Damon Arnette graduates on Sunday and he has his dog to thank for it.
Sort of.
Following the season last year, Arnette was out the door.
He was gone.
He was about to become former Ohio State cornerback Damon Arnette. His college days were over and it was time to become a professional. He had made up his mind to leave a year early for the NFL
The decision was so done, in fact, that he had already moved on. He was in Dallas looking for apartments near a training facility while he prepared for the NFL Combine.
But then he had to come back to Columbus where his dog was waiting for him.
And so were others.
“I came back to Columbus, just to get the rest of my stuff and my dog,” Arnette said. “I met with (secondary) Coach (Jeff) Hafley and just really after one conversation with him, mid-conversation I told him, ‘You know what, I’m just gonna stay.’
“I came back to get my dog and a couple more clothes and I was going back to Dallas. But then after talking to him and just seeing the technique that he teaches, it’s what a lot of us do naturally, and I would have hated myself if I would have left and saw everybody else doing what we’re doing now and I was somewhere else, so I wanted to be a part of this with everybody.”
It was a mature decision from a guy who wasn’t exactly known for such things, but it wouldn’t be his last.
Arnette credits his maturity to simply deciding to calm down a bit.
More Netflix. Less leaving the house at night.
His growth was noticed by his teammates and his coaches, both on the field and off.
“Really and truly, I feel like a lot of it with me has been off-field things that reflect on the field,” he said. “So once I cleaned up everything, everything else started to shine a little bit more. And other things are being noticed once I got certain things right in my life.
“A lot of dudes, they just mature faster than others and I feel like, especially with me, I’ve always just been an ‘on edge’ type of person. And then once I realized that playing with fire, you will get burned a lot of different ways, it just ain’t worth it. So I feel like a part of learning from that stuff is going through certain things and just learning from those mistakes.”
Some of those mistakes were seen on the field last year.
A pass interference here. A missed tackle there.
Nobody is perfect.
Arnette was a popular recipient of criticism from fans last year. He saw it. He heard it. His maturity kept him from taking it too personally.
Plus, he didn’t always disagree.
“You’re going to hear certain things,” Arnette said, “But a lot of stuff, when I’m thinking the same thing, it’s like, alright. You know what I’m saying? I’m thinking the same thing. They’re just saying it. Like ‘Why aren’t the corners looking back for the ball?’ In my head I’m thinking ‘Why the hell aren’t we looking back for the ball?‘ So it’s things like that.”
That doesn’t mean he always agreed, however.
“Shoot, I got a (direct message) one time that said I need to go back to high school and pick a different sport,” he said. “I was like, ‘Damn.'”
Criticism from strangers is one thing, but criticism from people who know you and love you is another. Especially when that person is both an Ohio State Hall of Famer and an NFL Hall of Famer.
Former Buckeye wide receiver great Cris Carter has known Arnette and his family forever. Arnette played football at St. Thomas Aquinas in Fort Lauderdale, which is where Carter spent several years as a program assistant.
Carter tried to talk to Arnette early on, but he wasn’t ready for what he knew he was going to hear.
“I talked to him at the Rose Bowl,” Arnette said. “He has known me since I was a baby, so our relationship is different. And he saw me at the Rose Bowl and I guess my dad told him that I was leaving. He just looked at me and was just like, ‘So, you’re not even going to ask me my opinion?’ And I just looked at him, because I knew what he was gonna say and I just wasn’t to try to hear from anybody. So I just looked at him, smiled, and walked away.
“And then when I was getting on the plane going back to Columbus from Dallas, he called me and just went off. He was like, ‘Man, you aren’t an All-American. You’re not this, that, and the third. You know, everything he was saying cut deep, but it was true. So when something cuts deep, but it’s true, you’ve got to evaluate what they are saying. Because he wasn’t the only person to say something and when somebody isn’t the only person saying something, there’s gotta be some truth there.”
None of it was easy to hear, but it helped him realize he wasn’t ready to leave.
He still had more to accomplish.
More to live up to.
Dallas could wait.
But the dog couldn’t.
“Having the thoughts of leaving, the question was, ‘Was I the best player I know I can be? Did I leave everything out there. And do I regret anything?’ And I couldn’t check all of those boxes,” Arnette said.
“So, then I was like, ‘All right, can you live with that?’ And I realized, ‘No, I can’t.’ I feel like I’m not doing Buckeye Nation or my teammates a service if I’d have left on that note last year.”
He came back for a number of reasons, but a singular purpose — he didn’t want to have any regrets.
Today, Damon Arnette becomes a graduate of The Ohio State University.
And he can live with that just fine.