You may have known that NFL player Noel LaMontagne played all five positions along the offensive line, both tackles, both guards and center for the Cleveland Browns, but did you know that he is a graduate of Southern Lehigh’s class of 1995?

LaMontagne started playing football in eighth grade on the freshman team. Even though he did not play when he was younger, he eventually pursued college and professional football.

“My father and older brother both played in high school and college,” LaMontagne said. “I think it was almost in my blood to a degree.”

The Lehigh Valley helped propel LaMontagne to earn everything he got, from little things to his highly successful professional football career. Almost everything he did growing up, going to school and playing sports, revolved around responsibility and accountability.

“We were all expected to be good people, to work for what we wanted, and, ultimately, to earn what we received. Sadly, I see a lot more of people being handed things these days versus earning things, but I always loved that where I come from, that mentality was the exception and not the rule,” LaMontagne said.

Once his football career ended, LaMontagne had the opportunity to become a sports agent to start working with and representing professional football players. LaMontagne has been managing for almost 14 years and helps NFL players manage their careers on and off the field.

“It is an extremely competitive and demanding business,” LaMontagne said. “But the feeling that comes from helping good people realize their dreams is one of the best you can imagine.”

Throughout playing football he had his anterior cruciate ligament, also known as the ACL, replaced in 2000, and then he re-injured the ACL replacement along the way.

“I no longer play because I am an old man with the left knee of an even older man!” LaMontagne said.

LaMontagne recalls that from the time that he was little, he knew he wanted to play in the NFL. He thought it was such a simple goal, that anyone could do it, but it took him until eighth grade, when LaMontagne actually started playing, to realize that it would be a lot harder than he initially thought. He describes football as “a sport that makes you earn every opportunity that you get, while making the most of that earned opportunity at the exact time.”

“The challenges and the competition that you face as an individual and as a member of a team are not paralleled by any other sport. Some are close, but there is just nothing quite like the game of football,” LaMontagne said. “Sports are difficult, and the further along the path that you get to participate in them, they get more and more difficult.”

When he got to play for the Cleveland Browns in the NFL against the Baltimore Ravens, he finally got to live his childhood dream.

“I had a lot of great moments during my playing career, I got recognized for a few steps along the way, and I would not trade any of those experiences for anything,” LaMontagne said. “But, that moment of getting to reach the pinnacle of a sport that I worked very hard to be a part of for a very long time is something that stands out to me as special.”

Along his journey to become a professional football player, he has learned so much through spending his days training.

“The funny thing about football that I have learned over the years is that a lot of it is about perspective. When you are playing in high school you do not have the perspective to know how good you can be or how hard you are capable of working to get better,” LaMontagne said. “Playing in college opens up your perspective, almost overnight, and you suddenly realize that as good as you used to be, you can be so much better. The NFL takes that concept a step further, and the longer you play in the NFL, the more open your mind becomes to your expectations and, ultimately, your limitations.”