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GREENSBORO - Get ready, Ricky Proehl. You played some big games at Wake Forest. And you played some bigger games in your 17-year career in the NFL.

But now, you've got the biggest game of your career.

It's with Proehlific Park. It opened three weeks ago. And it's some kind of sweet place, with six fields and a 60,000-square-foot gym spread across 20 beautiful acres, framed like a photo by Straw Hat, Horse Pen Creek and Jessup Grove roads.

Geared for kids ages 7 to 18, your park could really be a game-changer for Greensboro. It'll give kids a chance to play on teams, attend camps and even get tutored if they need some academic help.

And along they way, you can bet they'll find life lessons they'll need forever.

But will the people come?

Right now, from gas to groceries, families everywhere are feeling the squeeze. And your prices range from $60 to $100 per child per month, with a one-year commitment in most cases.

Plus, in your new neighborhood of northwest Greensboro, mostly white, always vocal, you haven't won everybody over.

Some see you and your park as a traffic nuisance or simply as an ego boost for a former pro athlete who wants to make more money.

You've heard it. You say it has hurt, like a "knife in the chest."

But there's that framed quote your wife Kelly gave to you. You've set it on your office desk, right in front of the chest-bumping photo of you and your son, Blake. You read it every day.

Faith Is Confidence

In God's Faith In Me

In An Uncertain World

On An Unchartered Course

And An Uncertain Future

You say it keeps up your confidence. You're sitting on a $10 million investment, covered by two bank loans and your own money. And with a 27-member staff this summer, you haven't even taken your first check.

You don't need the money. But still. You're there sometimes 16 hours a day, only to come home, to your 6,500-square-foot house a few miles away, and crash on the couch.

You've also brought in two rainmakers from your days at Wake: Mike Pratapas, your old academic adviser; and Jill Jones, a guard on the women's basketball team at Wake when you were there.

You coaxed Pratapas, a father of five, from the world of big-time athletics. You coaxed Jones, a mother of two, from the world of kids music.

Pratapas is your president; Jones, your vice president. They took significant pay cuts to come. Yet, they took the jobs because they believe in you. And they remember.

Jones talks about Nannie, her grandmother who had a screened-in porch along the Virginia shore. There, she, her cousin and everyone else had fun and built relationships.

Pratapas, the son of a Chicago cop, talks about the Valentine Chicago Boys Club. There, he could get 50-cent spaghetti plates and something he calls "bug juice'' before swimming or playing everything - even softball on the roof.

For them, Proehlific Park could become like that.

Now, according to Pratapas, you need 1,500 memberships - and you've got a long way to go.

Still, you've only been open three weeks, folks are trickling in and you've heeded the advice you've often used to calm down your wife: "Let's pump the brakes. Let's pump the brakes.''

Nearly half of your original 350 members have signed up for a year. And you've begun forming partnerships, hitting local schools, talking to groups to get folks through the door.

Then there's that thing about reaching kids. All you have to do is watch. You are a positive-thinking quote machine, and they hang on your every word.

So, there's no doubt your favorite music has begun.

On some days, you can sit on any bleacher at your park and hear the timeless sounds of kids at play: the crack of a bat, the slap of a pigskin, the encouraging bark of a coach.

But will people listen? Will the people come?