I'm a neat freak. It has to be neat," said Rose.
"My room, I can't live in a junky room. I'd go crazy," Rose told the-Ozone in an exclusive interview at lunch between practices for the North-South game on Thursday.
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[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Robert Rose at North-South Practice on Thursday[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Photo by Jim Davidson[/FONT]
</td> </tr> </tbody></table> [FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Photo by Jim Davidson[/FONT]
Rose will compete in the North-South game on Saturday, report to Ohio State on Sunday and begin classes for summer quarter on Monday. He will, in fact, have a roommate, and fortunately, it's someone who is familiar with his fastidious nature. Rose will room with his former high school teammate Ray Small. Rose says that Small might not quite measure up to his standards for tidiness, but he'll do.
"We requested it," said Rose of how he and Small ended up roomates.
"Ray is a junkie when it comes to neat," Rose laughed.
"He's not a slob, but he makes some clutter. I keep stuff, but I put it away somewhere neat. Everything has to be in order. I have CDs, and they're all in a CD case where I know exactly where they are."
Rose says he comes by his neat-nut leanings honestly. His father, Robert Rose Sr, instilled that quality in him as a youngster. Neatness, however, was just part of what he learned from his father.
"He's neater than I am. When I was little if I didn't put things away he'd get mad at me. He'd make me go put things away," said Rose.
"He disciplined me. Like every kid, I used to mess up, do bad things, do the wrong things, and he used to discipline me. I used get whuppins, everything, yelled at and punished, but that made me a better person today, because now I don't need my father to tell me to do this and do that.
"I don't resent any of it. I'm grateful for it now. At the time, I was mad and wondered why he was doing that, but now as I mature and get older, I thank him for it," said Rose.
Rose said that his father instilled him one overiding quality, the ability to know what is important, and what isn't.
"He has priorities," said Rose of his father. "He wasn't an athlete, but he has his priorities set."
Robert Rose Sr. got just what he was aiming for when he taught his son discipline at an early age, a responsible, self-sufficient son who is sure of his values and is comfortable with them. It only takes about five minutes of talking to Robert Rose Jr. to know without a doubt that the most important thing in his life is family. He credits his father for that, and for the ability to keep things in perspective, including his success as an athlete.
"I see a lot of people with broken homes. Where I come from, a lot of people have broken homes and don't have fathers or mothers. I was blessed to have both my father and my mother. That's real important to me and I appreciate that a lot. I take pride in my family and I'm grateful for them," he said.
Rose said those values were reinforced by his high school football coach, Ted Ginn Sr.
"It's different because he cares about you more as a person than just as an athlete. He's teaching how to be a man while you're playing football. It's important, because I know it's not just about football," Rose said.
Rose has football in perspective, but he also realizes that his success on the field has opened doors for him. He is proud to be the first member of his family to attend college, and has his sights set on yet another goal outside of football, a college degree, a goal that is as important to him as piling up quarterback sacks on the football field. For him, football is a release for his competitive nature, but he also sees football as one more learning tool in his maturation process and a means to his goal of a degree.
"I want to play and get my degree. Football helps you become a better man. It helps you deal with people. It can teach you different things, not just about football, but about life. I want to become a better man and get a degree," he said.
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[FONT=Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Robert Rose
Photo by Jim Davidson [/FONT]
</td> </tr> </tbody></table> Photo by Jim Davidson [/FONT]
"It's real important. If I get a degree, I'll be the first one in my family to get a degree, so that will open up a whole lot of doors for people even like my nieces and nephews. I take pride in that. I want to study human development and family science. That about family, about how families function and cooperate. That fascinates me," Rose said.
Like his father, Rose seems to have his priorities straight, and has not let his success on the football field cloud his thinking despite the hype and attention that often comes with athletic success.
"I think about that sometimes. I wonder if I didn't play football, would all these people be talking to me," said Rose.
"I always stay humble and not get the big head thinking that I'm better than other people."
Rose's maturity and level-headeness allowed him to survive the recruiting process despite the pressure brought on be being a highly sought after player.
"It was crazy," Rose said.
"My mother and father, they were being influenced by people, but I had to tell them you can't listen to what everybody says.
"I could get to some place and it could be totally different. My mother fell in love with USC. She wanted me to go there so bad because the guy came to her job and was talking to her. He was really in her head. It was Brennan Carroll, the coaches son," said Rose.
Rose himself, however, was not affected by the hype, and stayed true to the values that were instilled in him and made his decision on schools based on them, not on hype.
"Basically so I could be close to my family," he said citing his main motivation for becoming a Buckeye.
"That's a big part. I also have a lot of high school teammates that are already there, and Coach Tress is an amazing guy. He's just so cool. Coach Tressel and I get along real well. I've known him about three years, since 10th grade. He comes to our school and I got to know him," said Rose.
Athletically, Rose is a gifted athlete with tremendous upside, but according to Rose, it wasn't always that way for him.
"I wasn't always the best. I was always big, but I was a goofy-big, like a clumsy-big," Rose said with a laugh.
"I started playing when I was eight. I was always like an offensive lineman or center, I was never the star of the team. When I got older, though, my body started to change and fill out and I started to get a lot of attention, and I got faster and faster and stronger, and it all fell into place," said Rose.
Rose has the competitive attitude that is required for athletic excellence at a high level.
"I hate losing...at anything," said Rose.
In football, Rose found a learning tool, a means to his goal of a degree, and the perfect outlet for his competitive spirit.
"I like the adrenaline rush. I love competing. I love the game," he said. "I want to be the best at everything, I want to be the best at tying shoes, everything," Rose said.
When he isn't playing football or going to school, Rose likes to kick back, chill with family and friends, and take in a little television.
"I don't play video games. I just like to talk and have converstations, sit around and watch a little TV.
His taste in TV?
"I like a whole lot of shows, but I still like to watch cartoons. My favorite is probably Looney Toons and Bugs Bunny, stuff like that. I grew up on them. I just like them," he said.
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