Male Athlete of the Year: Terrelle Pryor / A wanted man

Terrelle Pryor's baseball career lasted all of one season at age 9. He hit 10 home runs that year, but never played again.

"He didn't like it because they always had him playing in the outfield," said Terrelle Pryor's father, Craig. "For him, he wasn't busy enough playing out there."

So Terrelle Pryor turned his attention to football and basketball. Now, as a teenager, he gets busy in those two sports like no area high school athlete has in decades.

Terrelle Pryor recently finished his junior year at Jeannette High School, where he threw long passes and made impressive runs as the quarterback of the football team. He also was a standout at defensive back and has been tabbed by a few scouting services as the No. 1 player in the country for next season.

In basketball, he stays busy playing just about any position on the court and has numerous Division I college scholarship offers.

He is a 6-foot-6, 215-pound two-sport megastar, and the Post-Gazette Male Athlete of the Year for the 2006-07 school year. The award takes into consideration all athletes in the WPIAL and City League. This is the 29th year of the award and some former winners were Dan Marino, Bill Fralic and LaVar Arrington.

"Everyone throws the word 'great' around a lot, probably too much," Jeannette football coach Ray Reitz said. "But this kid truly is a great athlete."

Terrelle Pryor runs the 40-yard dash in 4.4 seconds and bench presses 300 pounds. He has football scholarship offers from colleges coast to coast, including Texas and Southern California. He also has basketball offers from some big-time schools as Connecticut. He is the most heavily recruited two-sport athlete from this area since Tom Clements, a 1971 Canevin graduate who narrowed his choices to North Carolina for basketball and Notre Dame for football. He chose Notre Dame.

"He was kind of a mama's boy for a while when he was younger. He didn't want to be away from his mother," Craig Pryor said. "But once he gets his mind on something, it's tough to turn him away. He's always liked being active and being into something."

This is active on the football field: 1,676 yards rushing on 197 attempts (8.7 average); 1,732 yards passing on 92 completions in 163 attempts; 29 touchdowns scored, including one as a receiver. Those were Terrelle Pryor's statistics last season.

In basketball, he had a handful of "triple doubles" and averaged 20.8 points, 10 rebounds, 7 assists, 3 steals and 3 blocks. He has scored 1,658 career points.

Terrelle Pryor had some memorable games this past school year -- in both sports. One of his memorable football plays came in the PIAA Class AA championship. On an extra-point attempt by Wilson Area, Terrelle Pryor timed the snap perfectly, jumped over the center's head, landed on his feet and blocked the kick just as it came off the kicker's foot.

"I did the same thing against Laurel," Terrelle Pryor said. "That time, I jumped over the line and kicked the ball off the tee before the kicker did. I swear to God. The refs thought I kicked the kicker, so they gave me a penalty."

In basketball, one of his memorable plays came in the WPIAL Class AA title game against Aliquippa when he took a pass, drove to the basket and threw down a dunk in the face of 6-9 Aliquippa star Herb Pope.

Terrelle Pryor has come a long way since the days when his father had to push him to play football. He broke his wrist in a backyard game years ago and did not want anything to do with the sport again -- until his father pushed him to the field.

"He was kind of scared to play that first year," Craig Pryor said. "He started when he was 7, and I had to coax him to play."

Now, Terrelle Pryor has plenty of people coaxing him to different colleges. He recently sliced his list of colleges to 11. Making the cut were Alabama, Florida, Georgia Tech, Michigan, Michigan State, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Penn State, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia. All 11 have also said he can play basketball.

Ohio State is one of the schools at the top of Terrelle Pryor's list. He attended a camp at Ohio State recently. He has received some criticism because his hometown team, Pitt, is not on his final list.

"I couldn't care less if anyone's upset about it," Terrelle Pryor said. "Everyone is making a big deal of how I don't want to go to Pitt. I don't understand why it's such a big deal. I like the coaches and all, but it's just too close to home for me. I want to get away."

[More at www.post-gazette.com]