Adaptive league to help athletes in wheelchairs discover their true abilities this weekend in Rosemont
The scores may indicate one thing at the Move United USA Wheelchair Football League Chicagoland Tournament this Saturday and Sunday in Rosemont, but the players themselves already have decided their own outcomes.
“This tournament is to raise awareness for wheelchair football but it’s also to raise awareness for what people with disabilities are capable of,” said Jason Sfire of North Barrington, who coaches the Great Lakes Adaptive Sports Association Chicago Bears team and also is GLASA board president.
“I think too many times once you’re hit with a disability you believe that your life is kind of done, especially that your athletic career is over,” Sfire said. “I don’t think that’s true. I think we can achieve just as much with the ability that we have left than by measuring what our disability is.”
Sfire is proof. A four-year, three-sport athlete at Lake Zurich High School, Class of 1991, he fell 30 feet from a roof onto concrete while on a construction job.
Fifty-four surgeries later, and a bout with a MRSA infection in his spine, Sfire was left partially paralyzed.
Sfire responded by becoming a competitive wheelchair pickleball player and a seated golfer ranked among the best in his classification, he explained Friday while heading with his wife, Janette, for a 12:30 p.m. tee time.
With Daniel Venus, Sfire coaches the 16-man GLASA Chicago Bears squad that will host seven other teams in games scheduled from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday at the Wintrust Financial campus, 9701 W. Higgins Road. Attendance and parking are free.
Representing the Arizona Cardinals, Green Bay Packers, New England Patriots, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and other National Football League franchises in one of four national tournaments to qualify the USAWFL’s 16 teams into their own Super Bowl, these programs travel well, Sfire said.
“I will bet you that we have a couple thousand people throughout the weekend,” he said.
The GLASA team attracts players from throughout metropolitan Chicago, including captains Josh Fabian of Vernon Hills, Dave Michael of Grayslake, Mak Nong of Lisle and Jeff Yackley of Lemont.
They’ll head a free wheelchair football clinic from 1:30 to 2:45 p.m. Saturday, ideally for children with disabilities, Sfire said, “to promote recognition and raise awareness.”
The games themselves, played under normal football rules regulated by four officials, are 7-on-7 contests with three linemen, a quarterback and three receivers on offense.
There is live contact throughout, with plays stopped when a defender touches a ball carrier above the waist.
“There’s more contact on a tag than you would assume,” Sfire said. “A lot of times there’s chairs crashing into each other as the tag is happening.”
Overall, the GLASA Bears went 15-3 last season.
“This year we probably have our best team ever,” said Sfire, in his fourth year as coach. “I think we have a shot to win it this year.”
Optimistic on Chicago football? These guys already have won.
“What we’re all trying to do is help people with disabilities understand not how disabled they are, but what their true ability is,” Sfire said. “And if they put their minds to do it, and they work hard, they can go ahead and be an incredible adaptive athlete and accomplish great things in the sports world, and in life.”