Patriots wide receiver Bernard Reedy isn't taking anything for granted. He has just two catches in parts of two seasons, and the lack of job security that comes with being an NFL fringe player likely has everything to do with his decision to keep the offseason job that pays him $11 an hour.
"As soon as our offseason officially starts," Reedy said this week, via ESPN.com's Jenna Laine. "I'll be back at Care Ride when I'm able to. The work don't stop. Everybody still needs help."
Reedy, a former undrafted free agent who has earned just over $600,000 since coming into the league, considers his offseason job is something of a necessity.
But this isn't your garden-variety part-time gig. For $11 an hour, the 26-year-old works as a driver for Care Ride, a Tampa-area company that provides transportation for people in wheelchairs. Drivers receive special training and are first-aid and CPR certified. After being cut by the Falcons, Reedy wasn't on an NFL roster during the 2015 season and spent the fall and winter working eight hours a day, five days a week for Care Ride. He signed with the Buccaneers in February 2016, suffered a knee injury during the preseason and was waived/injured. He landed on the Bucs' practice squad that December, was waived again in November 2017 and signed with the Patriots a week later.
Through it all he has continued to work for Car Ride, which has accommodated his football schedule based on the time of year.
"I used to think about a lot of the people I would pick up and the situations that they [were] in and the stories I heard. Some of the stories, the normal average person wouldn't believe, but that stuff's true," Reedy said. "It's just ironic that I've had a job like that in the situation that I was in. To be around positivity and listen to people go through what I went through — I went through it sportswise and they went through it in life. It was tough to want to play and to want to be on somebody's team and [I] just [didn't] get the break yet, but I also thought, 'What about the people on life support? What about the people who can't walk that want to walk again?' That stuff's way more serious than running around and playing football."
When Laine first spoke to Reedy last spring, she asked about his post-NFL plans.
"I could still see me doing this [after football]," he said in May 2017. "I'm financially stable enough now that I could be OK if I didn't do this, but why sit home after you're done working out, going over your plays and stuff? Why sit home when you can come out and make you some more money and help people on top of that? And I'm talking about really helping people, helping people who can't help themselves."
