Pigskin Profiles
I've seen two wonderful profiles recently about football heroes whose successes have been hard won. In "Hiding in Plain Sight," Gary Smith of Sports Illustrated unravels the mysterious life of Randy Shannon, the University of Miami's head football coach. Smith offers a mosaic of details to gradually build the suspense over Shannon's past:
His secretary would be certain that he was working in his office -- why, she'd just seen him in there -- but, poof , he'd be gone, having slipped past her like a cat. His players and colleagues noticed how swiftly he would shift the subject if his past or his family came up. His high school coach was sure Randy was an only child and was shocked to find out, not long before Randy turned 41 last February, that he had four siblings. His best friends had never been to his current apartment in the decade he'd lived there. In all those years of staff photos in the Hurricanes' media guide, of head coaches and assistants posed next to their beaming wives and children, there stood Randy, always alone. "A monk," former Miami defensive end Javon Nanton had once called him. "A Hurricane monk."
I also admire how Smith puts Shannon's life in the context of a sport that has seen more than its share of off-field troubles. sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/football/ncaa/09/04/shannon0910/index.html
In "Homeless No More," Ken Murray of The Baltimore Sun profiles Roderick Wolfe, who overcame homelessness during his teen years to become a top player at Morgan State. Murray does a nice job of contrasting Wolfe's current glory with his difficult high school years. baltimoresun.com/sports/bal-te.sp.wolfe14sep14,0,7182688,full.story