Clock ticking on The Jay DeMerit Story Golf Tips

Clock ticking on The Jay DeMerit Story

July 12, 2011, 2:37 pm

Clock ticking on The Jay DeMerit Story

VANCOUVER From Friday’s Globe and Mail

Published Thursday, Jul. 14, 2011 6:50PM EDT

Last updated Thursday, Jul. 14, 2011 6:51PM EDT

Jay DeMerit’s ascent in professional soccer is one of the most unlikely in the history of the sport.

Coming out of the University of Illinois at Chicago, he couldn’t catch any real attention from Major League Soccer, so at 21 he packed up for England, where he hacked around at the lowest tiers of British soccer – and below. To stay fit, he played in Sunday pub leagues while teammates boozed before noon on the sidelines.

Scraping by, the Wisconsin native eventually scored a tryout for Watford FC, which then played in league below the English Premiership. DeMerit, who now stars for and captains the Vancouver Whitecaps of the MLS, impressed.

At Watford, several years after he secured his spot on the squad, DeMerit played hero. A defender, he hammered in the opening goal of a crucial 2006 playoff game that led his side to victory and earned the team promotion to the Premiership.

Last year, he was a starter for the United States team at the World Cup in South Africa.

DeMerit’s fable is chronicled in the new film Rise and Shine: The Jay DeMerit Story, which his old friend, Ranko Tutulugdzija, is fighting to finish. There’s a frantic final push for much-needed cash, using the online fundraising service for creative projects called Kickstarter.com.

Tutulugdzija needs money, mostly for licensing, especially to fund legal clearances for important pieces of the film, including $40,000 for two minutes of Premiership footage and another $40,000 for two minutes of U.S. national team footage.

The total ask is $215,000. As of Thursday afternoon, 1,621 donors had pledged $204,914. A deadline of 3:20 a.m. looms on Monday morning.

Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing deal. Reach a goal, get the cash. Fall short, watch it vanish.

“It’s always a bit strange when you get asked to do a movie about your life,” DeMerit says. “But this story is a lot bigger than me.”

Soccer, like many sports, demands adherence and dedication from an extremely young age if a talent is to climb to a professional career. DeMerit, instead, played basketball, football, soccer and also ran track growing up in Green Bay. It wasn’t until university that he turned his focus to soccer. An insistent determination made up the gap of experience as underlying talent carried him.

The moment of real doubt came when he returned back home after his first failed eight-month stint in England. He drummed up cash to return working as a bouncer and bartender.

“I expected to struggle, so it never really got me down,” says DeMerit, 31. “I was at home, I could have just stayed in the States, got on with life. Something inside me said, ‘It’s not over yet.’ ”

Tutulugdzija’s story is as unlikely as DeMerit’s. The two played college soccer together for the UIC Flames but lost touch.

In the interim, Tutulugdzija suffered through two brutal illnesses, the second – Rhabdomyolysis – tore his muscle tissue apart and threatened the amputation of his legs. From a Serbian immigrant family without medical insurance, Tutulugdzija gambled on traditional medicine in China, which underpinned a long but difficult convalescence.

Back at home in Los Angeles in 2007, Tutulugdzija connected with DeMerit, then on the U.S. national team. Inspired by DeMerit’s rise, Tutulugdzija set about making a film about his life. With a third friend, Nick Lewis, the trio ponied up about $20,000 each and got to work. A professional director was hired but he unexpectedly bailed, so Tutulugdzija and Lewis became unlikely filmmakers.

Illness stoked a resolute fervour in Tutulugdzija, an acupuncturist by trade in Tampa Bay.

“I learned what it was like to be helpless and how it feels to be a burden,” Tutulugdzija says. “I learned I am on borrowed time.”

Remembering his friendship with DeMerit at university, Tutulugdzija recalls him on the pitch. “Jay was something lion-like. He was heart and relentless.”

Now, the Monday deadline looms for the necessary cash to bring the DeMerit story to a wider audience. For Tutulugdzija, it is a story about a man, a belief, and a universal game.

“My own failure at making it in the soccer world helped me fully grasp how impossible Jay’s journey has really been,” he says.

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