Speaker 1: Welcome to the Command Center Podcast. I'm Julie Donaldson. Sunday
Speaker 1: Market The Next stopped an incredible journey for running back
Speaker 1: Brian Robinson Junior. The rookie made his regular season debut
Speaker 1: just six weeks after recovering from multiple gunshot wound. Robinson
Speaker 1: sat down with me to talk about what the comeback
Speaker 1: means to him, being the last one out of the tunnel,
Speaker 1: having your name called. What were the emotions and that moment,
Speaker 1: like for you, it was very emotional. I just didn't
Speaker 1: want to find myself crying about it at the time.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm just I'm a tough guy, man, you know,
Speaker 1: and I just try to show people how tough I
Speaker 1: am all the time. You know, Sometimes you can, I know,
Speaker 1: I can let up off of it and just ease up.
Speaker 1: But it's been a long six weeks, man. I don't
Speaker 1: think it's really hard to kind of talk about sometimes
Speaker 1: because like like ever since just the videos and stuff
Speaker 1: been dropped, like dropped since yesterday, you know, social media's
Speaker 1: just kind of been going crazy about it. Then you know,
Speaker 1: just see it over and over again, and it's just
Speaker 1: you just see how much love and respect, you know,
Speaker 1: people got for me out here and you know, people
Speaker 1: that feel the situation that I've been through. Man, you know,
Speaker 1: just for it to be me, just like God, this
Speaker 1: couldn't like, this couldn't happened to anybody. And it's like, man,
Speaker 1: if anybody the worst person it's possibly could have happened to,
Speaker 1: it could have been me, like just because of just
Speaker 1: everything I've been through in my life to get here,
Speaker 1: And like I didn't really want to get into depth,
Speaker 1: like in detail about just like how my life was
Speaker 1: growing up. But you know, just stand away from gun
Speaker 1: violas and stuff like that that goes on very often
Speaker 1: at home. Back at home, man, you know, what happened
Speaker 1: to me just so random, you know. So to be
Speaker 1: able to recover from what I recover from and be
Speaker 1: able to come back and play NFL football game, I
Speaker 1: never heard nobody in the world ever did nothing like
Speaker 1: that before. So just from recovering from what I went through,
Speaker 1: just made history, you know. So I imagine you probably
Speaker 1: asked yourself the question like why me just listening to
Speaker 1: you right there? Um and the different emotions that do
Speaker 1: come with that. How have you processed m going through
Speaker 1: all those emotions and answering why me? And being, as
Speaker 1: you say, mentally tough. I know, there have to be
Speaker 1: moments that you're probably just not and you have to
Speaker 1: acknowledge and recognize that in order to be mentally tough. Um,
Speaker 1: how have you gone about processing that? I just had
Speaker 1: to accept it, you know, I had to accept what happened,
Speaker 1: you know, even though I didn't want to. I didn't
Speaker 1: want to accept the fact that, you know, I was
Speaker 1: physically harmed by some strangers. But it's the fact that
Speaker 1: you know I could, I could make the strongest recovery
Speaker 1: ever and one of the biggest comebacks in sports history possibly,
Speaker 1: and you know, just another obstacle for me, you know,
Speaker 1: in my life. Man, I just like I told you,
Speaker 1: I've been faced with so much in my life, and
Speaker 1: every time I'll just had my back against the wall,
Speaker 1: I'll just fought my way up out of it. And
Speaker 1: like I said, like just a by far the worst
Speaker 1: worst situation I've ever been in, but another opportunity to
Speaker 1: kind of proved to myself. You know, you know how
Speaker 1: strong I am, you know, mentally and physically. So the
Speaker 1: biggest thing, you know, just as far as processing right now,
Speaker 1: I was just accepting the fact that, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: I was physically harmed by strangers. You know that I
Speaker 1: still I still haven't identified yet, and the fact that
Speaker 1: I got to just live with that the rest of
Speaker 1: my life. You know, we saw your mom at the
Speaker 1: game and the way that just like the teammates greeted
Speaker 1: you on the field, understanding the journey that you've had
Speaker 1: to kind of get back here and to get into
Speaker 1: the game. How important has that support been because nobody
Speaker 1: gets through anything or any challenges alone in life, and
Speaker 1: the support meant everything, you know. You know, as soon
Speaker 1: as I started to feel the love and from from everybody,
Speaker 1: I started to you know, believe that you know, I
Speaker 1: would be okay, you know, because at the time, you
Speaker 1: just like, you know, you mentally just everywhere you don't
