The Fair Response

As a football fan, Steve McNair was one of those guys you wanted to win a Superbowl. He was a great leader on the field, and from what I have heard a great leader in the locker room. As a quarterback these are some of the most important things you need to be a hall of framer. Yet, the one thing that would have carried him over, was lost by inches. Each year that Steve played everyone respect the team he played with as a threat to win the Superbowl, just because he was under center. No matter what team he was facing Steve never had to worry about being taken lightly, he was certified a winner. That is why his tragic passing is hard for football fans to stomach.

Just like when Michael Vick went to jail for two years for dog fighting, and now you have Stallworth not going to serve one day for killing a human being. If you are a true fan of the sport and you have cheered for the guys that have the talent, it is a hard pill to swallow when they fall from grace. Yet, Steve did not fall, Steve is not going away to rehab, he is not going to jail as so many black athletes do. Steve McNair has been lost to us, a portrait unfinished, statue still left trapped by the stone.

When Reggie White passed we were left understanding his greater calling. Because Reggie, had much more to live for, Reggie had a calling that reached so far beyound him that it took him. When we lost Sweetness, we did not lose nothing more than the shell of a man, because once he passed, he became apart of each and everyone of us. These men stood for something, on and off the field. These men where held by a level of class that has not been seen since. Well, we all thought in some form or fashion that Steve McNair was one of those men. Men, who we could live our lives by on and off the field. Yes, every man is flawed, everyman loses his way. Yet, like the great Temptation always going back to the mic, we as men must always find our way back to the greater calling in our lives

Steve McNair’s life will be lost to us, because when his name is spoken, there will be something missing. We will always desire to hear more from him. It will feel something like De Vinci not finishing the Monah Lisa, or Bill Gates never developing windows. Steve McNair’s days of playing ball were over, but his life and a model of a man had just begun. We lost him at a time where men being men is needed. We lost him at a time where the legacy of your life is being written. We lost Steve McNair at a time where we needed him most, not in the game of Football, but in the game of life. He was only 36 years old. On the scale of life, he was still just a boy, not yet reaching his twilight.

We may never know what really happened to him in the last moments of his life, but what we do know is that his life was cut short. In the past few weeks, we have lost many that had reached us in some form or fashion, men and women that had left a mark on the world. Yet, these losses pose a question to us, what will our legacy be, what mark will we leave on the earth when our time is up. Will we leave with grace as sweetness did or will we leave covered in mystery