AUSTIN, Texas — Ryan Becker isn’t ready to be done playing football. He went to training camp with the Arizona Cardinals in 2020 and the Atlanta Falcons in 2021.
“It was a dream since I was a kid,” said Becker. “Once you get in the first couple days of camp in the NFL, you’re like, 'Man, I know I can get back.'”
That taste of the National Football League is why Becker is back on the grind in the XFL with the Orlando Guardians.
“Camp is tough. Some of these guys haven’t played for two, three years,” Becker said. “It’s getting back in the groove. It’s just a little bit different.”
The Marble Falls, Texas, native, has bounced around NFL training camps since finishing his college career at SMU in 2019, something that forced him to rediscover another childhood passion during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Nobody was doing anything. I was just sitting at home training, waiting for a phone call,” Becker said. “I figured, why not start roping again?”
Becker has been calf roping since he was old enough to sit on a horse.
“I would go pick him up after peewee football,” said Ryan’s dad, Mark Becker. “I had the trailer hooked up with the horses loaded, and we were headed to the roping pen.”
“I loved it, almost didn’t play football in my freshman year of high school because I was roping all the time,” Ryan Becker said. “And then I realized that I can’t quit football. I love football too. So I just kind of made time for both.”
Ryan made time for roping even after he developed into a Division-I tight end.
“Whenever I wasn’t playing, I was roping...that’s just competing,” Becker said. “I love to compete.”
His love for roping turned into a side hustle for his NFL aspirations when he returned to the pen in 2020.
“Ended up paying for my year, all my training, and covered all my expenses,” Becker said.
“They said, ‘Ryan, you haven’t roped much in the last four years and you come down here and took our money,’” Mark Becker said.
Ryan surprises everyone with his drive to succeed — both with a rope and on the gridiron.
“Every young man wants to play in the NFL, and every man wants to rope,” Mark Becker said. “And he’s doing it. He’s living the dream.”
He enjoys roping while staying ready for another chance on the football field.
“It’s just about finding the right situation wherever you land somewhere,” Ryan Becker said. “And this is that opportunity.”
