What are the chances of a scholar-athlete from Menlo-Atherton High School making the huge leap into the National Football League?
Greg Camarillo of Menlo Park, in another chapter in his improbable football career, made the 53rd and final spot on the San Diego Chargers September 2, as a wide receiver and special teams member.
“Greg had been battling throughout camp for the fifth receiver position,” said his dad Al Camarillo, an American history professor at Stanford.
But in the final decision, it was Camarillo’s contributions on special teams, in addition to his role as a receiver that won him the roster spot, said Chargers coach Marty Schottenheimer.
“You look at him, he doesn’t have the height and the weight and the speed and the numbers,” coach Schottenheimer said in an interview with a staff writer on the San Diego Union-Tribune.
“(But) every time he’s out he catches the ball, he makes plays, he runs down, he tackles people in the kicking game in coverage,” said the coach.
Camarillo, who will wear 82 as a Charger, said: “I’m excited, thirsty. I’m going to show them they made the right choice.”
After graduating in 2005 from Stanford University where he had made the varsity football team as a “walk-on,” Camarillo was invited to try out with the Chargers. He made the development squad of eight players, who aren’t officially on the roster, but practice and travel with the team.
Camarillo’s dream of trying to make the NFL came true on the final day of training camp this month.
“Greg has always over-achieved,” said his dad, with a mixture of pride and amazement. He gives a lot of credit to Martin Billings, Camarillo’s football coach at Menlo-Atherton, for launching and guiding his son in football and sportsmanship.
Camarillo’s many achievements include being the first M-A student to receive the San Mateo County School-Athlete of the Year award in 1999, given by the National Football Foundation and College Football Hall of Fame.
As a senior at M-A, he captained the varsity football team, and was most valuable player, student body president, and an Advanced Placement Scholar.
He turned down Harvard and chose Stanford, where he showed up for football practice as a “walk-on.” His perseverance, work-ethic and focus paid off on the field and in the classroom.
Camarillo red-shirted his first year in 2000 at Stanford and later was a wide receiver and played on the special teams. He earned Academic All-Pac 10 honors for three years, graduating with a major in engineering.
At Stanford, he received the Jim Reynolds Award, which recognizes courage on the field and devotion to the game.
There’s another Stanford link. Greg was discovered by the Chargers’ wide receivers coach James Lofton, a former Stanford All-American and NFL Hall of Famer. Lofton’s son, David, was one of Greg’s teammates with the Cardinal.
Education has always been important in the Camarillo family. Al Camarillo is a professor of history and the Miriam and Peter Haas Centennial Professor in Public Service at Stanford. His wife Susan works as a counselor at Crocker Middle School in Hillsborough. Their son Jeff teaches American history at a middle school in Compton, where Al Camarillo grew up. Daughter Lauren will be a freshmen at UCLA, where her parents met as students.
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