Bryan Bulaga Part III: Loyalty means everything

It was almost midnight on Oct. 28, 2006, when the doorbell rang. It kept ringing, about 10 to 12 times. Noonan, then a senior at Marian Central and Bulaga's friend since they were 5, woke up on the couch of his family’s home in Crystal Lake to open the door.

There stood Bulaga, fresh off a Marian playoff win over Montini.

“Hey, man, what are we doing?” Noonan recalled Bulaga asking.

After every game that season, Noonan and Bulaga had gone to the Woodstock McDonald’s to meet friends. That wasn’t going to change.

Bulaga never ate there – he was too strict about his diet, which mainly consisted of grilled chicken. He was there, like always, for his friends.

In the locker room, he wasn't always a vocal leader. He joked around plenty. But when gametime came around, he was dead serious.

Kusek was more of the talker, and teammates knew they better listen.

"They knew, if they messed too much with Devin, they were probably going to have to deal with Bryan," Spoden said. "He just wasn't somebody to be trifled with. It meant so much to him."

[ Photo gallery: Bryan Bulaga with his family, friends ]

On Saturday evenings after Iowa football games, Bulaga was always at the same spot, hanging out at his apartment with friends and watching the late college games, hosting a cookout and picking apart blocking technique.

Almost all of Bulaga’s Iowa teammates would make it a point to stop by, even for five minutes, to thank the anchor of their offensive line.

“It was kind of like they were paying respect to the Godfather,” Noonan said.

“It’s just the kind of person he is. He's the type of guy who does demand respect,” Bill Bulaga said. “… He brings out the best in other guys.”

It wasn’t always like that at Iowa, however. Bulaga moved to Iowa City immediately after graduating from Marian, and his new teammates, well, treated him like a freshman.

“I told him, ‘Your play will earn you respect, then they'll begin to accept you,’” Spoden said. “They had to give him a hard time. But he just played his way through it.”

By the end of his freshman season, working out with seniors at Iowa’s Pro Day, Bulaga caught the eye of more than just his teammates. One scout asked who he was and, according to a story told to Spoden, Ferentz responded, “He’s only a freshman, fellas. You’ll be back for him.”

They were, of course, just like Bulaga is for his friends like Noonan.

He's even got that sense of loyalty tattooed on his biceps in the form of the Polish words "sila" and "pycha," meaning strength and pride.

Both of those were built at Marian Central by the coaching staff he says helped raise him.

"When a coach sees [talent] and they really harness that and they take you in and make sure that you’re doing all the right things to progress and get better, not just as a player but as a man, too, that means everything," Bulaga said. "In high school, I was at school most of the time. I was at home for dinner, to do some homework and go to bed. But those guys had me for most of the day pretty much those entire four years."

So he invited them to the draft with him, and Brucker got to walk down a red carpet in New York City while Spoden "bumped into" Jerry Rice in the hotel lobby and watched Jim Brown walk past.

To a person, they count it as one of the best weekends of their life.

“It was like you were a celebrity,” Brucker said.

Then came the waiting and elation after the phone call from the Packers. Green Bay became home.

Bulaga didn’t go off and celebrate, however. He came home and visited his mom’s classroom.

The kids asked him how much he weighed, what he ate, stood next to him to see how much taller he was and then measured their hand size against his. On one visit, he even squeezed into an elementary school desk and sat there grinning ear to ear.

"Did you grow up a Bears or Packers fan?" they asked.

Neither, he loved Rice and the 49ers.

The same happened after the Super Bowl win, when he went to Spoden’s house for a party for Spoden’s son Carter and some of his Crystal Lake Raiders teammates.

When Bulaga arrived, the young players stood upstairs, blankly staring as they looked down at Bulaga in awe. Then Spoden asked why they weren't coming down to talk to him, and they wound up throwing the football around in the backyard.

One of those Raiders players, Crystal Lake Central sophomore Wyatt Blake, is now a left tackle in Bulaga's mold who was recently ranked one of the top 50 prospects in his class in the country by 247Sports.com. He's even visited Iowa.

“I really remember him being massive and thinking, one day I will be there,” Blake said.

To Bulaga, those things are simple. His friends, family and coaches here him so much. Now, he repays them when he can.

“I have a small circle that I keep very close,” Bulaga said. “Once the trust factor is there and there’s people that you care about like Dirk and coach Brucker or like coach Spoden or Noonan or Kusek.

"Those guys, that tight circle, you keep those guys close. They’re there for you, you’re there for them.”

[ Read Part IV: Bulaga, coaches break ties with Marian Central ]