Michael Thomas repeats his mantra like it's a verbal tic.
"I feel like I've been having to earn it my whole life," he says. "That's just how my story's been. I found a way."
That time in high school when he was just a raw, late-blooming junior who couldn't crack the lineup? He found a way, in the spring that followed, to have the best offseason his high school coach says he has ever seen. That time when his monster offseason gave way to a monster senior year at Taft High -- never once dipping below 100 yards receiving in a game -- but still didn't yield the big-time college offers he craved?