Kenny Bell Needs Your Help

We've all seen or played Madden '08 and marveled at the life-like moves of Reggie Bush and Chad Johnson in fully rendered CGI glory. A lot of those moves we watch and are astounded by were all provided by one man, Kenny Bell...and believe it or not, he has never even been invited to an NFL training camp.

Kenny Bell is a 5'9 wide receiver who can run a 4.33/40 with a 39 inch vertical and played collegiate football at Hofstra (where Wayne Chebret is from) after the University of Washington went under NCAA sanctions and his scholarship was revoked, but he has yet to get a shot at the big-time. The closest Kenny's gotten to the pro's is 989 Sports' football video games and the Madden series.

The OC register interviewed the poor guy and he had this to say:

"I kept on thinking, 'Any day now, I'll get a chance to prove what I know I can do,'"

Kenny Bell graduated in 2002, has made a DVD of himself catching passes from Josh Booty and has a letter of recommendation from Jeff Garcia that states "He has shown me the talent and the skill to play on the professional level." The horrible thing is this poor guy still carries around both wherever he goes, just on the off chance that someone...anyone...will give him a shot with a professional football team. Just a tryout, a practice, something to show a professional scout what he can do.

Its really kinda sad. There's gotta be some team out there that can give this kid a tryout. He's got the speed and the vertical, someone could see something in him, or at least tell him what he doesn't have to make it into the pros. The guy is stuck in limbo, wondering if he'll ever just get one chance to prove he can or cannot make it as a professional football player.

I wonder, if anyone give this guy a chance or has time, bad-timing, and extraordinarily bad luck has conspired to ruin all of Kenny Bell's dreams. One thing is for sure, he will be immortalized forever in those Madden games. Every time i see a receiver stretch to grab a ball or get the hell knocked out of him so bad that he goes down in one of those helicopter blade spinning hits...I will remember that the guy that took that hit was Kenny Bell.

From The OC Register