D’Wayne Bates spends up to 24 hours a week chasing his dream.

He devotes three to four hours a day, five to six days a week on weightlifting, interval training and speed training, all in his quest to get back to the NFL.

Three years ago, wide receiver D’Wayne Bates played on the same field as Daunte Culpepper and Randy Moss as a starting wide receiver for the Minnesota Vikings.

Bates, the 71st selection in the 1999 NFL Draft, is now finding calls from NFL teams few and far between.

After an injury-riddled 2003 campaign, the Vikings cut Bates. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers signed him during the offseason, but cut him a month later.

“I’m considered what they call a veteran,” he said. “It’s a good thing, but at the same time the game moves on.”

Now Bates is almost ready to give up on this dream. If the NFL doesn’t come calling soon, he will move on from the world of clipboards to the world of chalkboards and pursue another of his passions — helping others.

Bates said he hopes to get his master’s degree in education from Northwestern when his playing days are over, envisioning a future as a social sciences teacher and football coach at a high school.

“I want to be in the classroom,” he said. “You see somebody grow, change, develop, you become an important figure in a kid’s life. Coaching is very instrumental in the development of a child.”

In the meantime, Bates is honing his skills by making public speaking appearances at Evanston schools.

“I try to make it a life-type speech,” he said. “I try to keep it real when I do go speak.”

And Bates’ penchant for teaching transfers to the football field as well. He keeps contact with the current NU football team and gives suggestions to the receiving corps, while making sure to be careful not to step on any of the coaches’ toes.

Graduating receiver Ashton Aikens said Bates’ instruction was indispensable during workouts with teams like the Chicago Bears, Bates’ first team.

“I knew once they said what route to run exactly how to run it,” Aikens said. “He didn’t have to do that with me. I wasn’t paying him anything.”

Former NU wide receivers coach Gregg Brandon, now the head coach at Bowling Green, said the qualities that made Bates a great player would translate to his coaching.

“I think he’d be outstanding,” he said. “He’s a lunch-bucket guy.”

Bates came to Northwestern as a highly-touted quarterback from Jackson, S.C.

But it took a switch to wide receiver for him to truly find his niche with the Wildcats.

Former head coach Gary Barnett said Bates was not the ordinary prospect.

“He had no reason to come to Northwestern, but he came and fell in love with it,” Barnett said. “I took him to Hecky’s.”

In his first collegiate game and his first game at wide receiver, Bates caught a post route for a touchdown and converted a third down late in the game that helped seal a 17-15 win over Notre Dame for the Cats.

“You could tell he was going to be the big-play guy,” Barnett said.

Bates lived up to this expectation the rest of the season, leading Rose Bowl-bound NU with 49 catches and 889 yards, both records for Big Ten freshmen at the time.

He also stepped up in the Rose Bowl, catching seven balls for 145 yards in the 42-31 loss.

By the time he left NU, he was second on the all-time Big Ten list for receiving yards and second in receptions, cementing him as one of the best receivers in Big Ten history, along with a reputation as a hard worker.

“He came early and stayed late,” Brandon said. “If there was a flaw in his game, he worked on it.”

Bates also left NU with nagging leg problems, stemming from a broken ankle and fibula suffered in a game against Oklahoma during his junior year.

The lingering effects landed him on the injured list many times during his career and gave him a reputation as “fragile.”

“I was probably at my most confident (before being injured),” Bates said. “Unfortunate things happen sometimes.”

During this current period of waiting, Bates is focusing on one of his other career aspirations: community building, a joint venture with his mother, Diane.

“My mom does a lot of community stuff,” he said. “I try to help when I can.”

But Diane Bates gives her son much more credit, saying he answers whenever his hometown calls.

D’Wayne Bates regularly helps with the summer program in the park where he played as a child and has aided in other ventures, like adopting a road near the park and raising money for Christie Parker, a 13-year-old in need of a heart transplant.

After the Chicago Bears drafted him, Bates supported his mother when she was forced to stay home and care for his sick grandmother.

“I call him a God-sent child,” Diane Bates said.

D’Wayne Bates has established contacts within the Evanston community and seems more than ready for a second career.

But he is not quite ready to give up on the NFL just yet.

Experience indicates that Bates will do everything in his power to ensure another shot.

“He was one of the guys who would go look for (his future) down the road,” Barnett said. “And he knew what he was going to do. He knew what he had to do to get there.”

Unfortunately, Bates said the decision is out of his hands.

“It’s mostly hearsay,” he said. “You get calls from a team that say your name is on their board. There’s nothing I can really do but stay in shape and wait.

“If the opportunity arises, I’ll be ready. There’s always hope for that opportunity.”

Reach David Morrison at [email protected].