Speaker 1: really know where to be mentally, but like, you know,
Speaker 1: support the support from the people that you know you
Speaker 1: care about the most and that you don't care about
Speaker 1: you the most, and you know it kind of make
Speaker 1: you feel like, you know, you're good, You're gonna be
Speaker 1: all right, you know, just kind of keep you grounded
Speaker 1: and you know, keep you mentally in the places that
Speaker 1: you need to be to take the next steps in
Speaker 1: that that helped me you know just kind of already
Speaker 1: you know, have a plan on how I wanted to
Speaker 1: recover from that and what I needed to do to
Speaker 1: come back, and just constantly like you know, keeping that energy,
Speaker 1: like bringing that that good positive energy that I needed consistently,
Speaker 1: like you know, day in the day out. You know
Speaker 1: those days where you know, I was coming out to
Speaker 1: the facility for you know, probably an hour or two
Speaker 1: hours out of the day, I would go home and
Speaker 1: I would have to like stay in the same place
Speaker 1: on the couch for like the rest of the day
Speaker 1: because I couldn't move. So you know, having my mom,
Speaker 1: my family back at home, you know, uh support me
Speaker 1: and you know take care of me for that time,
Speaker 1: and uh, they don't realize how much I appreciate that,
Speaker 1: because you know that's what that was the helping hand
Speaker 1: that I needed to you know, just want to push
Speaker 1: myself forward. Like and I'm a very independent person, so
Speaker 1: I like to do everything for myself, so you know,
Speaker 1: happening having a helping hand, it was like it was
Speaker 1: new kind of new to me, you know, having somebody
Speaker 1: to like have to really take care of me, like
Speaker 1: every single day, like for the whole day. Just my
Speaker 1: mom was taking me again like I was four or
Speaker 1: five years old, So you know, I mean that meant
Speaker 1: everything to me. Like that's all I really needed was
Speaker 1: some support, you know. You know, I had an ambition
Speaker 1: to fight back from it, you know, but the love
Speaker 1: support just kind of kept me motivated. How's the body
Speaker 1: feel now now that you've gone through that first game,
Speaker 1: You've taken some hits and everybody's closely watching how you walk,
Speaker 1: how you run, how's it feeling? Well? I feel like
Speaker 1: I just played a football game, you know. So you know,
Speaker 1: I took a few hits, but I walked away from
Speaker 1: a fine. I'm okay. I actually got hit right in
Speaker 1: the spot of you know, one of my injuries, but
Speaker 1: it didn't it didn't bother me too bad. You know.
Speaker 1: I shook it off. And does that become a mental
Speaker 1: thing as well when you get hit there. It was
Speaker 1: positive for me because I got hit there so hard
Speaker 1: that like that was the test that I need. I
Speaker 1: was like, okay, I'm glad that's over. Hopefully it don't
Speaker 1: happen again like so soon. But that was just the
Speaker 1: test I needed. When I got hit it and I
Speaker 1: got up and I felt that I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: it stung a little bit, but I'll be all right.
Speaker 1: You know. So the fact that I know, walk off
Speaker 1: the field healthy and you know, come back, return here
Speaker 1: and get ready to do it all over again healthy.
Speaker 1: Do you see the game any differently now I can say,
Speaker 1: I mean, just just my presence out there, like you know,
Speaker 1: I almost lost that opportunity, so you know, everything is
Speaker 1: just like light like bright light up in my eyes now,
Speaker 1: you know. No, I've been playing the game for so long.
Speaker 1: I've been playing for like almost eighteen years, like in
Speaker 1: my life, so it's just always been football to me.
Speaker 1: But now it's just like it's really my life. And
Speaker 1: I realized how much that I put into this gaming,
Speaker 1: into like bonding through this game, and it's just meant
Speaker 1: so much to me. You know, just be back out there.
Speaker 1: So it's next for you? What's next? Um? I just
Speaker 1: want to you know, keep you know, making progress, making
Speaker 1: stribs in the right direction. Uh, coming here every day,
Speaker 1: finding new ways to get better, get my body feeling better, um,
Speaker 1: get more involved into the game plan weekend, week out,
Speaker 1: and you know, you know, just should help my team win.
Speaker 1: Real great to have you back, and of the teammates
Speaker 1: love having you back. We're expecting some great things now
Speaker 1: that you're out there. So great glad to have you
Speaker 1: here with us. Thank you, thank you for all your
Speaker 1: news and analysis. Be sure to tune into Command Center
Speaker 1: weeknights at five thirty and ten pm on NBC Sports Washington.
Speaker 1: You can also stream on YouTube and commanders dot com.
Speaker 1: Heil to the commander,