[revrew]

"The ManChild" Has Grown Up
Adam West, Sports Illustrated

He was just 20 years old, hardly more than a child when the Jacksonville Jaguars selected him in the 7th round of the 2024 draft. But standing 6'5" and 295 pounds, Ricardo Heuring was obviously more than a boy. More than a child. He was … a MAN.

But it wasn't until the Des Moines Dragons took him with the final pick of the expansion draft that the nickname – The "ManChild" – caught on.

To this day, Heuring laughs at the moniker.

"I grew up in Harvard, Massachusetts, and I was six feet tall by my 12th birthday," Heuring recalls. "The assumption was that I would play basketball, but I just had no taste for it. I wasn't an athlete, I was a book nerd with a big appetite."

In fact, Heuring didn't play basketball in Massachusetts. Didn't play football, either. Most assumed the young wiz kid who graduated high school at age 16 would actually matriculate at Harvard University. But the overgrown Heuring had other plans.

"I loved watching things grow," Heuring recalls. "Plants, flowers, vegetables, didn't matter. I had a whole garden under sun lamps in my family's basement. Thank God the girls in my school didn't know about it – I'd have been laughed off!"

So it wasn't Harvard that captured Heuring's attention, but the Heartland. He wanted to be a farmer, a gentle giant just raising his crops and driving the tractor. So when it came time to pick a school, he chose Iowa State University.

At ISU, however, it was hard for the locals to overlook the teenager who now stood 6'5" and was chiseled without even trying. The football coach coaxed the gentle giant to come try pushing a sled around instead of a plow. And as it turns out, when you've got that much raw muscle mass, it doesn't matter how much you have or haven't played – it's an impressive sight on the gridiron.

"He didn't know a thing about football," Iowa State Coach Tom Bridges recalls about Heuring. "He was as green as the plants he was studying. But when he put a hand in the dirt and the ball was snapped, he exploded into the backfield like he had been playing all his life. He had the raw talent. It was all there. We just had to teach him the game of football."

Heuring finished his college career with an impressive harvest of sacks, but plenty of missed tackles and blown assignments as well. The tape still showed a raw powerhouse, and whether he could put it together at the pro-level was anyone's guess.

When the Des Moines Dragons took Heuring with the last pick of the expansion draft, in fact, ESPN's Todd McShay called Heuring "a seventh round rookie who likely won't even make an NFL roster."

And Heuring's first year in the Dragon green and gold revealed just how green Heuring was. Despite starting all 16 games and notching 7 sacks, he was struggling to keep up with the pro game.

"I just didn't have the moves or the experience to fight through the double teams," Heuring candidly admits. "I was stymied when I couldn't rely on overpowering my opponent."

After his third year, Heuring had only amassed 15.5 sacks, and the pundits were calling for the Dragons to desperately get some pass-rush help.

The help came in the form of a rookie, a similarly oversized young man they called "The Beast" – Elias Reese.

But rather than replace Heuring, Reese became his student. And the relationship changed them both.

"I came into the league ready to bull rush over everyone," Reese recalls. "But ManChild pulled me aside and said, 'Forget it. It doesn't work. We gotta be smarter than that.'"

With a budding superstar and eventual Defensive Rookie of the Year under his wing, Heuring applied himself to becoming a teacher. And in teaching, he learned. The ManChild was growing up.

The first year Heuring and Reese were paired, Heuring recorded 13.5 sacks and 16 hurries, by far his best season, college or pro. He earned his first ProBowl and 2nd team All-Pro for his efforts. In the dynamic pass-rushing duo's second year, Heuring did even better, with 14.5 sacks and 20 hurries.

In a few days, the Des Moines Dragons are going to play in their first Super Bowl, in large part because of the student and his teacher, the twin towers of power on the Dragon defensive line.

For Heuring, it's hard to believe he's come so far – from non-scholarship player, to dead last pick in an expansion draft, to playing for the Lombardi. And he's still just 25 years old.

"Yeah, I don't know how long the name 'ManChild' is going to stick," Heuring said. "But when you're as big and as young as I am, I suppose you can't complain.

"Maybe when I turn 30," he says. "Maybe by then, they can call me just … 'The Man.'"