Terry Crews Is Always On

The totally ripped star of Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Sandy Wexler starts everyday with a unique ritual:Swallowing a frog.

- Steven Stiefel

TERRY CREWS WAKES UP AT LEAST TWO HOURS before every early-morning call time to get in an intense workout. Many of these training sessions begin at a time most people consider the middle of the night. “The first thing I do when I get out of bed is swallow the frog, no matter what else I have scheduled later that day,” he says. 

What the hell is “swallow the frog,” right? It’s Crews’ pithy encapsulation for his entire life mantra: Perform the hardest thing first. Don’t think, just do. Undoubtedly, the spirit of the maxim would make Yoda proud.

It's a way of life Terry Alan Crews has known quite a while, and a trait—along with his unbridled charisma and wit—that helps drive his continued success. After earning All-Conference honors as a defensive end at Western Michigan, Crews enjoyed a successful but unspectacular NFL career, playing on defense and special teams for five different NFL squads (and one NFL Europe team) from 1991-97. Yet during his gridiron days he never managed to cash in or become a household name like J.J. Watt or Von Miller. “I got cut every year,” says Crews. “But I kept coming back. I didn’t know how to quit.” 

When his NFL career ended, Crews and his wife, Rebecca, moved to Los Angeles. Having worked in a super tough business for seven years, he wanted to transition to another super tough business: acting. Initially, he found himself depressed and inert. “I didn’t work out for more than a year,” Crews says about his arrival in Hollywood. Instead, he sat on the couch, watching TV, and gaining 30 pounds.