Scout NFL Audible: Rams Rookie Dustin Fry

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By Ed Thompson
Scout.com
Posted May 11, 2007



Rams fans are going to love their rookie offensive center, Dustin Fry out of Clemson, as they get to know him. Full of life and hungry to succeed in the NFL, this is a player you've got to be rooting for. Check out what he had to say about his career at Clemson and his skills in this exclusive interview with Scout.com's Ed Thompson.

Ed Thompson: You've been complemented for being very smart with your calls at the line. Talk a little bit about your development in that area and how complex that is for a center to have to size things up so quickly and make the right calls.

DF: For one thing, I just enjoy doing it. They always let our center make the calls, but it seems like the past couple years my coach gave me a little bit more leniency on some of the calls. In the past, when centers made the calls, it was like "you make this call no matter what, you're not reading the defense, you just look, you find the Mike, you make that point." When I kind of took over, more so in my senior year, he gave me more leniency to read the defense more, read the safeties, make your point on what you think they're going to do. It's not like I was just out there like "okay, I think he's coming." We had a game plan. We watch blitzes over and over and if they're a boundary blitz team from the field, what kind of blitzes they run. When I started feeling more liberal in my points and got to read more, it made the game a lot more fun, too. I think it helped out the team a lot better because you can put the guys in the right position to make the right plays.

ET: In 2006, about sixty percent of Clemson's rushing yards came up the middle. That shows a tremendous amount of confidence in you and the guys that were shoulder to shoulder with you. Talk a little bit about that.

DF: Yeah, me and my interior line guys, we came in together and we took a lot of pride in being able to run up the middle and convert short-yardage plays. My right guard and left guard, we love running that inside zone right behind either one of us, right up the gut. We really take pride in that and the backs we had, they made it a lot easier for us.

ET: In pass protection you guys led the ACC, ranked 6th in the country in sacks allowed at 1.5 per game. What's the secret to success there?

DF: Just being on the same page. Our pass protection is something that we really took a lot of time with and took a lot of coaching on getting our reads, getting the points down. It really was just practice. I mean, you can't be the best offensive linemen; if you go out there and don't really know your assignments on the pass protection you really can't do anything. It was a lot of just practice and re-doing it and knowing exactly what everybody else is doing which really helped us out.

ET: And you were named an All-American Strength and Conditioning Athlete by the National Strength and Conditioning Association. What do you think you did while you were at Clemson that helped gain you that type of recognition?

DF: I think just how I showed my coaches how I worked in the weight room. The numbers I came in with and the numbers I left with, how much I increased with those. Leadership in the weight room, just how you conduct yourself, a lot of guys just watch you to see how you work out. If you start slacking a little bit, they're going to slack a little bit, too. I really enjoy the weight room and that atmosphere and I think it was just my strength coach just rewarding me. Since I'd been there that was an award that I wanted to earn.


Scout.com subscribers can listen in as Dustin shares his wonderful sense of humor, filling you in on what he lobbied his coaches for while he was at Clemson as well as his description of every offensive lineman's dream

Link to Article from there you can hear audio if a member.
http://story.scout.com/a.z?s=123&p=2&c=643360&refid=400