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Overcoming adversity in sports essay
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Deion Sanders is an American professional football and baseball player. He is one of the few athletes in history to succeed in two professional sports. Deion Luwynn Sanders was born on August 9, 1967 in Fort Meyers, Florida, where he grew up with his mother and stepfather. His parents got divorced when he was really young. Deion loved almost all sports and he was good at all of them. When he was 8 years old he started playing football and even though he was very young, he still was a star. He was even playing teams with kids older than him and still did very well. Another sport he played was baseball and he played that just as well as football.
You might think that Deion didn’t have any religion in his past life, but he did. He grew up going to church with his mother. He has never drank or smoked. Since both of his fathers were addicted to those things, he made a commitment to stay away from that. One day he was with some friends in a car and they were smoking pot. He told them that he didn’t do that stuff and they left him alone.
Throughout his high school years he played all different kinds of sports. He played football, baseball, basketball and ran track. He was one of the best in all those sports. When he played for his high school basketball team he was the leading scorer, and earned the name “Prime Time.” After his four years playing for his high school team, it was time to start looking for a college. Since he wanted his mother to come see him play, his first pick of colleges was Florida State. He had great careers in all the sports he played in. Before his senior year at Florida State University (FSU), the Yankees took him, so he played professional baseball while in college. While he was in college he decided he would stay away from cursing. So every time he cursed he would pay someone 5 bucks. In 1989 he was drafted by the Atlanta Falcons in the first round.
In 1996 when he was playing for the Cowboys and Reds he felt miserable, he said, ”After scoring touchdowns and dancing in the end zone, after a stadium full of cheering fans had finally gone home, I was still empty inside.” Nothing was making him happy, he tried money, women, and just about everything.
Pollard was raised in Rogers Park, a predominantly white neighborhood and was racially criticized/ bullied throughout his childhood. As a youth Pollard would be called the “n” word by other kids in his neighborhood. It wasn’t until Pollard started high school that he wasn’t as mistreated. While attending Lane Tech High, Pollard was a three-time track champion, an outstanding baseball player, and a star football player. Pollard later on received a scholarship to attend Brown University in 1915. Pollard not only led Brown too but was also the very first African American to play in the Rose Bowl in 1915. In 1916 Pollard was unstoppable and the unrestrainable force that led Brown University to back-to-back wins over Yale and Harvard, two all-star football Ivy League schools. For all his achievements, Pollard was honored with a position to become the first African American running back in Walter Camp’s All American Team. A privilege to any other young football player. Yet, that position was taken away after the discovery of Pollard’s love for partying and hatred for school, causing him to no longer be considered academically eligible. Pollard was then employed to coach at Lincoln University. It wasn’t until the Indians coach, Ralph “Fat” Waldsmith, gave Pollard a second chance to his pathway of football greatness. Pollard was offered $200 by the Indians to play in one game against the Tigers and Pollard quickly caught a train to Ohio. After the game against the Tigers, Pollard was signed to play with Akron for the remainder of the season. The Akron Pros joined the American Professional Football Association (APFA), now today known as the NFL, in 1920, making Pollard one of the only two African-American’s in the
Babe Ruth is still a very well-known person in history today, even almost one-hundred years later. He did not only change the way people viewed negro baseball leagues, but he also gained a large reputation for his ability to play baseball, obviously due to his amazing abilities. Ruth’s ability to play was almost impossibly good, in fact, he was even titled “athlete of the century” for his ability. With that ability and power that he had once he won, he would become a
first person about his struggles in the beginning of his baseball career, and how he miraculously turns his
he began to shine in the pocket. He broke every passing record at his school. He
Anything a person might want to know about Negro League Baseball can be found in the mind of Tweed Webb. Negro League Baseball is this man's specialty thanks to his father, a semi-pro player and manager. If not for his father, Normal Tweed Webb might never have played shortstop with the St. Louis Black Sox while attending high school and continuing on even while he went to business college where he took a two-year business course taking up bookkeeping and typing. Tweed played ball until 1934. When he was attending a St. Louis school, dressed head to toe in tweed, one of his classmates decided there and then to give him the moniker Tweed.
Deion Sanders, also known as Prime Time, is probably one of the most successful athletes in the sports world. Not only did he start off young as a football star, but he also was able to become a pro baseball player as well. Ever since high school he's been a star: his goal was to become a famous, wealthy, and admired athlete. Playing both football and baseball, he was able to achieve this goal. Sanders is the only man to play in both a Super Bowl and a World Series. He became an all star from a young age, playing basketball, football, baseball, and track. He was able to letter in all sports and took his skill and talent with him to Florida State University to further his career. Though he had all this success, Deion Sanders eventually ran into his own problems and drama creating much controversy, marriage and religious conflicts, and almost ending his career. But he was able to learn from these experiences and shape his future in a positive way.
