“Futbol,” a.k.a., soccer, is not the only football being played in Germany any

Six-foot-2, 205 pound Cardinal Stritch junior offensive lineman (63) Florian Fuchs is not out of place among his teammates at practice, even though Fuchs is a foreign exchange student from Germany. (Press photo by Ken Grosjean)

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Cardinal Stritch’s 6-1, 205 pound two-way lineman Florian Fuchs, a foreign exchange student from Germany, would rather play football than soccer.

“I like hitting people,” Fuchs said with a slight hint of a German accent. “I don’t like soccer.”

“That was one reason why I wanted to come to America, because football here is so big. It’s much bigger than in Germany,” Fuchs continued.

Fuchs is planning to try out for the Stritch wrestling and baseball teams, also. This fall, Fuchs has been getting plenty of playing time as an offensive and defensive lineman for Stritch gridiron coach Joe Gutilla.

Gutilla’s only regret is that he can’t keep Fuchs around another year. Because he’s an exchange student, Fuchs is expecting to return to his family in Germany after the school year ends.

“He helps us out on special teams as a blocker and on kick-off teams and that kind of stuff, but not in any skilled position,” Fuchs said. “He’s a lineman and he enjoys playing there.

“I wish we could have him back because he’s only a junior and he’s really made improvements,” Coach Gutilla added. “I would think if he was here for another year, even in the offseason in the weight room, then we get him back to football next year he’d be a pretty good player.”

Fuchs played American-style football one season in Germany, but still had plenty to learn when he joined the Stritch team near the end of two-a-days. A friend talked him into playing the game in Germany.

“First, it was a joke because my friend played flag football and he said, ‘You should come to the practice today,’ and I said, ‘Oh, okay, I’ll come.’ It was fun and then I started to play,” Fuchs said.

His German club team played an eight-game schedule, but that often included home-and-away games with limited opponents. In addition, he says in Germany about 20 fans showed up per game compared to hundreds, often thousands in Northwest Ohio for a prep football game.

“I like it very much. It’s pretty cool,” Fuchs said. “It’s much more than in Germany, because in Germany you go out there and know that only your parents are watching you. That’s okay. Here, you go out there and you know even your friends are watching you, teachers are watching, everybody is watching you, so it’s amazing.”

Since conditioning began, he’s lost 30 pounds, dropping from 235 pounds because of the conditioning.

“He’s decent size but he’s in good shape (now). When he came in he was a little out of shape,” Gutilla said.

“It’s not as hard (in Germany) as here,” Fuchs explained. “Here, there is every day practice and workouts, and in Germany we had only two days a week of practice and only one-and-a-half hours; and we didn’t work out in Germany.”

Gutilla says Fuchs did not present a language barrier because he had a “handle on the English language.” But Fuchs did come with a football-language barrier, despite having playing experience.

“We had to really start from scratch with him,” Gutilla said. “The advantage he had is he did have some experience so he understood the game. But like he said, the way they play the game in Germany and the way we play it here, even at the high school level, is a lot different. It’s like night and day.

“He wasn’t sure about some things,” Gutilla added. “We had to get him the playbook and I had to take some time with him to go over some of the things in the offensive line. How we block. He picks things up pretty quick.

“The thing about Florian is he is really a quick learner. Very smart kid and he picked things up within a couple of weeks. He’s getting a lot of playing time. In some games he starts and in some games he comes in and out. It just depends on who we play and what we’re looking for.

“He has a great motor. He doesn’t quit. He keeps after it. He studies the game,” added the Stritch coach.

Because of his American experience, when Fuchs returns to Germany he hopes to teach what he has learned.

“I think I will teach them a lot of things because I learned a lot of things here that are much different than in Germany,” Fuchs said. For example, the blocking — how we block here is much different. In Germany we blocked how you blocked here 30 years ago.”

Of course, more than anything, Fuchs said he will miss his Stritch teammates when he leaves the school.

“I like them. It’s like I came here the first day and everybody liked me and it was like you’ve came right to friends. So, after two days, three days, they were already like family for me. It’s amazing,” Fuchs said.

Coach Gutilla is hoping to send Fuchs home with a video of one of his games so his German family can watch.

“I don’t know if he has been able to send anything back. I think that’s one of the things that we’re looking at doing for him when we’re at the end of the year. He’ll have a nice parting gift from us when he does go home,” Gutilla promises.

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