Great clips from this Steelers fan
Posted: Thursday, January 29, 2009 9:16 PM
Mike Celizic |
Justin "Jey the Barber" Drewery (left), with his friend, Don Matthews. Jey says he's in town to provide daily tonsorial services to more than half a dozen Steelers.
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TAMPA -- You’re never quite sure what to believe when people start talking about celebrities they know. But I’m going to take Jey the Barber at his word – for the moment, at least -- when he says he’s down here from Pittsburgh at the request of his Pittsburgh Steelers clients and pals who can’t go a day during Super Bowl Week without getting their hair touched up.
Jey – that’s how he spells it – is the nom de trim of Justin Drewery, who turned up at the same hotel I’m in with his friend, Don Matthews. Jey was wearing a Steelers hat, and I was heading out to do a fan story, so I asked him if he was in town for the game.
He’s 28, bright and personable, and he was wearing a do-rag under his cap that covered braids that hung down to his collar in the back. He said his clients helped pay his way down here so he could be available to tend to their hair so they’d look nice for the TV cameras every day.
“Every day, they get their hair done,” he told me. That’s down here. Normally, he said, the players get trimmed once a week – on Saturday – so they’ll look good when they face the cameras on Sunday.
“You feel good. You look good. You play good,” he said. “That’s the Steelers’ motto.”
He said he works for his uncle, Dave Adams at Dave’s Barber Shop, which, Google assures me, actually does exist in Pittsburgh’s North Shore section. The team’s coach, Mike Tomlin, is a customer, Jey said, as are a number of players that include Limas Sweed, Dennis Dixon, Willie Parker, Gary Russell, Tony Hills and kicker Jeff Reed. Jey claimed credit for the blond dye-job and spiked do Reed displayed on Media Day.
Jey said he went to Pittsburgh Beauty Academy to follow in his uncle’s footsteps as a barber. About three years ago, one of the players with Pittsburgh connections stopped in, he said, and before long he was cutting other players’ hair, too.
“They pay the same as anyone else,” Jey said. “But they tip a little differently. I travel with them.”
Down here, it’s all touch-up work, he said – shaves, fades, applications of lotions and potions.
I caught up with him later when I came back from Ybor City. He and Matthews were waiting for a cab to take them to some swell restaurant where they said they were going to have dinner with some of the players.
Like I said, he seemed genuine, so I’ll believe him, especially as the team’s media availability is over and I can’t check him out. But after the game on Sunday, I’ll ask around, just to be sure. I’ll let you know what they say.
