Asante Samuel's secret catches on

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It was the Nerf ball that eliminated those aggravating dropped interceptions, but New England Patriots cornerback Asante Samuel hasn't passed this remarkable training technique on to his teammates.

"It's my little secret," he confided in a phone interview earlier this week.

You mean it was your little secret, he was informed. Samuel, who starred at Lauderdale Lakes' Boyd Anderson High before moving on to UCF, laughed, then spilled the details.

"I've always been around the ball, and I've always had good ball skills," he said. "But in 2004, I dropped something like 12 interceptions. This offseason, I was sitting around the house and noticed a Nerf ball and thought, 'I'm going to try to catch that. That might help.' "
Charles Bricker: Miami Bureau