How a deaf football team silenced their on-field rivals during undefeated season: ‘Inescapable togetherness’

By fostering a rare bond among them as they emerged from COVID, Adams galvanized his players into something greater than the sum of their parts and was determined that their deafness would never be an obstacle to success. “It’s not something we are going to cry about. Those are the cards that we were dealt. 

“And you just have to work harder.”

That hard work was overseen by Adams’ assistant, Galvin Drake, a mountain of a man capable of deadlifting 405 pounds who finished all his text messages with a flexing bicep emoji. “He was the team’s enforcer, lecturing the players on the importance of weightlifting and eating well,” writes Fuller. “No junk food and soda during the season, he told the student athletes.”

As a deaf team playing in a league full of hearing teams, CSDR encountered many practical difficulties in their quest for glory. Before games, an interpreter reminded referees that players wouldn’t be able to hear the whistle and to use hand signals to convey decisions.

They also had to replace the traditional ‘Ready, Set, Hike!” used to start plays with a silent count as the quarterback clapped his hands rhythmically and the center looked through his legs to snap the ball.

The secret, as Adams explained, was communication and the Cubs system of coded hand-signals ensured everyone knew their role. “The Cubs had another weapon in their arsenal: American Sign Language. They were able to sign to each other from across the field beyond the distance over which voice might easily carry.”

Fuller also cites research showing deaf people can often see better than hearing people in specific situations and that gave the Cubs an advantage. “The neural difference meant that players had not only a potentially wider view of activity on the playing. They could also react more quickly to an opposing team’s moves,” explains Fuller.

“Milliseconds count in football.”

Being deaf had other benefits, as Trevin Adams, Cubs quarterback and son of Coach Adams, explains. “I can’t hear their fans, the crowds or the heckling,” says Trevin who is also deaf. “Trash talk, I can’t hear it. They can get in my face and tell me anything.”

Deafness wasn’t the only issue for some Cubs players. 

Homeless student Phillip Castaneda, for example, slept in his father’s Nissan Sentra each night, getting up each morning and waiting for the nearby Target to open so he could use their bathroom before he headed to CSDR and football practice. 

But such was the team spirit Adams created. 

“Inside the fence that ringed CSDR, they were at home in language and culture. It was a feeling of belonging amplified in the locker room and on the playing field. Football players at any high school share the bond of brothers in combat. For the Cubs it was an even tighter bond,” writes Fuller.