MONROE – The Pitman played in the Super Bowl.
Newcomers to town might not realize that. Maybe they only glance at the photograph of the football player on the wall of the lube shop as they wait for their car to be serviced, wondering who he is and what team he plays for but not grasping the significance of the picture.
Dan Bates / The Herald
Chances are, they never see the face down in the hole underneath their car or they would know that the Pitman and the player are one and the same.
Granted, Smiley Creswell has changed a bit, his hair graying somewhat and his body lighter than it was when that picture was taken of him on the sideline at Super Bowl XX in 1986. But the face is unmistakably that of Creswell, now 46, and the owner and operator of Smiley’s Pro Lube.
He still appears to be in good shape, looks as if he could still put a pretty good pass rush on the quarterback, as he did as a three-year starter for Michigan State after starring for his hometown Monroe Bearcats in high school.
Unlike some former NFL players, Creswell doesn’t walk with a limp and hasn’t had any hips or knees replaced. He still hikes, hunts and fishes, and is on his feet down in that pit 10 hours a day, changing oil, greasing chassis, checking all the “vitals” underneath vehicles.
So if he’s the boss, why isn’t he taking it easy, sitting in the office, drinking coffee and chatting with customers? Because he wants to make sure things are done right. Besides, he enjoys getting his hands dirty.
“I like it, I like the repetition,” he said one morning over a bearclaw at a downtown bakery. “Besides, if I screw up in the pit, I’m the one to blame.”
Judging from the fact that he’s still in business 17 years after he opened, it’s apparent that he’s been satisfying customers. “It’s been consistent,” he said. “We try to please as many people as possible.”
He has a lot of older customers, people he says who trust that he won’t try to sell them something they don’t need. “Old folks appreciate that,” he said.
Creswell returned to his hometown after his three-year NFL career ended following that Super Bowl game in the Louisiana Superdome. Maybe you remember it. A great Chicago Bears team defeated Creswell’s New England Patriots, 46-10.
The picture hanging on the wall in the lube shop pretty much tells the story: The bearded Creswell, No. 92, and other Patriots standing stunned on the sideline, looking as if they had just been hit by a semi – which is more or less what happened.
Creswell, a 6-foot-4, 260-pound reserve defensive end, played two quarters that day, earning $18,000, or half of what the winning Bears took home. Oddly, it was just the fifth game he played in the NFL and he wouldn’t have appeared in it if he hadn’t been cut by the Philadelphia Eagles late in the season and then re-signed by the Patriots.
“Just lucky,” he said. “That’s all it was.”
Coming out of Michigan State in 1983, Creswell was a fifth-round draft choice of the Patriots, receiving a signing bonus of $70,000. That was in addition to a $140,000 salary. “For a kid just out of college, that was almost enough to get him in trouble,” he chuckled.
It got him a 2-year-old Chevrolet Corvette with a T-top. He hadn’t had the car six hours when he drove it into Boston and stopped to make a phone call. When he came back five minutes later, the windshield was smashed and the T-top was missing. His first thought: What if it starts raining? “I learned a lesson in Boston,” he said. “What did I know? I was 22 or 23 years old.”
Creswell learned another – harder – lesson in his rookie season: How to cope with injury. He was having a good training camp when he suffered an injury to his left thumb in the Patriots’ third preseason game, sidelining him for the season.
He came back a year later and was having another solid camp. “I had a shot (at playing a lot),” he said. Then, it happened again. Another injury, this one torn medial collateral ligaments in his left knee requiring surgery. Another season of sitting and watching.
He had been in the NFL for two years and had yet to play a down in a regular-season game.
“I think if I hadn’t gotten hurt that second year, I would have stayed in the league five, six, seven years,” he said. “It’s just that when you get a major tear in your ligament in your knee, it’s tough to get your confidence back.
“The first year back when I went to mini-camp, I had hardly any confidence. I was scared and my injury was not even caused by a game. I did my job, stood the guy up, and someone came through and nailed me in practice. That guy was cut the next day.”
In his third season, he got another lesson in how harsh life can be in the NFL: The Patriots waived him in late August. Which wasn’t all bad, because he finally got to play in some real games when the Eagles picked him up two weeks later. When the Eagles let him go in November, the Patriots re-signed him, just in time for the headiest ride in team history.
The Patriots were about to become the first wild-card team in NFL history to reach the Super Bowl by winning three road games in the playoffs. They culminated that run by beating the Miami Dolphins 31-14 in the AFC Championship Game, slicing an 18-game losing streak at the Orange Bowl.
Timing. Chance. Luck. Fate. Whatever it was, Creswell – after playing just four games in three years – was headed for the biggest show in sports: the Super Bowl in New Orleans.
An opportunity that most players never get. Creswell admits that luck had a hand in it. But he also knows he wouldn’t have still been in the league if he hadn’t done the right things.
“I worked hard. I lifted hard. I ran hard. I was always in shape. That’s probably why I made it as far as I did. I might not have been the most skilled athlete in the world, but as far as determination and hard work and that kind of stuff, that was pretty much instilled in me by my parents. That’s just what a person had to do, put in time and hard work. And I was fortunate to have some great coaches.”
Last month, on the 20th anniversary of that Super Bowl game, the Patriots held a reunion, with owner Bob Kraft picking up the tab, air fare and hotel accommodations for the 42 players who showed up in Boston.
Creswell has nothing but good memories of his old Patriot teammates. “I played with a lot of great guys,” he said. “I can honestly say it was just really an honor to play with those guys because everybody looked out for everybody.”
When he saw the coach of that team, he recalled how Raymond Berry was such a stickler for details. Like having receivers squeeze silly putty during meetings to strengthen their grips. “And fumble drills,” he said. “We worked on those continually.”
The Pats’ Hall of Fame guard, John Hanna, looked as intimidating as ever. “If you didn’t give him a good lick in practice,” Creswell said, “he’d get ticked off.”
On New Year’s Day, the old Patriots were introduced before the game between New England and Miami. An awesome experience, Creswell said.
But not nearly as awesome as living that once-in-a-lifetime dream: playing in a Super Bowl. Does he ever, in his quiet moments, sit back and think about having an opportunity that most players never have?
“Yeah, I do,” he said. “It’s amazing how things worked out.”
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