BY MIKE LUCAS
UWBadgers.com Senior Writer
MADISON, Wis. — Brad Ferguson, a Nebraska walk-on linebacker in the late '80s, had a full-sized tackling dummy in the basement so that his two boys, Joe and Jake, could take out their aggressions.
"We'd play each other in tackle football all the time," Jake remembered. "The dummy would be the lineman and Joe would play on his knees just because he's four years older than me.
"I'd just try to run around him, full tackle.
"Me and my brother would be down there for hours."
From what age?
"Probably since I could walk, honestly."
As a technical point of emphasis, and a learning tool, their dad even drew a helmet and shoulder pads on the tackling dummy. Low man wins?
"If you're hitting it, you'd have to be lower than the pads," Jake said of a lesson learned. "I even used to hit it when I was in high school (at Madison Memorial). I'd work on my release in the basement."
Barry Alvarez chuckled at the recollection of his grandsons mixing it up.
"They were always rough-house kids," he said.
Especially the youngest one.
Alvarez recounted a story from a youth game where Jake came running over to him on the sideline for grandpa's validation after a crunching tackle on a flinching opponent.
"Jake really liked football — that's the thing I noticed when they were growing up — he really liked the contact part of it," said Alvarez, the 71-year-old Wisconsin director of athletics.
"He was gifted, he could catch the ball, he could run, he was a three-sport guy. But he liked to mix it up and he liked to compete. He's never been intimidated by who he plays against."
The Brothers Ferguson communicated via FaceTime before the Western Kentucky opener.
Joe Ferguson, 24, a former UW safety who appeared in 58 career games, is living and working in the Los Angeles area, where he's employed by a commercial real estate company.
Jake Ferguson? Well, he's working on the line of scrimmage and the second level of the defense trying to establish himself as a blocker and a consistent receiver as a redshirt freshman tight end.
The opening game results were encouraging. Not only did Ferguson throw a crucial block on Jonathan Taylor's 47-yard touchdown run but he had four catches for 43 yards, all four resulting in first downs.
"What you appreciate is that he (Ferguson) was who we saw in camp," said Wisconsin head coach Paul Chryst. "Because you're talking about his first game action, that's not always the case."
Alvarez saw the opener through the same lens.
"You never know how athletes are going to respond in the first game with a big crowd and under the lights," he said. "Sometimes they're overwhelmed by the speed of the game.
"I thought he competed well. He made some good catches and he moved the chains.
"You can do some things with formations to create some mismatches with him if you've got a linebacker or smaller defensive back covering him. He has long arms and big hands."
The 6-foot-5, 240-pound Ferguson has always been confident in his receiving skills. So have others. Before his senior year of high school, he took part in Nike's The Opening in Beaverton, Oregon.
The invitation-only event showcased the nation's top 166 high school prospects. Boston College's A.J. Dillon, Ohio State's J.K. Dobbins and Alabama's Tua Tagovailoa were among the campers.
Teaming up with Jake Fromm, now Georgia's quarterback, Ferguson had some "splash plays" and an overall strong showing, raising his confidence and profile with the recruiting analysts.
"That really helped me, playing with a different level (of players)," Ferguson conceded.
That was also the case last season as a freshman redshirt matched against defensive starters in practice. Ferguson went on to be named the Scout Team Player of the Year on offense (safety Scott Nelson received the award on defense).
"I learned how to play at the college level," Ferguson said of his apprenticeship. "The scout team was really big for me to learn the little details and turn them into habits."
Early on, he had a "wow" moment; a wake-up call to a brave new world.
"Threes-versus-ones," he recalled, "and my job was to block Leon Jacobs on a play."
Jacobs, a fifth-year senior, was a powerful, chiseled outside linebacker.
"I hit him, and I was, 'Oh, yeah, I got him good,'" Ferguson said. "And a split second later, he extended his arms and just tossed me. I thought, "Oh, yeah, this is a completely different game.'"
Ferguson quickly realized, "I need to be perfect on my techniques to win, and I need to be perfect with my hands to win … and my feet … That really opened my eyes."
Ferguson had the ideal role model in senior tight end Troy Fumagalli, the team's leading receiver. He listened intently whenever Fumagalli passed along pointers and tips and filed them away.
"Troy Fumagalli taught me if you're going to catch some passes you might as well get some good blocks every once in a while," Ferguson said after his college debut Friday.
"I kind of took that to heart last year, and I've been working on my blocking … I still have a lot of work to do but I'm taking the right steps."
Before taking the field against Western Kentucky, tight ends coach Mickey Turner gave him some advice. "Don't think too much," he told Ferguson. "Just throw it (his body) in there."
He took that to heart, too. And it paid off on Taylor's first touchdown when Ferguson picked off a defender on the second level, helping open the middle of the field for the sophomore tailback.
"It's always good to get that first game under the belt and just settle everything down," said Ferguson, who caught his first pass for a gain of 11 yards on the opening possession.
"On the first kickoff return, we kind of had a mess-up. And it was a lot less scary — I really don't know the word for it — but I felt more comfortable after that just being on the field.
"After that first catch, I said, 'I can play. I can make an impact on this game.'"
Besides Fumagalli's influence, Ferguson credited the other tight ends in the rotation — Kyle Penniston, Zander Neuville and Luke Benzschawel — for upping his game and bringing him along.
"I don't think I could have any better teachers than them," he said.
Although Benzschawel will be sidelined for a few weeks with a leg injury, the Badgers got some good news on Neuville, who has resumed practicing. Last year, he tore his ACL at Minnesota. Most recently, he was sidelined by a leg injury during training camp.
"The ability to have multiple tight ends is helpful," said Chryst, welcoming the return of his best blocker to the mix. "I know that he's chomping at the bit to get out there."
Ferguson feels the same way after tasting a little success — he can't wait for his next playing opportunity to get better — unencumbered by the long shadow that a Hall of Fame grandpa can cast.
"It doesn't bother him that I'm his grandfather," Alvarez said, "whereas Joe was always reluctant for people to know that. And that's okay, because they're totally different personalities."
Maybe more than anything, it was just a matter of timing.
"Joe was the first to kind of experience it all," Jake reasoned of the inevitable expectations and burden that was shouldered. "He was a little bit older and people said more stuff to him.
"I was just a little kid running around telling everyone, 'I'm Barry's grandson.'"
"But we both love him and he loves us both the same."
