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Finally beating the beast inside

By GARY SHELTON
Published March 13, 2005

This time, Dexter Manley is going to get it right.

Go on. Roll your eyes.

This time, things are going to be different. Manley has a new career, a new life, a new approach. He is clean, sober, enlightened. This time, he is going to change lives, starting with his own.

Go on. Shake your head.

With Dexter, all stories begin with skepticism. You have heard his lines so many times, and he has told them so frequently, that there is no place else to start. Manley, 46, has spent his life between promises and apologies, between second chances and halfway houses, between wasted paychecks and squandered opportunities.

Before you hear the story of Manley's latest rebirth, then, you may need a moment to gather your doubts.

"I understand why some people will doubt me," Manley said. "I'm a good bull-------. But my heart is right. I'm doing God's will. I'm committed to the broken heart. Playing football was great, but there is nothing like changing someone's life and walking him through the beautiful garden of sobriety.

"If people doubt me, that's fine. We'll see, won't we?"

The difference, Manley will tell you, is his sense of purpose. He is the director of community outreach for Second Genesis, a drug rehab center with 15 clinics throughout the Washington area. He speaks to high school students, to churches and, this week, to a congressional committee. Each time he talks, he allows all of the bad memories and good intentions to spill out in a single breath, as if he is reopening his own wounds for the world to see.

Once, he was a sensational player, a defensive end with blinding speed, rare fury and a devilish smile. He played for the Redskins, Cardinals and Bucs, and his charisma was evident to the fans in all three cities. Manley may have been hard to understand, but he was easy to like.

"Looking back, I could have been the best who ever played," Manley said. "I had all the talent. The only player who came close was Reggie White. No one could rush the passer like Dexter Manley. In the years I played, I was the best."

Had he stayed away from drugs, it isn't much of a stretch to imagine Manley in the Hall of Fame. You can picture him as a television analyst. Had he stayed away from drugs, all-time sack leader Bruce Smith might still be chasing Manley's totals.

Drugs took all of that away. They took his fortune, tarnished his fame and injured his family.

By Manley's estimate, he spent $15-million on drugs. He made 19 visits to rehab centers. Twenty times, he called 911 because he was contemplating suicide. Even now, two of his three Super Bowl rings (two victories) are at the pawn shop.

"It's only by grace and mercy that I'm still here," Manley said. "I walked those dark valleys. I led an empty and meaningless life. They say you have to suffer to get better. I suffered. I'm grateful that I lived through the horror."

Manley has been sober, he says, for three years. Last weekend, on the one-year anniversary of his release from prison, he flew to Tampa to speak at the Lake Gibson Church of the Nazarene in Lakeland.

For Manley, it was a return visit to the graveyard of his career. It was here, in December of 1991, that Manley used up his last chance with the NFL.

Manley spent only one season with the Bucs. He was picked up in preseason and put on the left side of the line, rather than his usual position on the right. Keith McCants, one of the team's most famous busts, was the right end, and as Manley says, "He was a terrible pass rusher."

Manley tried to talk defensive coordinator Floyd Peters into moving him back to the right. Peters didn't, and Manley's frustration grew.

Manley talks of a road trip to Atlanta when a teammate brought two prostitutes back to their room - both for the teammate. Still, Manley admits he couldn't get the thoughts out of his head, and soon, he was frequenting a strip bar near the team's practice facility.

A few nights afterward, one of the dancers escorted Manley to a nearby sub shop. She knew a dealer who frequented there, and Manley spent $200 to purchase cocaine. He swears he took two small, quick hits, and his companion took the rest. He took enough.

Manley was drug-tested the next day, but two weeks went by and he thought he had gotten away with his slip. He hadn't. He was shaving after practice on a Wednesday, two games left in the season and Christmas approaching, when he was summoned to the phone and told he had tested positive.

"It was the saddest day of my life," Manley said. "I wanted to die. I suffered so much from that pain, that worthlessness."

For Manley, the problems were just beginning. Emptied by the loss of football and celebrity, he smoked crack cocaine for the first time in '94. That never comes with a happy ending. Manley would stay awake nights, smoking crack, communicating with his son through a crack in the door. His habit, Manley said, cost him $8,000 a week. His addiction led to thoughts of suicide, which led to calls to 911, which led to the police responding, which led to four arrests and two incarcerations.

Once, Manley woke up in a garbage bin in Los Angeles. Once, he fell asleep in the doorway of a YMCA. A woman opened the door on him - "like I was an animal," he said - so he slept in the parking lot at Texas Southern. He spent two years in prison.

"If I hadn't been arrested," Manley said, "I would be dead."

When he was in jail, there was another inmate with a similar problem. His name was Ken Caminiti, who died of a drug overdose in October.

"It broke my heart," Manley said. "I used to tell him, "Ken, let's go to a meeting.' I guess he didn't want it enough."

Manley's voice cracks, and he falls silent for a moment. Yes, he finally says. He wants it enough.

There were a lot of times, Manley admits, he didn't care if he lived. Manley has been in pain for much of his life. He was unable to read or write until he was 28, and he remembers other kids making fun of him. He remembers Redskins teammates taunting him about his mother, a devout woman for most of her life who turned to alcohol when Manley's father died.

"Then I discovered cocaine, and I didn't care what people said." Manley said. "I didn't have that pain, that embarrassment."

Always, it seems, there were warring forces in his soul. He was physically gifted but emotionally fragile. He was supremely confident but painfully insecure. Once he began to test positive, he was wonderful at saying the right things and terrible at following through.

Even now, he is a year removed from prison but he speaks with the cadence of a preacher. He has spent his life resisting rehab, yet he works for a rehab center. He has not conquered his demons, yet he is in charge of helping others conquer theirs.

"The Beast is still in me," Manley said. "But he's asleep in the corner. As long as I do what I'm supposed to do, he'll stay asleep."

For the recovering addict, no day is easy. Within the last month, Manley says, someone has offered him drugs. Even in prison, a fellow inmate once offered him crack. Both times, Manley said no. Little victories.

The way Manley figures it, he's lucky. He still looks like an athlete. He still has the great smile. His wife, Lydia, loves him. He has a 4-year-old granddaughter, Kahlia. Fans in Washington still hold him in high regard.

"I'm just learning to live," Manley said. "My greatest responsibility is to serve people. If one man can do it, another man can. I'm a flower. Flowers just have to go through the dirt before they can grow. I've been in the dirt."

These days, Manley is clean. If you want to doubt him, do it on your own time.

On the other hand, if you wish to pull for a flawed man with a good heart, the line starts here.

[Last modified March 13, 2005, 00:23:15]