Lex Luger - Football Career

Football Career

Luger attended high school and played football in Orchard Park, New York. He then attended Pennsylvania State University on a football scholarship, but transferred to the University of Miami after his freshman year when the Penn State coaches thought he should move to linebacker or defensive end. A talented soccer player and lifelong fan of English soccer team Manchester United, Luger considered changing sports for some time but eventually decided his skills would be better suited to football. He sat out the 1978 season as a redshirt transfer student in Coral Gables.

In 1979, Luger played for Miami, which featured future All-Pro quarterback Jim Kelly, Jim Burt, Mitch Guittar, Fred Marion and current University of Georgia coach Mark Richt, until he was booted off the team for what Pfohl referred to as "off-the-field incidents," specifically on the team’s road trip to Atlanta to play Georgia Tech, Pfohl, suffering from cabin-fever and disappointed at not being named a starter by Coach Lou Saban by that 5th game into the season, just snapped and trashed his hotel room.

Upon leaving Miami, he played professional football for the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League where he played in the Grey Cup Game against Edmonton. He then signed with the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League, but never played in a game and thus is not listed on their all-time roster, though he did spend the entire 1982 season on the team's injured reserve list with a groin problem incurred during training camp. He returned to the Packers training camp in 1983, but he was released before the regular season began. In 1984, Luger finished his football career playing in the United States Football League for the Memphis Showboats. He also played for the Jacksonville Bulls and the Tampa Bay Bandits in the USFL, where he was a teammate with future WCW rival Ron Simmons.