Beginnings

My interest in football began when I was about 6 or 7 years old. The packers vs broncos was the first super bowl I remember watching on tv. I’m not sure exactly how football was brought into my life as my mama didn’t really watch much football on tv on Sundays. My older brother probably introduced it to me and my other siblings since he played pee-wee football.

Anyway, my siblings and friends would play football in the street for hours for what seemed liked every day. I’m on the shorter end and was skinny, so I was pretty quick. Definitely quicker than fast. I loved Deion Sanders (Primetime). I would hold the ball like him whenever I got an interception and do his endzone celebration high steps. I guess that’s how I became interested in playing cornerback. I would always try to bait the quarterback into thinking my assigned receiver was open, then use my speed and quickness to come out of nowhere and intercept the pass. It was great.

I had the NFL blitz video game on nintendo 64. I then had NFL gameday on playstation one. I think gameday 97 or 98 was my first copy. I loved that game. Then when I entered middleschool, I got my first copy of madden. Later I also played the college football video game and import the draft class to madden. I loved playing franchise mode.

Personal Take

My first “that’s not fair” experience with football came when the 98 Vikings lost to the Falcons to miss the super bowl. I was hurt even though I was Cowboys fan and didn’t really care for the Vikings otherwise. I guess I just liked seeing good football and wanted to the best team to win. I didn’t realize then, but I received an early lesson in how life isn’t fair and the best team doesn’t always win.