Artis Hicks started every game for four years playing offensive line at the University of Memphis. He followed that up with an 11-year career in the National Football League.
A graduate of Jackson-Central Merry High School, Hicks has been exposed to teaching at the highest levels for playing up front and blocking for the run and the pass.
“I’ve been back home for a few years, and I’ve seen some teams that did well here in West Tennessee and then they get pushed around in the playoffs when they start to shift to Middle Tennessee and East Tennessee,” Hicks said. “The schools in other parts of the state have more coaches and do a good job of teaching footwork and blocking techniques.”
MORE: Artis Hicks remembers playing in the Super Bowl
Hicks decided to do something about it and make his own knowledge of the position available to those that are willing to work for it with his Will Breakers Camp, which is set up for a week of instruction in the fundamentals of playing the line.
“A lot of people – too many people really – think it’s just a matter of being big and getting in front of the guy around you,” Hicks said. “But there’s two things – technique and mindset.
“A lot of people don’t know as much as they think they do about technique, because it’s about footwork and positioning and getting your hands in the right place and angles and a lot of different subtle things that not a lot of people think about. And then the other thing you need is that mindset of ‘I won’t be beaten on this play. I’m gonna dominate this guy in front of me because I can and break his will.’”
Hicks said he doesn’t want to get into coaching right now because he’s got daughters at home he doesn’t want to spend a lot of time away from, but he has worked with one memorable lineman from recent history in West Tennessee high school football.
“Trey Smith is really the only guy I’ve worked with long term, and I worked with him for three years,” Hicks said. “He was already a big kid when I started working with him, and he had quick feet and good hips.
“But then he started working on that technique and really started tapping into his own motivation. He was a great athlete that always went hard, but then when he learned to have that dominant mentality you really need to be a great lineman, that’s when a lot of people started noticing him.”
MORE: Trey Smith named top prospect in the country
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Smith played offensive line at University School of Jackson and was rated by ESPN as the top high school prospect in the country before he signed with Tennessee in December of 2016. His high school coaches, former USJ coaches Mickey Marley and Rusty Bradley, both credited Hicks with extra instruction for improving his footwork.
Hicks would like to have a similar impact on today’s high school players because of the opportunities available to them to further their education.
“I was in a grocery store one day and a big kid was bagging my groceries, and I asked him where he played, and he told me,” Hicks said. “I asked him where he was playing college, and he said nowhere, and that’s not right.
“We’ve got quarterbacks and running backs and defensive players getting college scholarships every year, but our linemen are missing out. And every offense will have five linemen lining up on every play, so that means every school has at least 15 scholarships out there available that our guys aren’t taking advantage of.”
Hicks said he approached every high school coach within a 35-mile radius of Atlas Fitness, where he holds the camp, to let all of the head coaches know about it.
“Everyone I made contact with were all on board with it and thought it would be good for their guys,” Hicks said.
Three players made it for the first week in early June. Six made it this week, which is the first week of the TSSAA’s dead period where athletes and coaches are allowed no contact for two weeks. There is one more week at the end of July available for anyone interested.
“These guys here are putting in work while most everybody else around here is probably sitting at home getting soft, and they’ll come back to work in a couple weeks and show they’ve done nothing,” Hicks said. “But these guys here with me will have a leg up on them.”
Charles Sims is a rising junior lineman at Jackson Christian that’s been at both weeks of the camp so far.
“We’ve been working hard, and I’ve learned about how to stand and how to move my feet once the ball is snapped,” Sims said. “There’s a difference between pass blocking and run blocking, and Artis has shown me how to do my best in both.”
MORE: Hicks says there's a link between academic, athletic success at JCM
Hicks said he’s had friends that helped him sponsor athletes to make it to the camp if needed.
“Ronald Benton at Mt. Moriah Missionary Baptist, Bill Hamilton, Ladawna Cole, Dr. Tommy Miller and Jeremy Crocker all stepped up if anybody needed it,” Hicks said. “They see the need for it too.”
For information about the final week of the camp, contact Atlas Fitness at 731-616-8909.
Reach Brandon Shields at bjshields@jacksonsun.com or at 731-425-9751. Follow him on Twitter @JSEditorBrandon or on Instagram at editorbrandon.
https://www.jacksonsun.com/story/news/2019/06/28/nfl-veteran-helps-local-offensive-linemen-get-better-artis-hicks/1587264001/
2019-06-28 11:42:00Z
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