along with a few other sports Legends that have given back to their communities over their career
DRob and Mia Hamm
DRob and Doug Flutie
It still puts me in a good mood when I see David. He is one of the few athletes that will always be a positive influence on my life.
nice to see him get his recognition. and damn, he makes everyone seem like hobbits!
Awesome. His smile always seems so genuine. One of my favorite things about the guy.
Flutie is a hobbit.
But yeah, DRob looks good. I'd still take him at center today over anything we've had since he retired.
Doug Flutie and Mia Hamm are the same height!
Classy move by the US Tennis association
You have to love seeing D-Rob smiling like that
Why does Mia look all dreamy and why leaning on D-Rob?
That's pretty awesome! I wish i couldve seen that. And Oh Mia Hamm! I wouldve totally coped a feel!
The Admiral should be honored every week somewhere on this globe.
Federer, Bolt, Jordan Can’t Match This Legacy
Commentary by Scott Soshnick
Sept. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Brace yourselves, sports fans, for a torrent of barstool blather about athletes and legacies.
Tennis offers Roger Federer’s pursuit of a sixth consecutive U.S. Open championship. Greatest of all time? The basketball hall of fame next week welcomes a gang of five headlined by Michael Jordan, who ushered in the era of athletes as global salesmen. The National Football League is back. So, too, is Brett Favre, who was asked if this latest foray into football might dull his legacy.
“When people start talking about my legacy, it’s mine,” he said. “It’s what I think of.”
When it comes to athletes and legacies, the conversations are usually more conceptual than concrete, abstract, not absolute. It is, as Favre insinuated, a subjective thing.
Except when it comes to former National Basketball Association Most Valuable Player David Robinson, whose lasting legacies pick up the telephone and tell you they’re working to cure cancer.
Robinson, who will be enshrined alongside Jordan, might not have the marketing might of Nike Inc.’s main man. He never awed crowds like the world’s fastest man, Usain Bolt. He never set records like Favre. And he never became an iconic figure like Tiger Woods.
What Robinson does have, though, is a group of accomplished men and women who are intent on paying homage to the millionaire athlete who cared about the kids from the east side of San Antonio, where children do, indeed, get left behind.
“If David wasn’t there,” 29-year-old Homer Adams III told me by telephone the other day, “I don’t know if I would be where I am right now.”
Where They Were
Before we get to where Adams, Jeffrey Ledet and their former Gates Elementary classmates are, let’s look at where they were.
Adams in 1990 was a fifth grader when Robinson forged a relationship with the kids at Gates, promising a group of 10- year-olds that, if they stayed in school, got good grades and attended meetings with mentors that he would pay for their college education.
The kids were required to attend a minimum of two mentor meetings a month, and 80 percent attendance through high school was mandatory. Free money was the motivation. Robinson took care of the inspiration.
He took the kids to his parents’ San Antonio gated community, where they saw for themselves that there are black families that laugh and smile together.
“There’s a hope that comes with living and smiling all the time,” Adams said.
Eyes Opened
Robinson sent the kids to summer camp. He threw them Christmas parties. He flew them to Houston for a Spurs-Rockets game. It was the first flight for many of the kids. Robinson flew back with them, not the team.
“We learned that there’s a bigger world outside of what we know from the east side of San Antonio,” Ledet said.
Robinson opened eyes. And minds.
Robinson was there, in the audience, when the kids graduated from high school. He refused to sit on the stage or stand up and be recognized.
Ledet remembered Robinson saying it was their day to bathe in applause, not his.
Ledet got a Bachelor of Science degree from the Cullen College of Engineering at the University of Houston. He’s working as a consultant for CenterPoint Energy Inc. while pursuing a Master of Business Administration at Prairie View A&M University.
To the Top
Eventually, Ledet wants to become the chief executive officer of a utility company. “Not Enron,” he says, laughing. More than anything, Ledet wants to show people in entry level positions that, with hard work, they can make it to the top. Robinson helped him. Now it’s his turn to help someone else.
“What I remember most about David was how much he cared,” Ledet said. “I remember him for that, not championships and MVP trophies.”
Adams, meantime, got his undergraduate degree from Tuskegee, his Masters in Genomics from Washington State and is working toward his Ph.D. in breast cancer research at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.
“Because of David, I feel an obligation to push, to keep going, to do more,” he said.
More includes an examination of a protein, Tiam1, and how it relates to breast cancer metastasis. Adams wants to work as a bridge between researches and physicians, helping to cure disease.
Not Enough
Inspired by Robinson, he’s also mentoring younger students. He doesn’t think it’s enough.
“I’m anxious to get to the point where I can give back, time-wise and money,” he said. “Even if it’s just $500 for school -- just to give kids motivation to pursue their dreams.”
All that because of Robinson who, along with Andre Agassi, Doug Flutie and Mia Hamm, were honored last night at the U.S. Open for their commitment to community service.
“David made me realize that I had the chance to make something of myself,” Ledet said.
Hearing that, the notion of asking Favre about his legacy seems, well, senseless.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?p...d=aayZuBsc1bCU
David is a great American.
Great, great human being!
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