Jackson worked extremely hard to get to his current position in life. He practiced non stop it seemed like. In high school, college, and throughout the pros, Jackson worked to get better at baseball, football, and track. He was able to work hard and become a star at all three. It helped that Jackson loved to be around the games, as a kid he and other neighborhood kids would play “stickball”, a form a baseball using a tree branch and a beat up tennis ball. As a teenager he would be working out or practicing constantly at his high school trying to get better (Jackson and Schaap 43).
Bear Bryant was a great man and coach, and he changed his life and college football forever with the decisions that he made. Paul Bryant (Bear) was born into a poor family and was the eleventh of twelfth children. Paul William Bryant was born in Moro Bottom in Arkansas. It's a small, unknown city. Legend has it Bryant got his nickname around the year 1927 by wrestling a bear from a carnival. People say that he only did it to impress a girl! From then on he was called "Bear Bryant" and that's where his legend begins. While the bear's owner left town without paying Bear got to take something home with him better than money... a story to tell your kids in the future. (100 years of Bear). When he was young every morning he would plow the fields
The greatness cannot begin to be quantified in statistics and numbers. Ty Cobb redefined the words hard work and determination by stretching his limited God-given ability to the maximum, and making himself into a baseball legend. Cobb throughout his lifetime insisted that he was "not a super athlete, rather he had a great desire to win." Thus, Ty Cobb’s motivation and determination to excel created a pathway to his success.
As a 20 year old youth in 1883, Billy played baseball in the lots of his neighborhood in Marshalltown, Iowa. One day the captain for the Chicago White Sox, A.C. Anson, was in the lots watching all the teenagers, young adults, and Billy Sunday playing baseball. Anson was so impressed with what he had seen in Billy’s baseball performance that Billy was signed unto the White Sox soon after.
On March 14th, 1947’ Michael (Mike) Wesley Ferguson was born in Detroit, Michigan. When Ferguson was just three weeks old his mother passed away. This left Mike’s father, John to raise eight kids. John remarried which brought the family to eleven kids. He loved all sports growing up, but found a special passion for baseball. Growing up the youngest of eleven kids, Ferguson was always the smallest one. He joined the local baseball team at the age of four, and his passion for the game began there. Ferguson was always the starting pitcher on his local school team. John moved the family to Hickory, North Carolina after a job emerged as a furniture factory manager when Ferguson was only 15. After high school, at the age of 18, he signed up for the
Jonathan Edwards was a man who could petrify any eighteenth century Puritan. He was born in East Windsor, Connecticut and was raised in a household with strict religious beliefs. In 1727 he began his preaching career as an assistant to his grandfather, Solomon Stoddard, the pastor at the church at Northampton, Massachusetts. When his grandfather died two years later, Edwards became the pastor of the Church at Northampton and began preaching all over New England. He then emerged as one of the leaders of the Great Awakening with his determination to return to the orthodoxy of the Puritan faith. That is when he adopted his “fire and brimstone” emotional style of sermon. Although people often ran out of the church in hysterics, most stayed in the church captivated by his speeches. He had always purposely chose to address his congregation with a sermon, using all of the elements of an oratory. In Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Jonathan Edwards displays all elements of an oratory by appealing to emotions, including expressive and rhythmic language, addressing the needs and concerns of his audience, and inspiring others to take action.
Would a regular citizen enjoy being as skilled of a dancer as a ballerina? Or as intelligent as the next guy? In Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.’s story of Harrison Bergeron, handicaps, such as small radio’s that blast sharp sounds are used to prevent individuals from having more intellectual thoughts than others. The year is 2081 and everyone is equal in every which way. Handicapped George and his wife Hazel are watching a ballerina performance. The show is interrupted by an announcement to watch out for their son, Harrison Bergeron as he is under-handicapped and dangerous. The conflict begins when Harrison enters the studio and declares he is Emperor. He finds his ballerina Empress, and dances with her before being shot and killed by Handicapper General Diana, resolving the conflict. This event is a more specific account of Harrison’s conflict with the current society as a whole, which is reflected through the use of theme, symbolism, and point of view.
Elijah McCoy was born in Colchester, Ontario Canada on May 2, 1844, the son of former slaves who had fled from Kentucky before the U.S. Civil War. Educated in Scotland as a mechanical engineer, Elijah McCoy returned to the United States and settled in Detroit, Michigan.
Hank Aaron was a famous baseball player who was respectful to his teammates and his fans. His nickname was “Hammerin’ Hank”. At one time he led the league in the most home runs. He was born in a poor family and then grew up to be a great professional baseball player. He became one of the most admired baseball players in Major League history.