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A proud Ike Charlton shows off a shot of his daughters (from left) Iniya, Tiah and Imari. 'That's why I play and why I plug along -- because they're here.' (KEN GIGLIOTTI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS )

Ike CHARLTON'S reason for leaving Virginia Tech with a year of eligibility remaining and in the face of great resentment from his college coaches and teammates tells you the kind of man the Winnipeg Blue Bombers standout linebacker is.

"My mother didn't really have a roof over her head. She was going through things with my father and realizing that they weren't going to be together," Charlton explains over breakfast at Perkins, where he knew both the menu and the staff. "I was able to change her life in an instant... I was rated the top defensive secondary player in the draft and I went high in the second round to the Seattle Seahawks. My signing bonus was just over a million dollars. It changed our lives."

Charlton spent four seasons in the NFL before injuries cost him his career in the U.S. Since then, he's spent five seasons with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers and is having another solid season, with 42 defensive tackles and three fumble recoveries after 12 games.

Charlton gave us an hour of his time and we got to know a different man than the guy in the shades and bling that he shows around the stadium:

On growing up

"I grew up in one of those neighbourhoods where it's tough to get out of if you don't have the right frame of mind. I had a good, strong family background. I grew up as an only child. My father was there and he wasn't there... We have a better relationship now. "

On snow and school

"My first year, I almost flunked out. I'd never seen snow, being from Orlando. Going to Virginia, in my dorm room we had a phone where you could push a button and it would give you the time and the temperature. I'd hear them say it was 15 degrees (Fahrenheit) and I'd just roll over and go back to sleep. There was no way I was walking to class in that. It was pretty rough on me that first year. I got in a lot of trouble, I'll admit that."

Latch-key Ike

"You don't have many five-year-olds walking home from school by themselves with their own key. I had to grow up fast. My mom was working two jobs to keep a roof over our head and I would have to stay at home by myself until she got home."

Fine-line friends

"When you leave the neighbourhood, it's a day-to-day task when you're dealing with that stuff. When you go back, you have some friends that will tell you, 'Don't do this, don't do that,' but you have others that think they can do whatever they want around you and say to themselves, 'It'll be cool. That's my man. We grew up together.' I'm lucky that I had friends that I would hang with them and when they went to do bad, they'd say, 'We'll talk to you later. You go home.' I played ball and they knew I wasn't really like that." We are family

"Ike is my football name. Everyone else calls me Isaiah. My girls call me Isaiah. My mom does now, too. The world knows me as Ike... But I'm the fourth Isaiah in my family. My dad is Isaiah, and his dad and his dad."

What comes first

"Family. It's not about me anymore since I had my little girls. It's about them. That's why I play and why I plug along -- because they're here."

Young love

"I love baseball. It's my first sport. I wore number 3 for Dale Murphy, baseball player with the Atlanta Braves. I wore 3 all my life up until I got to the NFL and I had to wear a number in the 20s because of my position. So I took 23. As long as I had the 3 in it. When I first came to Winnipeg, I was 23. Then I was a little frustrated and decided to try something different and took zero."

gary.lawless@freepress.mb.ca

On Vick: 'We made sure he was coming to Tech'

IKE CHARLTON and Michael Vick were teammates at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech). Here are Ike's thoughts on Vick as and athlete, his role in dogfighting and his future now that he's back in football: On meeting Vick: "I was his host at Tech when he came for his visit.

Me and my roommate made sure Michael Vick had a good time. We knew he was going to Syracuse to be hosted by Donovan McNabb, so we made sure he was coming to Tech, put it that way. We made sure he had a good time. We made some calls around campus and we showed him a good time."

On his abilities: "From his first day in practice, he threw a 20-yard out and it was on a zip. Everyone on the defence went 'huh.' We already had a good defence. We couldn't believe what we were seeing. We were like 'wow' and he hadn't even ran yet. He was special. He travelled with us as a freshman and it wasn't long before we were playing for a national champion­ship."

On dogfighting: "He did something that we grew up seeing and knowing. I've seen plenty of dogfights growing up in my neighbourhood. Do you condone them? No.

I never participated. But I've seen them. There are guys in the neighbourhood that have those dogs and they fight. I've never been to one that was bank­rolled. Mike had never been in real trouble with the law before. He's paid. He lost a lot of money and a lot of self pride. Everybody needs a second chance.

I just think people need to realize everyone makes mistakes, but if you want to try and change, people will see he can be a better man."

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition October 2, 2009 C4