Sunday, April 7, 2013


Please keep this young man injured in the NCAA tournament basketball tournamet in your thoughts and prayers. I "touched" up the image a bit because it was just gruesome to see as it was captured, but even this "touched-up" version would revealed a painful ordeal has occurred and a long recovery journey is ahead.  Please keep this young man in your thoughts and prayers.


I have never had an extremity breakage when I was still playing sports but this rehashed my memory of my ACL tear on my knee when I was in college. I know my blog is usually about football and the STEELERS but I must digress here a bit into my own experience.

I was told when my knee popped in college it sounded like "tree limb" had been snapped and everyone in the gym stopped their game. I only remember seeing red spots before I blacked out from the pain and was carried off.  Thank God my brother was there with me that day.

Truly, we all have to keep "pressing on-wards" when life throws us one of these unexpected challenges.  I was very glad to see the young man on crutches on the news today.  I truly hope this your man heals completely but "never" tries to compete at this level again and can redirect his dreams towards other avenues.

I did not redirect my dreams and immediately went into despair and depression.  See I had made up my mind again that I was going walk on to the college football team again and see what I could make of it by actually spending all the time expected to lift and watch films as the coaches requested. Playing college football at a major university is a job and the players should be compensated for their sacrifice in the classroom because a winning team can bring in "huge" revenues for the prospective university

Anyway, my ACL tear wiped out my dream in an instant.  Decades later, I think of not getting that second chance and not knowing the possible outcome of playing again will just be one of those regrets that will always haunt me at times.

If you ever have a chance at a dream(...as long as it's a legitimate and legal one, I might add!), ALWAYS GO FOR IT!!!  Pursue it in spite of what others tell you even if your own family is against it.  The one thing I failed to understand about achieving dream, is that the path to is NEVER straight and NEVER smooth.  That is why achieving your dream always requires you have the "courage" to take a chance.  "Courage" is NOT overcoming the fear but moving forward in spite of the fear you may be experiencing.

Taking chances will NOT always supported in your inner circle which is why so many dream achievers often have no encouragement from family and friends.  However, GOD will always put a "remnant of hope" in all our lives. We just have to hold onto that hope and believe.  Another thing about dreams is you "MUST" put in the work necessary to achieve the goal.

Last but not least, if you still fail at least you have removed the agony of never trying and thus never really knowing if you could have achieved your goal/dream.  "REGRETS" are a terrible thing to have to live with.