Players

Alameda’s Area 51

Where NFL Draft Picks Go for Practice

For years, National Football League players have been spreading the word to their former college teammates: If you want to increase your stock in the NFL Draft, head for Alameda.
    Here, in a spacious building at the western edge of the former Naval air base, Thomas Weatherspoon plies his trade—whipping athletes into the best shape of their lives.
    “Thomas treats each individual differently. He knows how to get every player’s potential out,” says Cal defensive tackle Lorenzo Alexander, a probable first-day selection in the NFL Draft on April 23-24 (Rounds 1-3 take place Saturday; Rounds 4-7 on Sunday).
    Weatherspoon heads a company, Performance Enhancement for Professional Athletes, or PEPA, which has been readying outgoing college players for the NFL Draft for 19 years.
    Previously, the company rented facilities in Alameda and Oakland to conduct training sessions. But last summer, Weather- spoon and his business partner, massage therapist Ann Manatt, joined forces with John Walker, the former Jefferson Airplane manager who is responsible for inducing several movie production companies to come to Alameda Point.
    Walker’s company, Area 51, located at the foot of Tower Drive on Monarch Street, had all the space PEPA needed to consolidate its training, nutrition and massage therapy under one roof.
     “There was no facility to care for these athletes, so we had to outsource all that,” Weatherspoon says. “Now, everything is taken care of here. They don’t have to leave the Island.”
    Weatherspoon’s methods are time-tested: most athletes lose weight at the outset of training, then pack on the pounds—and muscle—as tired legs are transformed into pumping pistons, and closely monitored nutritional programs trim the fat from beaten-down bodies.
    The results are often startling; Weatherspoon’s clients have earned a stellar reputation at the NFL Scouting Combine in Indianapolis—an invitation-only forum in which the top 300 or so college players show off their strength, speed and agility to representatives from all 32 NFL teams in late February. Just as important to Weatherspoon’s clients are the subsequent pro testing dates, in which NFL teams schedule player workouts on college campuses throughout March.
    The results of those workouts can make or break a player, not to mention have a profound impact on his financial future. The difference between a fourth-round selection and a second-round pick—the line Alexander was straddling when he came to Weatherspoon in January—can be millions of dollars in signing bonuses and contract value. That’s why agents are willing to advance an average of $25,000 per player to house, feed and train their clients in the three months leading up to the draft.
    “Not a day goes by when there’s not a super-intense workout,” says wide receiver Chase Lyman, another in a long pipeline of Cal players to put his future in Weatherspoon’s hands. “There are so many good athletes out here, it makes for a really competitive atmosphere.”
    Even as Lyman is speaking, he makes room on the couch in PEPA’s training room/players’ lounge for San Francisco 49ers tailback Kevan Barlow, a former client who returned to Weatherspoon and Manatt in January after a disappointing season. Just behind the pair on the training table is Oakland Raiders linebacker Napoleon Harris. Pittsburgh Steelers defensive back Chidi Iwuoma, 49ers center Jeremy Newberry, San Diego Chargers wide receiver Bobby Shaw, Seattle Seahawks running back Kerry Carter and Raiders’ cornerback Charles Woodson have also booked off-season training time at PEPA.
    Weatherspoon and his brother, 1996 Olympic gold medal triple-jumper Kenny Harrison, have garnered a
reputation for vaulting undervalued players into prime draft positions. In
2004, Weatherspoon took on under-
sized Washington State safety Erik Coleman—a player who wasn’t invited to the NFL Combine and couldn’t find an agent to represent him—and transformed him into a fifth-round pick and a rookie starter for the playoff-bound New York Jets.
    But plenty of marquee players have enlisted their services, as well. In 2003, Weatherspoon landed on the front page of the Wall Street Journal for his unique program, then was thrust further into national prominence when eight of his clients (including Cal quarterback Kyle Boller) were scooped up in the first two rounds of the draft.
    This year may bring yet another landmark: Cal quarterback Aaron Rodgers, who enrolled at PEPA after foregoing his senior season in Berkeley, is being projected by many services as the No. 1 overall pick in the 2005 draft.       
   
    Find out more about Area 51 by watching “Evening Magazine” at 7 p.m. April 13 on CBS, or catch the show at 8:30 a.m. April 14 on UPN Bay Area. Also check out www.cbs5.com.