Family of 'four moms' helped mold Saints' Evans

MIAMI - Jahri Evans, 10 or 11 years old at the time, had to make a choice.

Big sister Cheryl, in her mid-20s, was noticing that a kid Jahri often played with in their Nicetown neighborhood tended to pick on her brother, pushing him around. Jahri was huge for his age, but mild-mannered, growing up in a household with a mom and three much older sisters, the adored little brother, protected.

The oldest sister, Carmella, 16 years older than now 26-year-old Jahri, recalls that her brother "didn't like trouble, didn't like confrontation."

Cheryl had no problem with confrontation.

"He's such a sweetheart; he's always been that way," Cheryl said this week. "One day we were all outside, and this one kid just picked on him a lot. I'd had enough of it. I told him he either had to fight that kid, to stand up for himself, or he had to fight me, when he came in the house.

"He made the right choice. He stood up for himself. He would have had to fight his sister, and he knows how I am."

Jahri, now the Pro Bowl right guard for the New Orleans Saints, preparing for Sunday's Super Bowl XLIV, agreed yesterday that Cheryl "is probably the toughest of the three," and that he quickly decided that sorting things out with the other kid was the preferable path.

Yesterday, Jahri's mom, Katreen Hopkins, all three sisters (Carmella, Cheryl and Geana), assorted husbands and offspring and at least one cousin were scheduled to fly from Philadelphia to Florida, well in advance of tonight's predicted snowstorm.

"It's still surreal sometimes," Cheryl said, when she was asked about watching Jahri out there in his No. 73 Saints uniform, flattening other gigantic men. "It's amazing. God has been good to our family."

Jahri said yesterday that growing up with "four moms, all at once" was quite an adventure.

"One thing was, I was always fed," he said.

Another family story involves Carmella being so proud of her baby brother's size, she strapped him into his stroller and took him to show-and-tell one day at GAMP - the Girard Academy Music Program - in South Philadelphia.

"He was a big baby - he was one of those babies where you couldn't see his wrists, you couldn't see his ankles," Carmella recalled. "Big round face with little almond-shaped eyes. He was so big - everybody [at GAMP] couldn't imagine a baby being as big as Jahri was."

In the NFL, Evans' size isn't unusual; lots of guys are listed at 6-4, 318, or bigger. Evans stands out now because of his talent - some people tout him as the NFL's top guard - and his unusual path to the league.

Evans fractured his kneecap playing basketball during a church lock-in event for younger kids, the summer before his senior year at Frankford High.

"It was hurtful for him, but we did not want to make him feel he needed to nurture that hurt" to feel sorry for himself, Jahri's mom recalled. She said she didn't want Jahri to feel he had done something wrong - he wasn't supposed to play pickup basketball that summer, but some of the kids in the church program insisted. She remembers Jahri "didn't want the children to feel bad about it."

"I didn't lose faith and hope about still achieving my goals," Evans said. "I just knew it was going to be a little tougher."

He ended up at Division II Bloomsburg, on a combination academic-football scholarship. (His mom made sure he eventually got his degree in exercise science/sports medicine; Jahri had to take a few final classes after his rookie pro season.)

"Mountains, tunnels, farms, cows and all that other stuff. It was definitely a different area. I liked it a lot," Evans said. "You could focus on your studies, focus on playing football."

His mom and sisters didn't think much about the NFL until scouts started to buzz about during Jahri's senior season. Until then, Carmella recalled, she saw her little brother going into business, maybe opening a water-ice stand, something he'd talked about after working in one during high school.

Serendipitously, scout Jim Monos, dismissed by the Eagles in 2004, was working for the Saints in 2006, Evans' draft year. Monos' father had been the Bloomsburg offensive coordinator. New Orleans drafted Evans 108th overall, in the fourth round, with a pick it acquired from the Eagles, who felt they just had to move up to 99th to get another guard, one with a big-school pedigree - Georgia's Max Jean-Gilles. The Saints also netted defensive tackle Hollis Thomas in the deal. (Feel free to sigh in exasperation.)

Evans' agent, South Jersey's Jerrold Colton, recalls that it was easy to tell on film that Evans was "a real special athlete," but teams watching him bulldoze 200-pound defensive linemen obviously had legitimate concerns about what he would do against players his own size. Colton watched Evans ace his interviews and the combine drills, knew several teams were interested, was mildly disappointed his client didn't go a little higher than the fourth round.

"Since then, I've had a lot of [NFL talent evaluators] tell me, 'I really wanted to take him higher, but so-and-so [the GM, coach, whomever] wouldn't do it.' It seems like now, everybody knew he was going to be great," Colton said.

The initial plan was for Evans to back up ex-Eagle Jermane Mayberry his rookie year, but Mayberry retired after suffering a training-camp shoulder injury. Evans started right away. Until then, even Colton hadn't realized Evans' real potential, he said this week.

"When he started and had such success his first year, I started to get an idea," Colton said.

Did Evans know?

"Not at all," he said. "I knew I was going to work hard, try to be the best player I could be . . . I trained for the combine with a couple of D-I guys, and by the time of the draft, I thought, 'Hey, I can play with these guys.' "

His teammates didn't need a lot of convincing.

"First and foremost, he's one of the most physical guards in the league," said New Orleans right tackle Jon Stinchcomb, a 7-year vet. "He has just incredible upper-body strength, good lower-body bend, and just a tenacity that lets him finish better than 99 percent of the guards that are playing today. Off the field, you can never ask him to do too much. He's always willing to go that extra mile."

Left tackle Jermon Bushrod concurred: "He deserves every accolade he got this year."

Evans played this season under a 1-year restricted free-agent deal for $2.798 million. Since it seems a certainty there won't be a collective-bargaining agreement in place by next month, he'll be restricted again in 2010. Obviously, the Saints seem likely to tender him at the highest level, but given Evans' stature now, it's conceivable that someone might be willing to give up the required first- and third-round picks to pry him away.

Evans certainly isn't eager to leave; no one on a Super Bowl team ever is. The Saints' offensive line overcame the loss of original starting left tackle Jammal Brown in the preseason to be honored this week as the league's best all-around unit. Evans is touted as its focal point.

"We put a lot of time in - film study, watching each other in practice, helping each other out," Evans said. "The main thing we do well is communicate, across the board, so everybody's on the same page."