Steeldogs Hope Trone Will Return One More
Michael Vergane
Monday September 4, 2000
In fact, Birmingham ended up having the leading kick returner in yards gained (1268) and touchdowns returned (8). Now the Steeldogs hope that Adlai Trone will ‘return’ to Birmingham for the 2001 season.
Adlai is still relatively new to the game of football. He didn’t start playing until his sophmore year of high school. Maybe that is why he adapted so quickly to the Arena game. He was still in the learning mode.
“Growing up I guess I wasn’t too much into sports. I moved around in my freshman and sophmore years of high school. I went out for football in my junior year and finally got a chance to play in my senior year.”
Instead of sports, Adlai chose to concentrate on academics. He enrolled at Auburn University and was a walk-on for then Coach Bowden’s Tigers. Even now during the past af2 season, Trone continued to take classes at Auburn working towards his Masters degree in Finance.
Trone waited his turn at Auburn for playing time. He practiced with the team by playing on the scout team through his junior season. Things were pretty routine.
Then, on a Friday afternoon in October, something changed on the Auburn campus that opened some doors for Adlai’s playing career. Twenty-four hours before Auburn was to play Louisiana Tech for homecoming, Coach Bowden abruptly resigned. It came as a shock to everyone – including the players.
“It was kind of weird because none of the players knew this was coming down. But there were rumors going around town.”
“The Friday before a home game they try to keep the team together. So we get together early and then they take us to a hotel. So really the whole country knew before the players did.”
“Then right before we were ready to head to the hotel, Coach Bowden came in and said his goodbyes. Everybody was devastated because it was the day before a game.Eventually we figured out this was way above our heads and we had no control of it.” Brother Oliver took over as interim Head Coach in the 1998 season. This was another in the series of breaks that turned around his playing career.
Under Terry Bowden, Adlai was buried on the scout team as a cornerback. Coach Oliver wanted him to start learning all of the secondary positions to prepare him for his senior season the following year.
When Tommy Tuberville was hired as the Head Coach at Auburn in the off-season, he told Adlai that if he wanted to compete for playing time, he was looking at moving him to the free safety spot.
He took that as a challenge, and won the free safety job. In fact, he started all eleven games during his senior season.
After graduation, Trone continued to live in Auburn while he worked towards his Masters. Then the Birmingham Steeldogs of the af2 called.
Trone started all 16 games and played the majority of the season as a Defensive Specialist recording 65 total tackles and pulling down five interceptions.
But as the season wore on, Birmingham Head Coach Bobby Humphrey saw another talent in Adlai; that of a receiver. “Coach (Humphrey) was trying to get a few different looks in our offense and make some adjustments, so I’ve been playing some receiver the past three or four games.”
During those last few games of the year, Trone had nine receptions for 105 yards. Once again, another first for a guy who never played the position in organized football.
Like all players in the af2 this past season, Adlai is hoping to move up to a higher level in 2001.
“I hope I get an opportunity to play for a higher salary. But if it is for me to play in Birmingham and if Coach Humphrey allows me to come back, I would like to.”
Returning is just what Bobby Humphrey wants from Adlai Trone.
Michael Vergane was a writer for ArenaFan Online from 2000 to 2002.
