The culmination of your college career is ultimately making the MLS draft and signing your first professional contract. When all the blood, sweat, tears, years of doubt and despair is transformed into the realization that you have made it. You have arrived at your destination. You have achieved what others will spend their entire life dreaming about. You can forget about all the what ifs, second guessing yourself, and back up plans, as you’re a professional footballer now, and you have made it to the top.

But happens if you don’t? What happens if you don’t get drafted? What happens if you don’t get signed? What happens to the thousands of young college athletes across the country who will go unnoticed, unrecognized and virtually forgotten about every single year? Do they forget about the dream they once had? Do they accept they aren’t good enough? Complain about what should have been? Do they throw away their skill, talent, and potential all because of a little adversity?

You didn’t sign up for this sport because it was easy. You knew going into it that the road to becoming a professional footballer would require you to sacrifice your life. But you embraced the challenge without hesitation, fully knowing the monumental struggle which lay ahead of you.

You’re not going to quit now. You want to know why? Because you can make it. We all can make it. Erase the doubt. Erase the hesitation. Forget about what should have been, could have been or would have been. You’re not living in the past anymore. You’re not deterred by not getting drafted. You’re not disturbed by not getting signed. No matter the pain. No matter the struggle. No matter how much adversity we may go through in our life, we embrace it, and keep moving forward. We keep GRINDING!